Long Road Report to Hell 4/4/19, Show #3: MLW Rise of the Renegades

TKG: Bloodsport ends and we head into town for MLW. Originally this was scheduled to be LA Park v Rush and the thing I was most excited for. That wasn't happening. This was a long TV taping and had the real rhythm of a TV taping (angle followed by long showcase match, angle followed by long showcase match, angle followed by long showcase match ) and that rhythm eventually kills you. 

PAS: Hindsight is 20/20, but we probably should have just gotten a good dinner somewhere, rather then two long, expensive Uber rides into the city for this show. When we got these tickets we thought we were out of luck for Bloodsport and didn't want to fly to NYC for two shows, once we got Bloodsport tickets this became a mistake

ER: This show sounded like an excellent idea at the time. We had a gigantic gap in our schedule due to Bloodsport selling out sooner than we anticipated, and wanted to fill it with wrestling. WWN tickets at the same time were like $80, MLW tickets were $20. Easy choice was easy. In hindsight though we should have just had dinner and then rolled the dice on whatever was playing at White Eagle. Getting to Queens and back was a nightmare, and MLW didn't really book any interesting on paper match-ups. MLW has a several guys I really like, and they were all matched up against guys I don't care about. So we drive into the city and it's weird because in California the uber drivers never shut up. You go to the airport and you know you're going to be talking about the new elimination diet your food-allergic driver is starting for the duration of the fare. In NY they're nearly completely silent, so this driver had to listen to us talk about the tremendous hit our music collection will take if we were to cancel 60s rockers the way we easily cancel guys like Ryan Adams today when we find out what scummy dudes they are. Wrestling too. Tom talks about how many different musicians beat up Tammi Terrell. And soon, the talk turned to Ferriday, Louisiana and Jerry Lee Lewis. Phil talks about how Jerry Lee essentially killed two wives, with a "Ferriday's Most Famous Son" police report saying the women died from falling down and hitting their head too many times. Then Tom tells an incredible story about early 90s Jerry Lee tax troubles, and how he had a 900 number grift that Tom actually called, and to milk the time of the call Jerry Lee had *known stutterer* Mel Tillis doing the call intros!! Our driver sat in silence as Tom went into an extended "Now if-a you'd like to he-he-he-hea-hear Jerry Lee tell a story about E-e-e-el-ell-elvis then press 1, and uh if-a you'd..." I was in stitches. Phil tipped the driver handsomely.

Brian Pillman Jr. vs. Maxwell Jacob Friedman

TKG: Maxwell Jacob Friedman? Not Maxwell Jacob Goldstein? It was MJF and not MJG? We must have watched 30 matches of his and no one corrected me all the times I yelled “Don’t want drama, don’t want none” and “Hey 8ball says your mouth says no but your body says stick me”?

PAS: We came in during this match and headed to the bathroom and got situated, so weren't fully settled and focused on this. Both guys are fine, but this was mostly a set up for the six man later in the show. Pillman does look exactly like his father and I am happy to have a Pillman back in my life.

ER: We got there a little late and missed an Ariel Dominguez match which is a drag. He's a fun tiny babyface underdog in a gi. And like Dominguez, Pillman is a guy I like, who I haven't actually seen in a match I really like. This seemed to have a nice pace but as Phil said, we showed up as it was starting, used the restroom, found a place to stand (and I went over and pet Mr. Velvet in between peeing and finding a spot), so I only caught glances until the finish.

Jacob Fatu vs. Barrington Hughes

TKG: Fatu, Samuel, and Simon Grimm are working some kind of paper bag passing international brown solidarity heel team gimmick. MLW likes to use vintage managers and semi disappointed that Armand Hussein isn’t out explaining this. Is Armand Hussein still alive? 2019 Arman Hussein would be awesome ridiculous move. Fatu squashes the huge Barrington Hughes and the heel team bury him under either a balaclava or their team flag. Hughes is super obese guy from Florida so him getting knocked down is always scary.

