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

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

IWA Mid-South Hardcore TV 1/31/98

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Paul Diamond vs. Adam Flash

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

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

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

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

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

Shark Boy vs. Mad Man Pondo

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

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

Axl Rotten vs. Trailer Park Trash

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

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

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

IWA Mid-South Hardcore TV 2/7/98

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

 

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Found Footage Friday: CANNON~! BROOKSIDE~! BALL~! IAN~! GRIZZLY~! ST. CLAIR~!

Cannonball Grizzly vs. Tony St. Clair IWW 2/15/98

MD: Look, Segunda Caida isn't out to be revisionist. We don't wake up in the morning with the idea we have to reclaim John Nord just to be difficult to everyone. We watch matches, we see patterns, we comment on them, conventional wisdom be damned. That said, sometimes, if we see something that we think defies the general narrative, we chase it. This is me chasing Paul Neu to Germany based on a few things we've seen. As a 25 year old, he was notoriously bad, gifted a gimmick that the fans really wanted to get behind with a push to match, but without the skills (either on the mic or in the ring) to make it work. This is him seven or eight years later and this absolutely worked.

These two were fairly frequent opponents over the years, going all the way back to 89 (and I'm not watching 89 Neu; I have limits). St. Clair was 50 here but he was still grizzled and hard hitting. This went about ten minutes before Brookside interfered and things broke down, but it was a solid ten minutes, especially the brawling on the outside. Well they stayed outside too as the ropes weren't tight enough and Grizzly had a problem whenever he tried to go into them or especially up onto them. You'd expect St. Clair to have pretty good forearms and uppercuts, but Grizzly's stuff looked credible too, from just throwing his body at St. Clair to tossing headbutts or shots to the gut. Looking at these three matches as a set, you can't say he wasn't comfortable with these brawls, even if he, at one time, had been the least comfortable wrestler imaginable. This likely set up a Schumman/St. Clair vs Grizzly/Brookside tag and that was probably pretty good too.

ER: It's pretty perfect that Germany's 90s Big Daddy was named Neu. It's a shame he never got another real chance in the states and really did get better with - get this - experience. If PN News was Neu! '86, then 1998 Cannonball Grizzly was Neu!, and then obviously PN Neuz was Neu! '75. Also, David Flair was the least comfortable wrestler ever. PN News always had more body charisma than first year and beyond David Flair. But even Flair seemed to be figuring things out after seven or eight years of doing it. 

Cannonball Grizzly vs. Ian Rotten (Barbed Wire Baseball Bat Match) IWW 5/9/98

MD: This was pretty much what you'd expect, and I mean that in a good way. Ian came out and insulted the crowd, taking his good time to get there. He stalled. He ultimately put over Grizzly, needing to go to underhanded or desperate shots for each advantage that he got, starting with the kick on the handshake, going low a few times, using the bat first, sneaking in a chairshot with one of the chairs I love in this promotion because they fall apart in the best, most dangerous ways. 

And Cannonball sold for a bit and started firing back again and again. He was a pretty solid standing tall babyface in the midst of a hardcore match here, grabbing anything not hammered down. There was one point where he jabbed part of one of those broken chairs into Ian's head and the announcer shouted out "That's the hardcore! That's core! That's core!" as only a German announcer in 1998 could. Shortly before that, during one of his comebacks, he launched himself through the ropes with a giant sized tope just because he could and because he knew he had someone big enough to more or less (more less than more but no one died) base for him. The finish was pretty gnarly as he got out of the way of a charge with the bat causing Ian to smash it into his own chest, and then, with some effort, he pancaked him onto it. Post match they made up and Ian was as carny as could be and everyone left happy. I'd say this was another good showing for Grizzly though. Though both of them were no holds barred, Ian could assert himself more and Grizzly had to work from underneath and then get revenge both for himself and for the crowd and he did a pretty rousing job of it through the blood and the carnage and the violence for the sake of violence.

ER: Did everyone else know that Ian Rotten worked Germany? Everyone else knew that Ian Rotten worked Ox Harley a couple times in one week, smack in the middle of Kentucky, and in between those matches he was main eventing a German indy? The video tape time stamp does not lie. Ian Rotten swings his barbed wire bat like Leatherface's chainsaw in some Hannover college gymnasium, and obviously he is wearing his Ribera Steakhouse satin jacket. He does a long respectful promo that builds to him talking about how ugly everyone in the town was. Ian Rotten has the shittiest body in the building and does biceps poses and Hogan ear cupping like a Will Sasso character. He stalls on the floor and waddles around in this really funny little duck walk whenever he gets on the mic to plead for them to go easy on him. 

It's all really satisfying, because Grizzly isn't a dumb babyface. He finally starts doing something to stop Ian's bullshit and you get a cool big fat babyface kicking and punching and headbutting Ian around ringside. Grizzly bleeds good blood when Ian hits him with the barbed wire bat and rubs it across his forehead, and his suicide dive is a really incredible bump for him. He ploughs through Ian and bounces hard on the floor. Ian platers him with a disgusting chairshot to the face and Grizz does a perfect little cartoon dance into a face flop, then gets up and whips Ian through a bunch of wood slat 1982 Boston Garden ass chairs, using the splintered fragments to Pogo Ian's head. Ian transition back to control by squeezing Grizzly's ball sac like a sponge, some of the most realistic looking rugby violent scrotal offense I've seen. I have no doubt in my mind that Ian has done that to someone in a shitty bar. After getting his balls twisted, Grizzly makes sure to just fall on Ian a few times. Honestly it's really great. This was a fast paced rugged fight with two sloppy bodies and sloppy bar blood over the eyes. Why was nobody brave enough to rate Cannonball Grizzly in 1998? 

Cannonball Grizzly vs. Robbie Brookside (Street Fight) IWW 1/17/99

MD: Between the commentary (youtube translate as usual) and his post match speech, plus, of course, the non-finish, I get the idea he might have been a last second replacement for someone. It makes sense, because they seemed to be learning the opportunities of the venue as they were going. Maybe my favorite thing in the whole match is Grizzly getting Brookside on the outside after reversing a series of neck-based submissions/chokes and lifting him up and slamming him back first into the ridge of a barstool. It's one of those things that no one plans in advance. You couldn't look at the stool and think "Hey, if I do a lifting bearhug and charge in, it'll look brutal." At least, I don't think you can. It's a moment of being so in the moment that you just heft a guy up and try to figure out how to make it seem like you're doing harm to him, the antithesis of any big tv streetfight now with a ton of set pieces and spots. Doing harm in the situation of the moment is kind of a lost art when it once was the entirety of pro wrestling.

Anyway, Grizzly looked good here overall. He used his size well in all the ways you'd want him to, as a weapon, as a cutoff tool, as an out of control opening creator for Brookside. He wasn't afraid to bump, but most of his bumps were not off of things Brookside did (and when they were, it was on the second or third dropkick not the first), but instead him careening out of control on a missed corner splash or elbow drop on the floor or somersault cannonball senton off the second rope. He slammed Brookside back into the corner to break a hold or absolutely flattened him with a rising pounce or Vader Attack when it was time to cut him off. Even his punches looked pretty good, and certainly him smashing Brookside into pieces of furniture on the outside. Brookside was a game opponent, charging in right from the get go, switching from one hold to the next desperately later, sweeping Grizzly's feet out on a billiards table to create a spectacular bump, running when it was time to run, but it was Grizzly who stood out here, just a guy very confident in his own size and power, the absolutely opposite of all of our memories of him. 