PAS: Fatu is really explosive and fun to watch. No idea why they would fly in Hughes from Florida just to get squashed a couple of times, that guy is two airplane seats minimum, you might need to buy him a whole row. They are really burning through that venture capital cash in dumb ways.

ER: I got excited for Fatu's music as he's a Bay Area guy who had big early impact and clearly looked like a guy who would get national opportunities. He also had a great match against Boyce Legrande which was arguably my favorite match for Phoenix Pro Wrestling, the local group Tim Livingston and I do commentary for. And then the Caramel Colossus comes out and I'm stoked for a BIG big boy battle. But since it's a Hughes match, it only goes 1 minute. Hughes has really only worked 1 minute matches for MLW (other than their bad WarGames match) so I knew it would be too flukey that I would be there live for his first actual match. Jesus, give me 4 minutes of this dude working a tubby match and I'll get it on our list. Little did I know that we'd be seeing like 7 segments of Hughes getting jumped by Fatu's stable throughout the night. Phil and I were dying the next day talking about MLW buying 3 airplane tickets to fly Hughes up to just get jumped by Fatu's gang. I mean Hughes is gigantic, gigantic enough that you not only have to buy him 3 tickets, but they have to be tickets in an extra leg room seat, which can cost considerably more than other tickets. Just a wild use of $$ there. We saw so many obese dudes get jumped by Fatu's gang by the end of our time at MLW. It got absurd. I would have cried laughing if Hughes had shown up at the late night AIW show just to get jumped and rolled over slowly with kicks. Would have made me even more of a fan.

Rey Horus vs. Ace Austin

TKG: This was a long long showcase match. I think Ace Austin is working a “close up magic” gimmick and does lots of stuff built out of headstands. First juniors exchanges were fine and felt like they could have had a fun lightning match but then they try to a strike exchange section, and a throws section and a mask removal section and a finisher exchange section. This felt like had way more sections than needed and no one had any idea of how to move from one to the next.

PAS: This was a long singles match from two guys who clearly can't put together a long singles match. Maybe if either guy was with a veteran who could control the match and work around their spots it might have been OK, but we didn't have that guy and it suffered.

ER: This match felt so long. Starting from the time we walked to breakfast, we'd already been up and about for 9+ hours, and this thing was long enough that I assumed they were going to Mordor. Horus is good with a base like Steve Pain or flying in for trios spots, but god I did not need to see 20 minutes of him working on material. Austin is a guy I haven't seen much of, and then oddly saw the next day on the subway taking up a seat while women were standing, and he had some fun material and some unique body movement, but his shtick didn't work in an epic singles. The match already felt long when Phil managed to have enough time to get in four different and spaced out "How long IS this match?" riffs. The best was "How is Rey Horus vs. Ace Austin going to be the longest match we see this weekend!?"

Low Ki/Ricky Martinez vs. Mr Grim/Hollywood ?

TKG: I think this was Ki and Martinez v Grim and maybe Hollywood Shuffle. Guy had Hollywood on his pants and he was beaten into realizing that there is always work at the post office. I was pretty sure his name was Hollywood Shuffle but also thought MJF was MJG. Of the squashes on the show this was best as Ki squashes are always going to be nasty. They do a post match angle with the Fatu, Samuel Simon team burying Ki under cloth.

PAS: I think this might have been Ki turning face, as he was arguing with Salena De La Renta coming down the aisle and it looked like Ricky Martinez abandoned him before the Contra beatdown. Hard to turn someone face after this brutal of a beatdown. Ki ko's Grim with the first blow and ends up opening up Hollywood's jaw so he could break it with a punch. It seems like Ki's MLW run is based around his unprofessional rep, and he KO's Grim like he was Mace Mendoza or Elax. This was fun, but man what a waste of Ki, I kept hoping they would announce a cool Ki match, and when they didn't I was hoping for a surprise Ki match, and instead we just got a fun squash.