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Ian Rotten Was Pushed With His Sorrow Well Rehearsed

JR: If you've enjoyed these Ian Rotten reviews, Phil and I have decided to collect them and print up zines. It will contain all we have written thus far plus I think three matches we haven't written up for the blog. Each match has art accompanying it and I think the overall idea of it all is going to come out pretty good. The layout is almost complete, so I have put up preorders on my itch page:



https://jrgoldb.itch.io/methlab-battlarts-the-pre-order

Ian Rotten vs. Tarek the Great 10/21/06 - EPIC

PAS: This is presented like a throwback to a legendary match of the past, Lawler vs. Dundee in SAW is great, but it isn’t Lawler vs. Dundee in Mid-South Coliseum, this however was actually better and nastier then their 2002 match. Tarek has filled out in the four years since their first match, he looks less like a junkie and more like a junkie who cleaned himself up and got a construction job. As one would expect from this series this is all about hitting people hard in places they shouldn’t be hit. Ian is merciless here, he throws these thudding palm strikes that land like he is aiming six inches past Tarek. He seems to be trying to strike through him and land on some guy behind him. At one point Ian takes the palm of his hand and drives in into the back of Tarek's head where his spine meets his skull, it felt like he was doing some Kung Fu movie strike which gives his enemy permanent paralysis. To his credit Tarek attacked like he was in the fight he was in, he kicks Ian right in the top of his skull and unloads with some big palm strikes of his own. Also, Tarek wasn’t putting on a ton of holds, but what he did put on was really tight, his choke sleeper popped Ian’s eyes out. I didn’t love the finish, they tried for the Hart vs. Piper sleeper roll up and it didn’t land, but everything else was incredible violent stuff.


JR: One of the things we have been so enamored with throughout this project has been Ian’s ability to work in ways and from angles that make wrestling seem like something just beyond comprehension. The movements and strikes seem to force an opponent “out of book”, creating a world in which to maintain the illusions that professional wrestling survives upon, a worker must react differently and organically.

While Hero almost certainly has the single most compelling match of the style, I am beginning to think that Tarek might be the opponent that gains the most from what Ian brings to a match like this. His selling is sympathetic and organic without making the match one sided. He struggles and feeds off of Rotten in ways that allow Ian to seek variations on themes and work them to natural conclusions.

Rotten is probably best remembered for truly gross headbutt spots in his matches, but the strikes he throws that feel the most sudden and violent are his palm strikes. He uses them so well to mark transitions and momentum shifts. Here, after a longer feeling out process, his first true strikes are open palms to the base of Tarek’s neck. It feels violent, it feels wrong. It feels like it could injure, rather than hurt. The palm strikes continue to be the theme, even as Ian works from underneath. The only thing he can hit is Tarek’s thigh, which he does repeatedly and with abandon.

There is a closeness to this match that makes it stand out. Against some other opponents (Joe comes to mind, but he’s far from the only one), Ian mines drama and tension from distance. There are moments in those matches that feel like two rams backing up slowly to collide until superiority is established. Here Tarek works like a boxer who knows he doesn’t have the length advantage. He must stay inside of Ian. He must take the punishment he knows is coming because the alternative is punishment that he can’t.

The finish, an obvious homage to Piper/Hart, falls flat and is poorly executed, which is shockingly almost a theme at this point. The finishes often seem so overbooked and “rasslin” that they feel jarring. Earlier, for the match against Claudio, I wrote about trusting the audience. Or lack thereof. The matches themselves establish a world in which both men must work outside normalcy to simply survive. The prior work is undermined by the tropes of wrestling.

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RIP Mitch Ryder

PAS: I used to buy XCW-Midwest DVDs from Mitch Ryder in the early days of Segunda Caida. We reviewed a ton of them and it sort of established SC as the kind of place that would review a dozen XCW-Midwest shows. Ryder was a breath of fresh air in the "do a bunch of stuff" era of indy wrestling and was always good for some bumping, bleeding, and brawling.


Mitch Ryder/Todd Morton/Tarek the Great/Bull Pain vs. Ian Rotten/Mark Wolf/Tracy Smothers/Sabu IWA-MS 10/20/01

PAS: Overbooked as it gets, but totally awesome. We probably didn't need a surprise partner (although Sabu is always great in that role), a Tarek the Great face turn AND a Tracy Smothers heel turn all in one match. The Tarek turn added nothing to the match and could have been scrapped. Still everything else was great, Pain cracking Ian in the jaw with a baseball bat, Todd Morton doing two crazy cage dives (including walking the side of the cage), Sabu taking a bump off the side of the cage to the floor, and tons of blood. Ryder was mostly on the outside of the cage running interference, throwing Wolf into chairs, brawling wildly with Smothers, punching Ian in his bloody head. Finish was some classic IWA White WorldStarism. Tracy puts on the ref shirt to count Bull down, only to jump Ian, then the Bad Motherfuckers beat Ian down while the fans throw things. Corporal Robinson tries to make the save by walking the rafters to the top of the cage, Ian's wife Patti tries to hit Tracy with a stick. Total Fentanyl clinic riot which is one of the best things about IWA.

JR: When I was in college I had to take an acting class as a general requirement. I was not a strong actor but I remember I did one scene with a partner and our thought process was “if we just cause chaos the entire time, it will cover up our distinct lack of talent”. It worked well enough.

I thought about that while watching this. As a wrestling writer, I’m someone who is constantly trying to identify narrative. I legitimately can’t do that here. There is a story and it’s established well, but I think to mention it or try and define it would in some ways take away from the sheer spectacle that unfolds. Every single person in this is insane. Sabu shows up early and spends almost all of his time bumping from the cage to the floor. Tarek turns face, the sniveling henchman finally growing a spine and standing up to the abusive Bull Pain and paying the price. Pain holds court, despicable and massive from the first moment, at once the center of everything and completely separate from it all.

Almost everyone is wonderful here. Smothers gets to work his greatest hits throughout, working as a fiery babyface and then turning mid match and working as a heat magnet for the rest, trying to start a riot every step of the way. Every single person takes a bump that they absolutely regretted moments after it happened. Todd Morton did two cage dives!

Of course, we watched this in tribute to Mitch Ryder. I wouldn’t exactly call this a showcase for Ryder, but his makes the most of his moments. In some ways, it’s a good microcosm of his career as a whole: while others will certainly have more words devoted to them, more camera time thrust upon them, in the moments that Ryder was the focal point, he stood out. The door of the cage was slammed on his back and he stooged and pranced like Rick Rude after an atomic drop. In the chaos on the outside, he flung himself around. Chairs and tables and fans scattered around him. He talked trash into the camera, filling the frame with his insane, sweaty face. In short, he was a wrestler. He did everything he was supposed to do and he did it well.

ER: When somebody seeks out an "IWA Mid-South" match, this is the kind of match they have in mind. This was undistilled IWA, the kind of grimy bloody violence you want to see, and the kind of match that's impossible to pick a favorite performance. Mitch Ryder's team come out to Eruption like they are zit faced teenagers, and jump Ian's team the second they come out from the back. And from there we got a perfectly messy terror of stiff punches, crazy bumps, and high emotion. Todd Morton was a real loon, doing TWO cage dives, and it's actually amazing how quickly and easily the shortest guy in the match can scramble up to the top of a cage. Morton hits a pinpoint accurate elbowdrop off the rafters ABOVE the cage, and later hits a frog splash on Ian off the top of the cage while fully protecting Ian. Sabu runs into the chaos and every time he pops into frame he is taking a way too dangerous bump, like falling out the cage door onto his head or getting kicked off nearly the top of the cage all the way to the floor. Tracy Smothers was a big Tasmanian Devil, and two different times I had to check and make sure the tape wasn't on 2x speed. tracy was throwing impossible to block punches, the kind of punches that look much more like the punches someone would throw in a parking lot fight. He was beating people around ringside, throwing Ryder meanly into a table and big cooler, and on his way out he clearly hit a fan. Ian bled about 5 seconds into this and didn't stop, then took constant offense from 4-5 guys for the duration of the match. Ryder was the real heel personality throughout this, taking stooging bumps, yelling at the camera, getting tossed into the crowd, running interference to kick guys off the cage as they were trying to get in, orchestrating Ian getting his arm slammed in the door, and that's all important. He wasn't doing the flashy stuff in the match, but he was constantly the guy doing the important stuff to bridge the violence, to kill time with charisma until a big spot from Morton or Sabu. Glue guys are underrated and important parts of big bloody cage matches, and they don't come more underrated than Ryder.


Mitch Ryder vs. Ian Rotten IWA-MS 11/22/01

PAS: This was an old fashioned walking tall babyface match with Ian putting up half of IWA-MS against Mitch Ryder's hair. It was a fans lumberjack match and Ian is seconded by Sherri Martel. Ian Bill Watts himself all over Ryder who bumps and bleeds the way you need to in this match. Ian adds disgusting headbutts to the big punches you would normally see in this type of match, and both guys get soaked by the end. Ryder is great at finding little moments to take over control while mostly giving the fans what they want to see by bumping around. The finish felt kind of blown by the ref, which is my only beef. Finish has the BMFs and CM Punk stop the haircutting, beat up Sherri and shave Ian's head. Keeping this feud going, I am not sure about bailing on stips like this, but the BMF's are always great to watch beat people down.

JR: So the stipulation here is that if Ian loses, Ryder gets 50% of IWA-MS. Does that mean they would then book by a two person committee? I’m really interested in how this would’ve worked.

Am I alone in thinking there is something about Mitch Ryder’s face, especially when it is masked by blood, that is similar in some way to James Van Der Beek? I’m not saying Ryder looks like him per say, I’m just saying that a drunken Ryder probably at one point claimed he looked like him. Anyway, it adds to the whole effect of scumbag heartbreaker.

This match is ludicrous. Ian selects fans to be the lumberjacks, four of whom were obviously pre selected and one was a spur of the moment call because Fanin and Prazak thought it would be funny and yelled loud enough for Ian to hear them. They essentially serve no purpose after some initial lip service that Ryder is trying desperately to escape. In some ways, the early portion of this is similar to what Phil and I wrote about with Methlab BattlArts, but with Ian cast in the role of conquering babyface. Ryder is good at helping Ian project that same sense of foreboding and dread, as though a match with Rotten is always moments away from slipping completely out of control.

Ryder does well enough while on top. A match can go far on simple things when the participants know how to work the margins. Ian is great at bleeding. That may sound silly but it always looks both grotesque and sympathetic. Ryder understands where he needs to be at all times, working the cut, using the sleeper enough times where a finish would be credible but the predictable escape is warranted. While the finish here is obviously a mistake, the work before is hearty enough to still be enjoyable.

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All Time MOTY List Head to Head 2007: Rotten vs. Dukes VS. Hero vs. Kingston

Ian Rotten vs. Jason Dukes IWA-MS 10/13/07

PAS: Incredible stuff, the kind of violent unprofessional brawl that Ian Rotten does so well. Ian isn't afraid to both deliver and receive a nasty beating, and Dukes comes forward and meets Ian's aggression with some of his own. We get two crazy bumps by Dukes: a missed tope which landed him into a bunch of chairs, and a crazy Psicosis corner shoulder bump. Ian lands some sick forearms to the jaw, and killer looking jabs, everything he did looked like it hurt so bad. I love some unprofessional crowbarring and Ian always delivers, and Dukes hit back with appropriate force. There was a killer moment where Duke pulls off Ian's boot and does some Eddie Marlin boot punching and some sick looking knee drops right on Ian's exposed ankle, just gross. Finish kind of sucks as we have a ref bump, and a Joey Ryan and Karl Anderson run in. Still, this was super high level violence. IWA-MS ran so much, it is clearly a real vein of untapped gems.

ER: Dukes comes out to Handel's Hallelujah Chorus looking like an Ian Rotten who hasn't yet experienced horrific body scarring, and before Dukes can make it into the ring Ian jumps him, future meets past. Ian has his whole head wrapped in a bandage, busted open on a show earlier in the day, and the announcers do a great job pointing out that Ian has been bleeding for basically 6 hours. Dukes opens up that cut immediately, Ian's face eventually dripping with a deep crimson mask, thick blood rivulets streaking down his neck. Ian swells up Dukes' face with the hardest punches and meanest jabs, taunting Dukes to throw harder by no selling punches directly to the jaw. Dukes is really great at spilling through chairs and grabbing onto fans while staggering through he crowd (made up nearly entirely of clones of the same man). Dukes' two big bumps were placed really well in the match: the first time he even steps foot in the ring he goes for a dive and Ian just slowly walks out of the way, crashing Dukes disgustingly shoulder first into the floor and a chair; later he flies (other) shoulder first into the ringpost on his way to another ugly trip to the floor. It's smart to give Ian a couple of good rally/recovery moments in front of his crowd, bleeding everywhere while going back in hungry after his injured prey. The leg work from both looked really ugly, like they both wanted to do permanent damage, both guys stomping and dropping knees on ankles and the inside of knees, and I'm always going to be into an 80s style brawl with a loose boot. We don't get loose boot spots anymore (which might be for the best as nobody wants to see Gargano emoting while untying laces) but these moments looked like something you'd see in a smoky arena 25 years prior. The run in finish was at least quick and paid off immediately, but it's still not the way you want something this bloody and raw to end.

Chris Hero vs. Eddie Kingston Review


Verdict:

PAS: Really close, and I think a better finish might have pushed it over the top, but we got the finish we got, so I am going with Kingston vs. Hero.

ER: This was a real classic grimy brawl that had been entirely off my radar until the last week. The big tope bump from Dukes may have been a higher peak than Hero/Kingston, but Hero/Kingston came in with a higher floor and felt like even more of a complete brawl. That's why it's the champ. But Ian/Dukes is a real hidden gorefest, more violent than most death matches while not being a death match.

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Ian Rotten Hurt You in a Voice Like a Prayer

Ian Rotten vs. Claudio Castagnoli ROE 6/19/04

JR: It’s hard to remember just how different indie wrestling was fifteen years ago. How when Kenta Kobashi came to New York to wrestle Samoa Joe for ROH, it took days to convince him that people would know who he was, that he wouldn’t have to work a stereotypical foreign heel gimmick for the night. You can see it on his face when he comes out, the realization that he was somehow relevant to a room full of people from half a world away, people he presumed had never even heard of him.

I think, in some small way, this is probably how Ian felt almost exactly a year prior, wrestling in some ballroom in Austria against Claudio Castagnoli. I guess this is from a company that is tangentially related to WXW, so people probably knew who he was. But did he feel naked in some way, not wrestling a death match? Was there some fear of going outside of some agreed upon comfort zone for an expectant crowd, like when a band plays songs off the newest album instead of the hits?

I’ve sort of nibbled at the edges of an idea while watching all of these Ian matches, but there is something structurally interesting in them that reminds me of cosmic horror. The matches all start out nominally like a wrestling match; they have holds, there is a feeling out process, there are things that Ian does and that Ian’s opponents do that allow the viewer to say “yes, this is a wrestling match in some identifiable way”. But the longer they go on, really, the longer Ian exerts some offensive control, the more weird it feels, the more the viewer is confronted with things that feel out of place, that feel just off enough to make you stop and pay attention because something is happening in front of you that is recognizable in some sense, but undefinable and grotesque in some other. Phil spoke about it in the Homicide match, where Ian, as time goes on, works holds from angles and places that are not angles and places that we are used to seeing. It’s unsettling then and it remains unsettling here, as he uses short palm strikes while Claudio is on the ground, sharp and violent things that are within the rules of wrestling, moreso even than a close fisted punch would be, but are so absurdly violent looking that they feel illegal, as though the ref should move in and say, “no, this isn’t allowed” and start counting to five.