ER: Love Tom going for a "There's always work at the post office" joke. He didn't do that while we were watching the show. He sat on that one so as not to risk either of us stealing his Hollywood Shuffle joke even though Phil and I are going to be the two people who would have laughed at a Hollywood Shuffle joke. And I knew they were going to screw us like this. Segunda Caida might be the collective biggest Low-Ki fans in the world. We've probably brought more attention to the Low-Ki/Rey Mysterio match than JAPW brought to the Low-Ki/Rey Mysterio match. But the whole time leading up to the event, matches with everyone else kept being announced, and Low-Ki kept being announced as merely "appearing". We all knew that meant we'd get a 3 minute Low-Ki squash and not a Low-Ki match for our list. We can't have nice things from MLW. Luckily Low-Ki is a great guy to beat up a couple no names in a squash, you know he's not going to finish the match without at least a couple noteworthy moments. Here his double stomp landed so hard my stomach hurt (although my stomach also had two IPAs and a heavy mac and cheese still hanging out in it so...). Bummed we only got like 2 minutes of Salina De La Renta, too. She's my favorite manager in wrestling today, and I was excited to see how she works the crowd live when the cameras aren't on her. Sadly I saw barely any of her.

Myron Reed/Rich Swann vs. Jimmy Yuta/Lance Anoa'i

TKG: I don’t think I’ve ever seen Reed before but really liked him as cocky guy who wants to hit his stuff on opponents and runs away from getting hit.

PAS: This was pretty good. Reed and Swann seem to be work a heel Black Lives Matter gimmick which is problematic, but they were a fun heel team, cutting off both faces and feeding their comebacks well. Anoa'i seems kind of superfluous in a fed pushing Jacob Fatu so hard if they aren't going to be teaming or feuding.

ER: I've really liked all of the Reed matches that have been on MLW. He brings a lot to job work, getting the best matches in MLW out of guys like DJZ and Kotto Brazil. Swann kind of has a natural smugness to him, can't really put my finger on it, but always felt he would work much better as a heel (and he does), so this is a heel team with a ton of potential. Here he's an overlooked heel who now uses what had been used as flashy babyface comeback offense (like all of his awesome cutter variations that he would hit as a dramatic "3 point tying shot") as awesome sneak attack cheap shot flashy offense. He literally ran in at one point with a match turning cutter from the entrance ramp, and it looked even more spectacular as we were standing in the corner to the side of the ramp, so we couldn't see his starting point. We just saw Reed suddenly bursting into frame with a great cutter. I agree with Phil that it's weird having Anoa'i as a semi featured role while Fatu is getting a major heel role. It's like they purposely wanted to avoid teaming up the Samoan guys but really Anoa'i would be more effective as a monster Samoan in that angle than teaming with a dud like Yuta.

Minoru Tanaka vs. Daga

TKG: This was my favorite match on the show. These are two guys who know how to put together a complete singles lucharesu match, know how to put the lucha in the puroresu, know how to put the puroresu in the lucha, understood lucha in a real traditional sense, and understood the puroresu style before all of the Choshu and ”shoot” Inokiism was stripped from it. Really felt like a complete match where transitions between the mat work, strikes, and dives and back all made sense, didn’t feel like they were just done to check off boxes. And everything done on high, high level. Felt like it needed some type of stakes instead of just being two guys thrown together to give it some sort of added meaning. Like a championship, or if this was part of the MSG G1 show (people would have praised this highly if it were on MSG show). Best match on show but still thought it was weird match to throw money at….I don’t know. Also possibility that overrating it as response to Rey v Austin match.

PAS: I thought this was good, although I think I liked it less then Tom. Daga is a guy who is inspired by people inspired by Minoru Tanaka so there was nice synergy in the match up. Tanaka is pretty low on the list of BattlArts alumni I would be excited to see live, but he still can throw out some tricked out counters and submission attempts. This was also pretty stiff, although with added leg slaps. I agree it felt a little exhibition-y, but its shining competence was really needed at this point of the show. 