Ian’s work is always accentuated because it presents his opponent’s with a binary choice: to follow him down a dark path or not. Some, like Joe or Homicide, are capable of transforming and becoming more violent themselves, creating their own dark oddities. Others, like Tarek, perhaps B-Boy, are ill-equipped and can only respond by doing things we see them do in a standard wrestling match. Both serve to create narrative and atmosphere, albeit in very different ways. Claudio is more the latter at this point in his career, although part of that is due to him being hamstrung by Ares being a very present heel manager on the outside. But prior to Ares becoming a major part of the match, Claudio tries in vain to wrestle and strike and have a match, while Ian makes the choice to consistently punch and kick and grab at the back of his opponent’s thigh. It’s horrific, each shot landing with a dull thud, each causing Castagnoli to crumple and lose his balance for the briefest of moments.

There is a sequence that probably marks the midpoint of the match that is a tremendous distillation of Ian’s work in this style as a whole. In the corner, he absolutely pastes Claudio with a forearm, so hard he follows through, almost like a boot scrape. He whips Castagnoli across, who is still selling his leg and basically hops along the diagonal before collapsing. From there, Ian hits a drop kick in the corner, somehow equal parts more athletic than it should be and awkward and unsafe to the point where it looks like he's never attempted it before just now. The announcers, who prior to this had spoken in hushed German like the match was a golf tournament, just start laughing incredulously. There is nothing to be said.

It’s this dropkick that serves as a clear escalation, in the same way that headbutts often do in the previous matches we’ve looked at. Castagnoli works with purpose in his control segment, taking Ian’s arm using the mat, the ropes, his own head, anything he can find to create a fulcrum and bend it in some direction it isn’t supposed to bend. He tries to escalate, to follow Ian the way that others have, but he lacks the tools. He sells his leg throughout, and it plays in to the next major transition, as Ian is afforded too much time and counters a move from the top rope. Well, he knees Castagnoli in the face during a diving headbutt. The announcers laugh again. It almost comes across as a defense mechanism. They do so a third time on a lariat.

That’s why it feels so jarring when the finishing run, instead of a continued devolution into something eldritch and unknowable, turns into a pro wrestling match. There is a failed interference spot, and a tribute to Dusty Rhodes. There is referee distraction. It all feels so….normal. Not even normal for Ian’s standards, but decidedly normal. Perhaps it was Ian’s suggestion, a rare lack of confidence in his own work or a lack of trust in the audience. Maybe he simply thought that they needed something easy, something universal that could be grasped by people who haven’t seen him stretch the boundaries for years. Perhaps, unlike Kobashi, no one took Ian aside and convinced him that he was relevant, that people would be able to follow along.

PAS: Wasn't Claudio's early 2000s gimmick that he was a wealthy millionaire? He is wearing a short sleeve patterned shirt with a tie and white jeans, he looks like he about to do a bringers set at the Fort Wayne Indiana Comedy Barn in 1987. This was pretty early Claudio and you could see the outlines of what he would become, but he wasn't there yet. This was a hell of an Ian performance though, and for most of the match he delivered the kind of viscerally violent performance that has drawn us to him. I coined the term Meth Lab BattlArts for this style of match, but after watching so much French Catch over the last couple of months, Ian really reminds me of those nasty Catch heels, much like Tony Oliver or Cheri Bibi where they look for every opportunity to throw in a hard cheap shot or twist a limb in a wrong violent way. Ian's palm strikes in this were their own unique bit of thrilling transgression. This was great stuff until it wasn't. I agree with what JR said, it felt like both guys were unwilling to take the match where it should have gone, and kind of took a hack road out. Still this was a heck of a hidden gem, because large parts of this were some of the most vivid wrestling you will ever watch.

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Ian Rotten Looked at the Floor and Scribbled on Gum Wrappers

Ian Rotten vs. B-Boy IWA-MS 12/19/03

JR: The conversation on twitter the past few days has been based around a few notable people (erroneously) categorizing professional wrestling as performance art. I will not bore everyone here with my thoughts on why this comparison falls short. Instead, I will describe one of the more popular performance art pieces of the last decade or so: Melati Suryodarmo’s ‘Exergie: Butter Dance’. In the piece, Suryodarmo, wearing a short black dress and high heels, attempts to move and dance in evocative ways, while perched atop a stage covered in thick blocks of butter. As she moves, she inevitably slips and falls and collapses and seems to care very little for her own physical well being. Eventually, she removes her shoes and crawls off in silence.

I mention this piece because, strangely, the opening of this Ian Rotten and B-Boy match is the first thing I’ve seen in wrestling that has even tangentially reminded me of performance art. Rotten, confident in his movement and in control of his own body, makes an uncharacteristically smooth takeover and pulls B-Boy down into an armbar. In doing so, he manages to land awkwardly upon his opponents leg, and for the briefest moment there is doubt, a sense that he lost track of where he was, like that feeling when you think there’s an extra step and you plant your foot too forcefully and your entire equilibrium is off for longer than it takes your body to register that you’re still on solid ground.

This feeling continues into the first strike exchange, after Rotten comes off the ropes, on his heels from a few forearms. When he swings back he somehow leaves his feet, collapsing onto B-Boy, forcing them both back on the ground, rolling around and desperately grabbing and looking for some minuscule advantage. Last week Phil wrote about how Rotten applies holds from unseen angles, as though he is breaking some unspoken compact within the cooperative confines of professional wrestling. Here, even as it looks clumsy and oafish, I am struck that it is a conscious decision, that he does this to create a feeling of chaos and reality, not only for the audience but for his opponent. He finds ways to get people, seasoned and talented people, to run away, to expose themselves, to move quickly and purposefully without thought. It heightens everything.

When discussing professional wrestling, an idea that comes up often is escalation. I’ve touched on it briefly in this series. In most cases, we take it to mean an increase in motion; moves that the crowd accepts as ‘more devastating’, done in quicker succession, an inevitable and unsustainable perpetual motion machine. Here we see that to some extent, as B-Boy’s kicks create momentum and space that we had not previously seen. But at the same time, Ian’s previous efforts to look wild and unfettered serve to create their own sort of awkward escalation. As he ties B-Boy up and goes for headbutts, a spot that would normally look contrived or cooperative instead looks forceful, a declaration of war.

This match, moreso than any of the others we have written about, strikes me as a one man show. Perhaps that isn’t fair to B-Boy, whom I actually think is quite good here. But he is so stoic and emotionless throughout, whereas Ian is again so vibrant and vocal. He is constantly talking and screaming and grunting and doing small things to tell the audience where and when to pay attention. He creates a fuller experience for a crowd, for he has an innate sense of when to let things breathe and when to let things crash and come to conclusion.

The finishing run of this presents another narrative wrinkle that we haven’t seen from Ian yet, and one that is immensely interesting. The consistent story throughout all of these matches is that Ian is forever moving forward. Here he does so even to his own detriment. Even as his body breaks down, as he can’t stand on his weak knee, as his headbutts do more damage to himself than to B-Boy, he presses. It only serves to expose him. It’s like watching a bull lose a bullfight.