ER: Tom's enthusiasm helped me get into this one more. I think he was so insulted by the Avengers length Austin/Horus match, really Daga is a not as good Minoru Tanaka, and on the car ride back to White Eagle we talked about BattlArts alumni we'd want to see live less than Tanaka. Came up with junji.com, probably Mohammed Yone, consider Viktor Krueger but decide it would be cool to say you saw Viktor Krueger live, and maybe Tsubo Genjin. But Tanaka was a major part of my 2000-2001 wrestling fandom, a guy I actively sought out and remember being super excited for his first CMLL tour as Heat (which was disappointing and in retrospect the beginning of me drifting away from him as a worker), and that still means something to me. He was a real pro here and it was cool to see how hard even the lesser BattlArts guys hit in a live setting. You see guys like Rey Horus or MJF and then you see Tanaka throw a sidekick to Daga's chest and you're like "oh right, the BattlArts." This was a really fun match and felt like it was at a good spot on the taping, which I can't say for a lot of other things. Daga hit a great dive at one point and Tanaka really hurled himself into the railing off it, probably the best dive we saw at this show. Some of this really isn't my style of choice anymore, but it was a nicely done version of that match.

Dynasty (Alexander Hammerstone/Maxwell Jacob Friedman/Richard Holliday) vs. The Hart Foundation (Brian Pillman Jr./Davey Boy Smith Jr./Teddy Hart)

TKG: Is this the first time I’ve seen Teddy Hart live? This can’t be the first time I’ve seen Teddy Hart live? He comes across as a giant fucking bigger than life character in person wearing insane sparkles carrying his Persian aloft. A star from a different universe than our world cotidiano. Pre-match me and Phil bet on how many moonsaults he will do and when in match he would fake a knee injury. He only did two moonsaults but both done in the thrown out way only he does them, and he tweaks his arm near the end and angrily works at restoring feeling in hand, popping arm back into place. Anyways, superstar. Pillman had an injury angle early in the show and so match started 2 on 3 with Pillman eventually running in to make injured guy comeback save. This was at its best when Hart Foundation were kind of working as walking tall babyfaces in a tables match. Hammerstone I thought was amusing as heel powerhouse who just isn't as strong as face powerhouse. Him being challenged into dueling delayed vertical suplexes with Davey Boy Smith really got that whole thing over.

PAS: This was my favorite match of the show. Hart and Davey Boy work the first part of the match like Teddy Hart vs. Homicide with Teddy in the role of Homicide. They bumped all three heels around the ring with super stiff shots and for a while it looked like a fun squash match. The Dynasty got some big comebacks and Teddy took some big bumps. The spot where Hart hit a Doomsday Destroyer while leaping off the back of Hammerstone was maybe the craziest spot we saw all day, and we saw some crazy shit. Enjoyed this thoroughly, and Teddy is pretty much a must see guy at this point, really wish he worked Bloodsport.

ER: This was definitely my favorite match of the show. We were all pretty much in awe of Teddy Hart. The guy is a total megastar. He looks like if Colin Farrell had a hip hop producer role in Spring Breakers, coming out in a spectacular turquoise and purple glittery sequined jogging suit with matching tank, leaving him and the ring covered in glitter (which has been a theme of our day that Bloodsport sadly didn't honor). He was carrying Mr. Velvet - which is weird to see live and comes off borderline cruel - but we did get to see him placed on the turnbuckle and I'm sorry but that's cute. This was a really action packed garbage brawl with Teddy throwing the best punches in wrestling today, fans making fun of Hammerstone for looking like Jericho (although at least looking better than current Jericho), Davey Boy looked like a great powerhouse opposite him, we got a cool Pillman triumphant run-in, MJF did an actual funny spot when Holliday called for a tandem suplex and MJF had a great facial reaction that said "Man I'd rather not, my neck is still dead from an earlier bump" and the delay caused him to get suplexed. The ringside brawling was really intense, and Teddy did a bunch of great "popping my arm back into the socket" material right in front of us, into the barricade. The match was a tables match that didn't waste a bunch of time on table set up and didn't waste time teasing a bunch of table spots. They set up one table, and had a cool finish through it. Excited to see how this plays on TV.

Josef Samael vs. Ace Romero

TKG: I looked it up and sadly Armand Hussein has passed. I kind of liked Allen Martin as a manager. Is Allen Martin still alive? 2019 Allen Martin managed Contra would be an awesome ridiculous move. Samuel has heel Persian boots with exaggerated hooks on toe making him kicking an obese man low seem like he might get under the pannus to do some real damage.

PAS: Barrington ambled out to make the save and got beaten down for a second time, and this Contra war on the obese continued, really felt like they should have booked Simon Grimm vs. Fallah Bah or Big Slam Vader for continuities sake.

ER: We were trying to come up with more obese guys they can bring in, which highlighted the dearth of big fat guys on the indies right now. I like Romero a lot but this was more fat guys getting rolled over slowly with group kicks. I did enjoy my conversation with Tom about how a kick to Romero's groin would have no effect due to how his belly hung low enough to cover his genitals. Tom - without missing a beat - explained the physics of Samael's effective hooked boots ball kicking.

Gringo Loco vs. Puma King

TKG: This was true lucha and I will always take lucha over lucharesu. But this was lightning match lucha…and I could’ve watched it go on for another ten minutes happily. Gringo Loco’s hair was the most spectacular hair on a weekend of spectacular hair.

PAS: This had a couple of moments of real transcendence,  Loco is a elite level Lucha base, and they had some really great fast exchanges. When it got away from that into more extended runs of offense for either guy it got less special, still it had those moments. Loco is a long time favorite of mine and I was excited to see him live.

ER: Glad I finally got to see Gringo live. He's a favorite of the blog and a real artist, reminds me of watching Skayde matches for the first time. He'll throw in some World of Sport style handsprings but break out one of a few different headscissor variations, a cool cross ring cutter, can do great dives and catch dives great, and yes Tom is correct that his Mania week hair was spectacular. Crowd was a little tired so Puma's shtick didn't work as well as it typically does, but I thought this match was a nice pace and should also play well on TV.

Mance Warner vs. Sami Callihan 

TKG: These two work a two disgusting guys brawling indifferent to ref who DQs them early. Lots of spitting and snot rockets early. Kind of like imagine a Joel Goodhart booked Henry O Godwin v. Bastion Booger brawl. Holy fuck how awesome would Mark Cantebury v. Mike Shaw for Goodhart have been? Aww fuck. Back to actual match in front of us. Warner and Callihan beat each other around ring. Pretty early in the match they do the wearing chairs like necklace spots that I thought dragged down the Jay v Parnell match. After bitching about those spots earlier, those spots worked surprisingly well for me here, some of that is when in match they were used and some of it is these guys are playing such cartoonish caricatures that them obliviously not taking chairs off their necks works. Would Bastion Booger or Henry O Godwin prioritize taking a chair off their neck? No, of course not. Why would they? Two guys who wanted to beat each other up.

PAS: This was a day in which we watched a lot of brawling, this was solid violent stuff, but was overshadowed in my mind by the violence proceeding it, and the horrific stuff still to come. Callihan and Warner both bring a bunch of energy to what they do, and the execution was fun. Finish with the Hijo de La Park and Martinez run in, and crazy guy team up, served its purpose, but the whole match felt a little like they were working towards a run in.

ER: This was the kind of match that played great live and up close. They guys spent most of the match on the floor and when these two are on the floor somebody is going to get hit hard. They brawled over near us a bunch and the shots look so much meaner 7 feet away that through a TV screen. Seeing hard chops to the throat live is just cooler, and we got the added bonus of them trying to wrap beer cans around each other's head. The spitting stuff is gross, but damn hitting a guy in the side of the head with the EDGE of a beer can looks like it would instantly bust someone open. These guys really hit heard and Mancer is a cool MLW addition. The stuff around a chair was really nasty, and we get a ridiculous moment of a tombstone piledriver through a chair that had been set up. It got a 2 count, and this marks the first - but not last - time of the day we would see a piledriver through a chair get only a 2 count. Still, match was a fine asskicking.