PAS: B-Boy is a guy who has been in my life for nearly two decades now, but I have never fully developed an opinion on him. He has cool entrance music and hits really hard, but always seemed a bit formless. Like JR mentioned above, he felt like an Ian opponent here,  a replacement level stiff worker, he will hit hard, take some shots, do some stuff on the mat, but the all of the seasoning in this match was Ian's. B-Boy puts on a pretty basic leglock, and Ian turns it into figure four, B-Boy throws some solid, but leg slappy kicks, and Ian cracks him with a palm and knuckles directly on the side of the jaw. They mention that Ian was wrestling BJ Whitmer the next night and I imagine it was a similar kind of match.  The real flaw of this match is B-Boy just kind of putting on an armbar for the finish after focusing entirely on the leg. 

My parents were both avid Contract Bridge players, and I grew up in the world of high level Bridge, going to National tournaments for vacations, caddying etc. There isn't prize money in Championship Bridge so really elite players make their living from taking on clients. Often World Championship teams will be made of 4 or so of the best players in the world, and a couple of rich guys paying to be part of the team (famously the chairman of Bear Sterns was playing in a National Championship Bridge Tournament during the first days of the Financial Crisis and was unavailable as his bank collapsed). If you are going to be a client playing at the level, you have to a very good player (Bridge is a partnership game), but almost all of the real flash, brilliance and moments of grace are provided by the Pro. That is what this match felt like. B-Boy is a competent wrestler at this style, but Ian is the world class maestro making the magic. 

COMPLETE AND ACCURATE METH LAB BATTLARTS

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Ian Rotten Was Living In a Devil Town, He Didn't Know It Was a Devil Town

Ian Rotten vs. Homicide NWL 8/2/04 - EPIC

JR: There are two ideas about wrestling that I find myself fixated on. The first is the inherent romance of the idea of professional wrestling: the idea that the world, or some approximation thereof, still has intrepid and conquering heroes, willing to fight for something beyond themselves. The second, and perhaps the inverse to that, or at the very least something that informs that first idea, is that successful wrestlers are broken and jagged people, whose success in wrestling is because they have no other avenues for success. They are people who live outside society.

I’m not sure that Ian fits the first idea, but he certainly fits the latter. He never presents himself as someone with any goal beyond bleeding to put food on his table, but there is a workmanlike joy in that from him in some way. I wonder then if these seemingly rare mat work exhibitions were moments in time that he relished. Rare opportunities for him to show off, to do things that are reserved for performers that other think more technically sound, sleeker, more proficient, more practiced. But like we’ve touched on in almost all of these reviews, there is an earnestness to Ian’s work that sets it apart. The spots that he relies on, the aspects that are revealed as performative only through study, still have a groudedness to them. He ignores the flash that other, showier workers use to keep people invested. He trusts himself, and he trusts that he knows his audiences. He makes no apologies. There is something admirable about it. 

Take, for example, the way Ian (and Homicide, to some extent) uses his head. In a rear mount, Ian digs his chin in to Homicide’s spine. He uses it as a tool, as a way to gain leverage, as a way to press upon his opponent. And because of that, he exposes himself to harm and to danger and often finds himself caught. It’s an encapsulation of his style as a whole, using anything he can to continue to press forward, putting every bit of weight on his opponent. 

In the first match we looked at for this project, in which Ian fought Chris Hero, Phil talked about the palpable sense of dread that Ian’s matches have. There is a wonderful example of it early in this. After both men get back to their feet, and Homicide has control of the arm, Ian pulls them both down. Cide rolls quickly and decisively, as he did earlier to gain advantage, but Ian has learned, and Homicide finds himself rolling directly into contact. He squirms away and goes to the outside and there is the first real breath, the first show of negative space, and it works because of a moment on the mat that feels almost like a near death experience. And Homicide, for his part, despite pointing to his head after the escape to tell us how smart he is, is hesitant to get back in the ring, and even more hesitant to lock back up. He’s a wrestler that doesn’t show fear, that doesn’t beg off, but for a moment he has to regroup, and that is perhaps just as powerful and just as telling.

From here, the match falls in to a familiar rhythm. Ian uses headbutts as another reset button of sorts, creating a clear second act within the match, although not before once again trying to use his head for leverage, digging his forehead in to the back of Homicide's neck. They start to exchange blurry eyed strikes, Homicide on his feet, Ian on his knees. Homicide continues to show hesitation to go back on the mat, and when Ian finally bring Homicide back down, Cide cheats and bites and claws his way to an advantage, all so he can stand back up and strike. It’s strange. While the match itself has some different notes, this almost feels like the touring equivalent of the Joe match we just watched, albeit one that has a definitive finish. Rather than ending during the threatened brawl on the outside, here they continue to swing wildly, and Ian breaks a whiteboard over Homicide’s head in a truly preposterous moment of violence. 

While I think Rotten has a lot of strengths as a worker, I think his genius in this series shows in how clearly he finds breaks and ways to escalate. This match is almost a three act play, with each division acting as both an escalation and a separation. After the whiteboard, even the matwork is more frenzied. A figure four is countered and both men roll off the apron to the floor. When Rotten goes back to the same submission it gets broken with a chair. There is a desperation to the work from both men. Ian tries a double leg takedown from his knees, but ends up in a choke. Homicide starts working the arm again, paying off his work in the early portions. The finishing stretch is mostly lead by Homicide, with him trying and testing various ways to grab Ian’s arm. It is a definitive and rather abrupt finish, and somewhat less clever and decidedly more “wrestling” than what we’ve seen until now. Perhaps had this match taken place in IWA-MS and not NLW, we would’ve seen the Ian we’ve become accustomed to, the one who moves ever forward, even in defeat.

PAS: I always thought of these two guys as mirror images of each other. Pair of guys who started out as Deathmatch wrestlers and brawlers but had this secret skill on the mat and desire to show off. Both guys had training schools, both had cult favorite indy feds which they headlined. In many ways this was like a battle between a DC and Marvel versions of the same superhero, like if Quicksilver and Flash had a race.

I think the crowd was expecting a brawl, and it was cool that they decided instead to hit the mat as hard as they did. I loved how Ian would grab rollups from weird angles, and how vicious Homicide's arm work was. One thing about Ian is that wrestlers seem perfectly willing to violate the unspoken agreements, Homicide really kicks the shit out of Ian's arm in ways that had to ache for weeks, and those headbutts were knocking large parts of Ian's education out of his head. No wonder the IWA-MS payouts were always hinky, that guy couldn't do math after those headshots.

According to Cagematch this is their only singles match, I had never heard of this match before, it had 40 views on Youtube. One thing that is so great about this hobby is mining for lost classics, and this totally counted. This feels like it should have been a legendary rivalry. Like Ian vs. Homicide should have ended in a JAPW vs. IWA-MS War Games match or something, instead we got this one shiny jewel of a match.

COMPLETE AND ACCURATE METH LAB BATTLARTS

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Ian Rotten Dropped His Last Dime Down a Wishing Well

Ian Rotten vs. Samoa Joe IWA-MS 4/8/05 -EPIC

JR:Have you ever seen Death Wish IV? The opening sequence, if I’m thinking of the right movie, is of a criminal doing heinous and criminal things, and then all of a sudden Charles Bronson shows up and fucking annihilates him. The criminal runs and hides and shoots desperately at him but Bronson just keeps coming, walking between the shadows in a dimly lit parking lot.

I think about this scene often, well, perhaps not often, but probably more often than anyone else. In it, Bronson, the ostensible hero, is filmed almost exactly like an 80s movie monster, this unstoppable and silent killing machine that we have been trained to fear. He is a grey haired Jason Vorhees. But we are rooting for him, because the actions of his victims are so awful.

There is something about Ian that reminds me of this. Not that his opponents are awful people or doing particularly dastardly things, but because he is positioned throughout these matches as a conquering hero, a dominant force, and yet the way he wrestles and works positions him as something other, something monstrous. He comes across as manically violent and almost inhuman in his disregard for safety, and yet there is something charming about him, with his tuft of blond hair and almost cherubic face, albeit one that is scarred heavily.

This match is somewhat uncharted territory thus far in this project, as this is the first time we are seeing a match in which the narrative is that Ian is essentially outmatched. The Hero match was in 2002 and before many of the matches that would make him well known nationally. The Tarek match was against Tarek. Here, we have Ian vs Samoa Joe in 2005, against a man at the height of his powers. It’s subtle, but the differences are noteworthy. Very early in the match, Ian opts for a slick counter into an arm drag, followed closely with a headstand escape. Perhaps I am projecting a bit too much upon the work itself, but I find these early earnest attempts almost heartwarming; for the first time, we see some effort from Ian to leave a positive impression upon his opponent. It’s as if he wants Joe to see him do things that most would think him incapable of. It’s an interesting choice narratively, as so much of Joe’s mystique is based in a practiced unflappability, but there is enough negative space after the sequence to make sure the crowd also notices the importance of it.

The early narrative is one of increasing desperation from Rotten, although he does it in such a way to come across as canny rather than outgunned. His earlier attempts at impressing Joe with his agility and creativity slowly and assuredly give way to things on the borderline of legality; dropkicks to a knee, a clear choke, a fishhook to break a hold. Each brings Ian a slight material advantage and a more than slight moral victory, as Joe is reduced to grabbing ropes for breaks, motioning for the referee to break the hold, and taking his time to shake out a limb or catch his breath. In some ways, Ian’s plan has worked: he knew what he was in for, while Joe did not.

We have talked at length about Ian’s matwork throughout this series, but I don’t think we have devoted as much space to his strikes, which are sublime. I’m going to work under the assumption that they look good because he is actually just hitting his opponent very hard, but holy lord everything lands perfectly. There is a matter of factness to them all, this immensely understated violence, as though by not commenting on the stiffness of the forearm, by not giving it room to breathe, it somehow becomes more pronounced.

The match ends with this extended exchange of strikes, as it pours over to the outside and both men are counted out. As the bell rings and they announce a double count out, Joe I still putting his hands up. Ian takes off his shirt, hands at his sides. There is probably ten feet between them and it may be the most violent image I’ve ever seen.

PAS: This was more Methlab Futen, then Methlab BattlArts, but man alive did they deliver what you want out of this match up. The match didn't have a ton of matwork, but the matwork it did have a bunch of small moments of innovation which are traditional in these Ian matches. Joe tries to roll over with an Indian Deathlock, and Ian blocks it twice, by pushing at Joe's knee. When Joe finally rolls it over, Ian grabs a neck crank so Joe can't really rip at the knee. It is those kind of little reactions which is missing from all but the best mat wrestling.

Most of this match was on the feet and they were really pasting each other. The headbutt battle was both really stupid and really awesome. Joe cracks Ian with a headbutt, and Ian fires back, does a bit of a glassy "I shouldn't have headbutted a Samoan" sell, and says fuck it and just starts ramming him until they both fall down.

I am two ways on the count out, it is sort of silly to have a double count out in a fed like IWA-MS which basically has no rules, and it was clearly not what the crowd wanted to see. Still if you are going to do a double count out, this kind of Godzilla vs. King Kong rumble is the way a count out should be done. I loved Joe cutting off the traditional Ian post match "Introducing a Shriner's luncheon speaker" speech and threateningly demanding a rematch. It was a real minor tragedy we never got that rematch, it was set up great and would have been epic, it is up there with some of the all time great teased but never delivered matches.

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Ian Rotten Perverted Me

Ian Rotten vs. Tarek the Great IWA-MS 10/4/02 - GREAT

JR: Maybe about ten years ago someone wrote an article on boxing for Triple Canopy that I believe is now lost to time. It tried to use Virginia Woolf’s To the Lighthouse as a metaphor for something I can’t really remember, but one of the more cogent points that was made throughout was that while individual fighters are generally compelling because of their greatness, fights themselves are often more compelling between two fighters who have distinct and obvious weaknesses. At some level in boxing, everyone is good enough to exploit an opening, repeatedly and with profound cruelty, but only a very select few are able to do so without having a similarly glaring weakness themselves. So while watching two tremendous fighters play a game of mental chess, cautiously circling, pressing incremental advantages, and having wondrous and lightning quick footwork is perhaps beautiful, the fights that drive the popularity of boxing as a whole, and the fights that we think of when we picture a quote-unquote prize fight, are the ones that are more about flaws, and the inability to mask those flaws.

I thought of that article and its potential application to pro wrestling while watching this match between Ian Rotten and Tarek the Great. Often, extended mat sequences, and even the amorphous and general idea of “strong style” can come across as overly cooperative when in the hands of talented performers. They work with a speed and fluidity that can only be accomplished in a universe that is fictionalized, and their work serves to highlight the idea that the universe is fictionalized, that what they are doing is agreed upon on some level. A back and forth strike competition, even if the performers are “actually hitting each other”, one where no one gives an inch, one where the speed increases in such a way as to bring applause to a fever pitch, is a design. It is a choice. And after the moment is gone, the viewer is left with the knowledge that it is a choice that was made to play upon their emotions, to play upon the general want to participate and to acknowledge performance.

So really, there is something refreshing about this, about watching two performers who have that same general agreement, that they will pound upon one another for the theoretical enjoyment and engagement of the crowd, but have to do so in fits and starts, without the polish and veneer that others have. Their attempts to lock in holds are slow and clumsy. Strikes are wild and deadly looking affairs, looping and wide swats that look all the more dangerous due to their unexpected nature.

I speak a lot about what I call “dynamics” when I discuss wrestling critically; for me, matches are compelling when there are moments of work that shift gears, that change speeds, that make a narrative experience beyond escalation. Ian is tremendously naturally gifted as a dynamic performer, and the matwork here is a solid example. Throughout the match thus far, the work has been cautious and guarded, the work of two men who are consciously trying to defend themselves, aware of their own shortcomings in some way. And then! Out of nowhere, Ian reserves something with speed and grace and power, and it creates such a meaningful narrative transition out of what could have easily been a moment done for polite applause, a moment for the crowd to follow the bouncing ball. Instead, he changes speed and forces the audience to pay attention, as the work has gone against the natural rhythm of what we expect from these matches.

Tarek, for his part, is a capable and understanding performer, and is able to work in a way that shows off the size difference between the two. On things like pinning combinations out of counters he shows clear struggle at having to leverage someone who probably has 40 pounds on him. Whereas the Hero match we did last week looked uncooperative in its desperation and cruelty, this match finds ways to create the same energy while establishing a clear hierarchy. We aren’t supposed to buy Tarek on the level of Hero, and we don’t. He looks game but overmatched, with enough skill and shine to push Ian, albeit not to the same point of no return that Hero brought out. While Tarek may be lacking as a credible opponent, he does have skills that serve to bolster Rotten’s work; namely his inherent stillness. Rather than always flailing and grasping for ropes and escapes, Tarek is comfortable not moving while Ian has things locked in. It again reinforces the size difference, and creates a stark contrast to when they do finally get off the mat towards the end, and Tarek’s brief flurry looks like it truly shocks and surprises Ian. It’s not enough, but it creates contrast, both to the earlier segments in the match and to Ian as a performer.

There are moments toward the end that are a bit cute, a bit more cooperative than anything we see in the early stretches here or in better matches like the Hero one. But those aren’t enough to undermine what is otherwise compelling work. I am pleasantly surprised by the tonal differences that Ian is capable of within the same style, and his natural affinity for transition. As Phil pointed out last time, he is capable of enveloping the whole of his match in this extremely sinister aura, but here he proves he doesn’t have to rely on it to create good work. He has tools beyond what someone would expect.