TKG: Airwolf v Rey Fenix starts and we decide that we don't want to miss the AIW opener, so we pour one out for Jan Michael Vincent and Ernest Borgnine and leave.

ER: I make a "manager as Alex Cord with an eyepatch" joke but it gets minimal reaction. I silently assure myself that nobody heard it and that's why it got no reaction.

PAS: This show ran really long which was kind of a bummer, we came to see LA Park, and didn't get that chance, but I didn't want to miss any of the AIW show and we really made the right choice.

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Hugo's Lucha Libre Live Report 9/12/18

Wife and Little Dude headed down to her parents for a week while I am off to a business trip tomorrow morning. Since I am on my own, I made a last minute trip down to the Fairgrounds to check out some lucha libre. This was part of a fair, so the crowd was probably 40% white, which is very different then previous shows where it was just me percent white.

Red Mask? vs. Komaya

Different opponent for Komaya then listed on the poster. Komaya is a guy with Muta paint and kanji on his trunks who kind of ruins his gimmick by doing a lot of loud crowd work in a Colorado snowboarder accent. This was solid juniors wrestling, Red Mask guy was lucha trained and had a fine armdrag and headscissors offense. Komaya had a stiff shot or two, everything wasn't super crisp, but it moved at a nice pace and ended in a good spot. This would get the old full Worldwide point if it was a WCW syndie match.

Lady Lee/Athena vs. Luna/Alley Gato

Kind of odd that the only three caida match on the show was the luchadoras match, but this was another well worked entertaining match. This was an atomicos with one thick girl and one skinny girl on each team, and for the first part of the match it was skinny vs. skinny and thick vs. thick. The skinny girls (Luna and Athena) looked a little wrestling schoolish in their exchanges, but I liked both big girls. Alley Gato hit this BBW rana and a great second rope rolling senton. Straight falls ruda win which I was not expecting, I remember thinking that the segunda had too many near falls for a segunda and then the Rudas won. Lady Lee had fun submissions and the rudas won the third fall with a cool double bridging Indian death lock. Alley Gato continued to impress, she really should have been in the MYC.

Corsario Negro vs. Sol vs. Rayo vs. Joe Alonzo

This was a nutty four way which felt like a crazy undercard Tijuana spotfest. Lots of dives of varying quality, big bumps by everyone. Really liked Joe Alonzo, he hit a beautiful lionsault, worked stiff, and took a crazy bump where he did a running stage dive over the railing into a bunch of chairs. Corsario Negro had some stiff shots and was a fun rudo. Right after that happens I look over to my right and Rayo is just chilling up near me in the balcony, and he flies maybe 20 feet off the balcony onto everyone below (I don't want to know what stupid shit Aerostar is going to try next month) Rayo took the craziest bump on the last show I saw, so he is clearly the lunatic of this fed. Match falls apart a bit after the stage dive, unsurprisingly, but Rayo goes over which totally makes sense.

Amaya vs. Heros vs. Vago

This is for the Hugo's title which a replica NWA Big Gold Belt with plastic red HUGO pasted on it. Vago comes out with a tiny super cute baby and immediately starts rudoing it up which was lucha as fuck. Much of the early match is the rudos Vago and Amaya double teaming Heros, until they turn on each other. Amaya has a nice right hand, and Vago has a great sleazy rudo charisma. Heros does a tope into a chair which clearly fucked him up. He rolled under the ring and even took his mask off under the ring. When he gets back in he is off, there is a badly blown diving rana. It's his match to win though, so when they set up a super rana for the finish it added a bit of danger because I was worried a concussed guy would kill himself and Vago. They hit it cleanly, Heros wins the belt and the ring announcer pops his shoulder back into place. Post match they set up a title vs. title match with Amaya and his Rocky Mountain Pro belt which is the non-lucha fed with local TV. I might have to start checking them out, because I dig some of the gringos who work this fed.

Bestia 666 vs. Rey Horus

These were the fly-ins and they worked their fly-in match. Bestia was kind of along for the ride, he threw some chops, grabbed a belt from a fan to hit Horus and based for all of Horus's spots. Horus does have some great individual spots, his tope con hilo was super fast and high, and his jumping DDT and dragon rana all look great. Still I didn't think either guy had a ton of superstar presence since I have been in Denver I have seen guys like Zumbido, Demus, Negro Casas and Blue Panther and while they weren't doing dragon rana's they connected to the crowd so much better then either of these two.

Really fun show, no match which would make an MOTY list, but I enjoyed every match I saw and it all moved at a nice pace, the Arena is set up great, with screens and lighting and raised balconies and I am excited that this fed runs every month. Hopefully if I am in town I can check out their AAA Supershow next month with Monster Clown, La Mascara, Pimpinela, Rey Escorpian, Drago, Aerostar, Averno and more.

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Wrestlemania Weekend Thursday Wrestlecon Supershow and Axcess Cherry Picking

Wrestlecon Supershow

Joey Janela vs. Penta el 0M

ER: I was curious what Janela could do here, since Penta is just beyond dullsville at this point. Penta is just about the most boring and uninspired guy these days when it comes to getting his shit in, completely disregarding any offense he has taken and just running through his sequences. I really liked him in the first season of LU and I can’t think of anyone whose stock has fallen farther in that time, while still maintaining a rabid fanbase. Janela looked good, hitting a bunch of nice full extension superkicks at well timed parts of the match, hitting a big superplex, a great dive down the stretch, and making Penta’s sometimes dodgy offense look good. Penta has terrible slingblades, but Janela made them work, really got good bounce off the backtracker, and the Penelope interference was used really well. I liked her yanking Penta’s foot to set up a superplex, and the finish with Janela leaping off the ropes into a superkick, and then Penelope doing the same, dodging one, and getting leveled by another was some fun BS. Penta is super predictable the whole match, but Janela mixed a couple things up and paced out a nice performance

ER: So Jerry Lawler threw a fireball that hit Joey Ryan in the tip of the dick, which is just fantastic. The execution was fantastic, the build up was great, and Ryan sold it for ages, as he should have. This was a comedy spot that paid off.

Jeff Cobb vs. Tomohiro Ishii

PAS: I am not the biggest fan of your Ishii slugfests, he always kind of comes off as third rate Takeshi Ishikawa, with out the selling or diversity to really take it to the next level. Still big dudes pounding on each other is a genre of match I am going to dig, and Cobb's power stuff is really fun. Wasn't a huge fan of the early endless elbow exchange, but this got pretty great by the end. Loved when Ishii got pissed off and started countering the elbow smashes by leaning in and headbutting Cobb's arm, nasty stuff and a cool variation of a fighting spirit spot. Cobb also had some out of control throws, he has such explosion with his hips and he chucks Ishii like a longshoreman throwing a bag of coffee. Couple of great headbutts too, with both guys reckless throwing their head at their opponent.

ER: That elbow exchange was interminable, but happily they got it out of the way really early in the match, instead of doing that thing where a match is peaking and we have to stop thing for some standing exchange. But we got that out of the way and then the match was able to do what it was supposed to do, which is to be a human recreation of BattleBots. Cobb brought maybe his meanest match ever, and dropped stuff like the standing shooting star, and instead focused on all of the big throws. It was appropriate to bring out the triple Germans on the weekend that Kurt Angle returns to the WWE big stage, and I don't know if Angle's ever looked as great as Cobb's here. The bridge was an impressive touch, and he mixes them up by even suplexing Ishii into the buckles. This was a long match with a lot of heavy lifting, and I was really impressed with Cobb's gas tank. He does a cool captured arm and leg suplex into a bridge, and at one point I actually yelled ROLLING OLYMPIC HELL when he grabbed Ishii in a head and arm choke. Cobb becoming a proxy Tamon Honda would be great for us. Ishii is just a total masochist, not leaving a match satisfied until his vertebrae are properly compressed. He lands a bunch of stiff arm lariats into Cobb's lungs, and I was really losing it when he pushed Cobb back across the ring by headbutting Cobb's strikes, just backing him up with his cinder block head, and Cobb had a bunch of great "Who the hell is this guy!?" faces. Cobb hits my favorite spot of the match by leaping head first into Ishii with a spectacular torpedo headbutt, and this match was one of the greatest versions of two large beer kegs becoming sentient and hurling themselves into each other that I've seen. This could have been bogged down by no selling suplexes and throw trading, but I loved how they ramped everything up, and loved how Ishii outlasted Cobb and won with a vertical suplex (you know, followed by a couple of brutal headbutts).