PAS: I thought this was excellent, compelling, violent wrestling. It was clearly worked in the same style as Hero vs. Ian, but while that was something truly separate from pro-wrestling, this felt more like an interesting stylistic outlier, but within recognizable boundaries. Part of it may have been that Hero vs. Ian was without commentary, all you could hear was the cursing and shrieking in pain, while this had Jim Fannin and Dave Prazak just dribbling out inane nonsense. This also had a bit more of a wrestling ending, Ian sugar holding Tarek asleep was pretty cool, but it wasn't as visceral as Ian quickly tapping as his knee tendons shredded like coleslaw. 

It is hard not compare the two matches, but this had a lot in it to love. I thought the bear hug from the bottom by Ian was especially nasty, you could really see him digging his knuckles into Tarek's spine. There was some really slick counter wrestling here, Tarek is able to reverse a leglock from the bottom. Not to be outdone Ian reverses a Tarek leg lock, by grabbing and pulling Tarek's head to Ian's chest and rolling into a small package, totally cool almost Solaresque counter work. We had our bits of violence too, Ian and Tarek exchanging CTEbutts and Ian landing a sick open cuff to the ear.  The first match we reviewed felt like a pinnacle of a style, this feels like more of a great representative example, you may learn more from a representative then from a peak.

COMPLETE AND ACCURATE METH LAB BATTLARTS

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Ian Rotten Came Knocking At The Door, I Let Him In for A While

Ian Rotten vs. Chris Hero IWA-MS 5/4/02 -EPIC

JR: Late last year, Phil Schneider approached me about working together to write up all the Ian Rotten matwork matches, known colloquially as “methlab battlearts”. I jumped at the opportunity, for Phil remains an inspiration of mine. My wrestling writing, and truthfully, the entire way I watch wrestling, would be very different without him. It was a task that got pushed back, as we both have our own things, and life sometimes gets in the way. But tonight it starts! This is the first write up in what will surely be a long project, spanning many, many matches. I have no idea when it will end. Off the top of my head, I can think of about 6 or 7 matches I would safely categorize as MLBA, I’m sure there are more, but that will require us both sifting through a few years worth of Ian Rotten matches. I don’t really look forward to this. That’s a lie. I do look forward to it, just not to the time it will take.

But that is a problem for future JR. And future Phil S. Tonight, our problem is watching Ian Rotten fight Chris Hero in 2002 in Dayton, OH.

There are 37 people at this match. I know this because I watched a match from a few months later that had 24 people in the audience and they commented on the crowd size of the two shows. The matches starts with a clean break and some solid tie up work. Hero is game, and this is before he became obsessed with World of Sport, or at the very least before he let that obsession work its way into his matches. But at the very least, Hero is someone who has a pretty innate understanding of leverage and is someone who doesn’t shy away from contact, which makes him a great opponent here.

I have no idea if Rotten has ever watched WoS, but more so than any BattleArts wrestler, his performance in the early portion of this match reminds me of Jim Breaks. Not in the world necessarily, but in how vocal he is. Ian has an understanding of his audience, what their expectations are and how well they can follow a narrative. By having a match that is so out of the ordinary for both participants, he knows and understands that he has to guide them a bit more, and he does this but yelling and whining and cursing and hollering any time there is a level change or a moment of resolution in the work. It creates clear rhythm that the audience can follow and enjoy, like how the audience knows and understands when a jazz solo ends.

The other major strength of Ian’s work in this match is the sheer weight of everything he does. Not in a metaphorical sense, I mean that every hold that he has Hero in he makes look as though he is truly pressing upon him. There is a wariness to participating in constant contact with someone, and Ian understands that. He may move slower than some others, or have to visibly think through the steps to do something in a way that other, more technically adept wrestlers do not, but he makes an effort to always be touching and pressing and falling and laying on Hero. He forces the issue in ways that other performers do not. Often, technical wrestling can almost come across as no different than a high flying match in structure; fast paced reversals followed by a break as the two competitors circle around and pace, waiting for their polite applause. Here, Ian and Hero are always forcing the other to confront them and their actual, physical forms.

All of that is a somewhat overly confusing way of saying that this match just features Rotten and Hero hitting each other very hard. They exchange headbutts that knock the every present bandage from Rotten’s forehead. Ian hits an uppercut and later a crossface that both land with a thud that is harrowing, like watching someone on a bike collide with a mailbox. Hero’s strikes are equally hard, but are almost all in retaliation. There is a natural quality to them, kicking and screaming and flailing while on his back, desperate to avoid Ian grabbing his knee and ankle and just mangling them over and over.

It’s interesting to see how Ian’s understanding of the layout and rhythm of deathmatches infers how he works here, specifically in regards to the use of props, for lack of a better term. While there are no weapons or elaborate death match machine set ups or anything of the like, Ian manages to get huge amounts of mileage out of small and simple things that act almost as act breaks. The end of the first portion of the match is symbolized by Ian's forehead bandage coming off, whereas the finishing stretch is marked by Hero having to tape his knee while a tired and desperate Ian lunges for it over and over, eventually leaving himself open for a counter attack. One could watch this and see these transitions and moments being instead barbed wire bats or panes of glass, and the match makes roughly the same amount of sense. While I tend to think this word is meaningless, there is a universality to the structure here that allows Ian to consistently remain in control and never find himself out of book in any meaningful way.

This match is wonderful. One of my favorite matches ever is the Satanico/Sangre Chicana match from 89, and the work in the second half of this almost is a matwork equivalent, where everything looks desperate and wild and subsequently more real. Watching this match is watching two people struggle in the mud, concussed and angry, hoping that by some stroke of luck the next thing they try will land true.

PAS: This project is going to be a challenge for me, because JR is such a talented, thorough writer, I am going to get his reviews, and struggle try to find something interesting to say which isn’t just going over points that he made better.

JR talked a lot about the vocalization in this match, and it is really powerful and makes the whole thing almost uncomfortable to watch. There are 37 people in the audience, so you aren’t going to hear traditional crowd reactions, instead you hear people just expressing shock, “Fucking Christ”, “Shit”. It really adds to force of headbutt or forearm when some guy in the audience seems disgusted by the whole thing. This is a death match promotion, Ian Rotten is normally going through panes of glass, but the crowd seems way more appalled by a hammer fist to a knee then anything with barbed wire or lightubes (and it is a great fucking Hammer fist, these guys were throwing heaters).

Both wrestlers were really vocal too, cursing at each other, shrieking in pain, mumbling under their breath. There is a lot of over the top vocal selling in wrestling these days, but in a performative way, nothing felt performative here. At one-point Hero’s shriek gets really high pitched, it is the kind of shriek I made when I dislocated my kneecap playing Rugby, or you will hear on the pickup court when someone shreds an Achilles, it didn’t feel like selling, it felt like two guys taking it much too far. I loved how fast Ian tapped out too, it felt like both guys tendons were slowly ripping througout the entire match, if you tore a tendon in your knee, you wouldn’t gut it out and make tough guy faces, you would scream, tap and go to the hospital. The lack of traditional wrestling selling in this match really made it special, it unnerved me, it isn’t the way a wrestling match is supposed to work, it isn’t how wrestlers are supposed to react to holds and it makes the whole thing seem wrong. It has been a while since I watched any of this stuff, and even with grappling being a much more prevalent thing in independent wrestling these days (They weren’t running Bloodsport and Ambition shows in 2002), this felt wholly alien, a completely separate bit of horror.

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Complete and Accurate Meth Lab BattlArts

JR Goldberg, one of my favorite wrestling writers, was talking up matwork Ian Rotten, and I remembered how much I loved that stuff and how I hadn't watched it in years. It also gave me an opportunity to rope in JR and get him to write for Segunda Caida. We are going to be going through this stuff and seeing how it holds up and if it is as great as we remember. As always matches are going to be ranked EPIC, GREAT, FUN and SKIPPABLE


2002

Ian Rotten vs. Chris Hero IWA-MS 5/4/02 -EPIC
Ian Rotten vs. Tarek the Great IWA-MS 10/4/02- GREAT

2003

Ian Rotten vs. B-Boy IWA-MS 12/19/03-GREAT

2004

Ian Rotten vs. Homicide NWL 8/2/04 - EPIC

2005

Ian Rotten vs. Samoa Joe IWA-MS 4/8/05 -EPIC

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Eddie Kingtson In Some Sick Hills, Bagging Up Fishscales

Eddie Kingston vs. Ian Rotten IWA-MS 7/8/05 - EPIC

PAS: This was just a grimy sick fight, an I Quit cage match without any 21st century fanciness, just two guys in close quarters trying to maul each other. The whole thing was filmed with one super close camera angle, and it could pick up the sick smack of every crossface and headbutt. It is pretty hard to do any close magic with the camera right in your face like that, nothing seemed pulled, everything was raising bruises and welts. Kingston and Rotten were cursing at each other and threatening to beat each other to death. Rotten comes in with a cast on his arm, which he uses as a weapon, but Kingston also rips it off so he can beat on the injured arm. Rotten also tries to mangle Eddie's arm with a chair and some armbars. There are some thumbtacks which get pushed into temples and foreheads, and the finish is Ian trying to take Kingston's eye out with a fork. This doesn't have the Jackass style entertainment of some death match stunt shows, this is hard to watch violent stuff, really not a match for everyone, but an achievement nonetheless.

ER: This was a real sick, grisly fight, something that horrified parents would have had to shield their kid's eyes from minutes in as they left in horror. But at no point does it feel like a geek show, this isn't guys rolling around in light tube glass needing attention, this was a fight that started with chairs and strikes, and devolved into strikes and gouging and threats. There isn't a whole lot of "wrestling" (Ian has a couple armbar attempts and a neat kneebar reversal, and he even does a koppo kick to Kingston's arm that had to come as a surprise), there's a lot of knuckles into face and gross headbutts. Ian gets bloody real quick, to no big shock. Ian is one of wrestling's great bleeders, able to get that deep crimson red covering his whole face, that color of red that would cause any normal man to panic and realize their situation is BAD. And Kingston is certifiable because no sane man would let Ian clonk his deep red bloody head into his own head many times. Kingston may be certifiable, but he's also a savage, going after Ian's hand and bending at his fingers, prying at his cast, and Ian does some amazing selling with his pained howls. Ian breaks out that high pitch howl a couple times, and it really is the sound of a man being tortured, totally chilling to see a dude covered in blood screaming like that. These two are just nasty to each other, and Kingston's selling is top level as usual. When he was holding his arm and telling the ref under his breath "It's broken, fuck, it's broken," and begging Ian to just not hit him with a chair for a moment, it's all too real and not much of a stretch to think he could be hurt. This whole thing was grim and violent. Most of my peers and loved ones probably already think I'm a weirdo for watching pro wrestling, but if they found out that this was what I was watching they'd probably think I was keeping somebody in my basement.

COMPLETE AND ACCURATE EDDIE KINGSTON

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Wednesday Morning War Games: IWA-MS- Team IWA-MS v. Team Fanin v. Team NWA

Team IWA-MS (Ian Rotten/Chris Hero/Axl Rotten/Corporal Robinson/Bull Pain) v. Team NWA (Tank/Eric Priest/Chandler McClure/Sal Thomaselli/Vito Thomaselli) v. Fanin Family (Eddie Kingston/BJ Whitmer/JC Bailey/Mark Wolf/Steve Stone) IWA-MS 7/2/05

This was a three team, two ring War Games with ownership of IWA-MS at stake. While it was a little overstuffed (Team NWA seemed superfluous, and were the first team eliminated), this really shows the value of having great brawlers and letting them brawl. War Games are always going to have section where lots of guys are just wandering around kicking and punching, Corp, Ian, Eddie Kingston, Bull Pain, Tank, these are all time great punchers and kickers. Watching Corporal Robinson hurl those half punch/half forearms is just pleasurable. We also had the Chris Hero v. Eddie Kingston feud weaving through this, which is one of my all time favorite indy feuds, there is a great moment near the end where Hero just unloads with crazed elbows. Steve Stone was my favorite under the radar guy in the match, his brawling looked on the level of the legends, he bled a ton and he took some nasty bumps. I didn't love either finish, Tank seemed like he went down a little early, and having JC Bailey turn on Fanin seems like a weird finish for a face team to win. Still this is a violent bloody brawl which was very entertaining and worth tracking down.

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Phil Cherry Picks MAW

I got my hands on a bunch of MAW shows from the early 2000s, this was a Milwaukee area indy which used a bunch of IWA-MS guys. Since these are dozens of long ass early 2000s indy shows I am going to cherry pick some interesting looking matches.

CM Punk/ Jason Kronnan/Dave Prazak v. Dino Bambino/Bobby Bambino/Sherri Martel 2 out of 3 falls Tables and Ladders match 7/23/00

Punks team comes into Kid Rock which should strip him of all of his straight edge scenester cred. WWIMKT (What Would Ian MacKaye think). He also has a stringy blond front rattail and cut off jorts, his look didn't exactly scream future PPV headliner. This was a total shitshow trainwreck but a pretty entertaining one. Sherri was awesome stiffing Punk and Prazak, and even taking a bump off a ladder through a table which is nuts for a lady in her 40s in front of 100 people. Dragged a bit in the middle, but the end was pretty nutso with Prazak going head first through a table and Dino doing a shooting star press through a table which looked really dangerous, he barely rotated enough and looked like he almost spiked himself headfirst into the concrete.

Ian Rotten v. Peter B. Beautiful 6/3/01

This comes off of a KOTDM match between the two of them where Ian crowbarred this kid in one of those weird quasi shoot IWA-MS angles. I have no idea why Peter signed up for this a second time, as again Ian gives him nothing and just brutalizes him with lightbulb tube shots and chairshots. There was some angle where the MAW owner runs in a ineffectually chokes Ian with a pool cue, this leads to PBB's one cover which Ian kicks out of and then Rotten goes right back to mauling him. The end got downright Kurisuish with Ian throwing wind up kicks to this kids eye and punching him square in the cheek. I like meth BattlArts Ian a lot, but this was a different sort of thing and I didn't enjoy watching it.

Ian Rotten/Necro Butcher v. Corporal Robinson/Bull Pain 9/21/02

On paper this is just a murderer's row lineup of early 2000's brawlers. I don't think any match could have lived up to the match I had in my mind, but this was still really entertaining. First part of the match is worked as a southern tag with the heel Pain/Corp team working over Necro. Necro is a guy willing to get worked over and Pain and Corp are awesome guys at beating on someone, awesome punches and stomps and nasty chair shots. Pain is amazing at baseball bat shots, one of the best magic tricks in wrestling history, he really looks like he is braining people with bat shots. Corp has these amazing fast punch combos where he looks like he is beating on a guy in fast forward, man what a heel team those two were. Instead of a hot tag Ian just beats up the ref, and we then have about twelve minutes of straight brawling. I did think that not having the hot tag was a bit deflating, and while the brawling was super nasty looking it got a bit repetitive. Still this was violent nasty stuff executed well and fun to watch. First MAW hidden gem

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