Rey Horus/Rey Fenix vs. Flamita/Bandido

PAS: I could imagine this was a blast to watch live, but it felt a little like a car with a gas pedal stuck on mash. Everything was worked at the same pace, it never felt like it had a chance to breath for me. Fenix was super impressive, in a match filled with freaky athletes, everything he did had an extra burst of speed and an extra pop of height. There was some crazy flipping on the ropes where he got knocked down bounced up and still hit a springboard, the balance was bonkers. I also really loved Horus's out of control surprise tope con hilo through the ropes, dives are so much cooler when they are out of nowhere like that. I hadn't seen much Bandido and he didn't do a ton for me, seems like he was setting up his signature counters too much, felt like a Dragon's Gate guy to me which is not a compliment.


WWE Axcess

Kassius Ohno vs. Keith Lee

PAS: Cool idea to run these short indy style matches at Axcess, hopefully more fancams show up. Hero is a guy I kind of forgot about, I don't watch a ton of NXT and he got memory holed a bit, but his is still fucking great. He may be the best leg slap striker in wrestling history, I know it is a lot of smoke and mirrors, but he really looks like he is murdering people with those shots. Lee seemed a bit cowed by a WWE stage, as his charisma was a bit muted, although he is still an impressive athletic marvel. I loved Hero taunting him only to get smashed with a pounce and firemans carry powerslam.

ER: Rachel and I saw a great show in SF last night, Soccer Mommy headlining with Oakland's extraordinary Madeline Kenney opening for her (and debuting some wildly great new stuff, check them both out on bandcamp), and between sets we watched this match on YouTube. I think Phil is totally on the money calling Hero the best thigh slap striker in wrestling. People make fun of that skill mostly because it's something we see done so much so badly, but Hero throws so many great strikes with well hidden slaps that it feels like a cool old theatrical art. Tajiri would be the other candidate, and I think it's a cool skill to learn so well. Lee was a bit more restrained than I was expecting, but Ohno sure helped Lee look great. It was crazy how high Ohno got on a slam and how far he flew off the Pounce. Lee leans into a bunch of high kicks and comes up with some cool surprises of his own, really liked a couple tornado back elbows he caught Ohno with. Shout out to whomever captured this and didn't get caught recording front row, super fun little match. 

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2015 Ongoing Match of the Year List

Rey Horus v. Steve Pain OWA 3/14

PAS: This is pretty much a Psicosis v. Rey Jr. for the 2015s, I am not sure either guy is a complete wrestler, but they dance together really well. Horus gets crazy, old school Gran Hamada height on all of his ranas and throws, while Pain gets whipped around in headscissors like Dick Togo. A lot of these exchanges feel like that kind of MPRO stuff, with even more speed and height. There are a couple of moments where Horus adjusts in midair, where he looks like a gymnast doing a rings routine. Some slow spots early, and the strikes should either be tightened up or removed, but this is a partnership really worth watching, and it is cool we got a nice singles between the two

ER: This did feel real exciting, while at the same time feeling like a tryout match showcasing all of your coolest rehearsed shit. But, when you got cool shit, you gotta show it off. Pain controls early and I really liked all of his flapjacks into strikes. Horus gets insane height every time he's tossed up in the air, and Pain is always there waiting with a kick or slap. Things slow down a bit in the middle and it's a clear calm before the storm, as once things kick in, they don't stop until the pin. Horus hits a wild dive and a huge rana to the floor, Pain SUWA's himself on tons of weird angle ranas and armdrags, Horus dropkicks so high he practically goes over Pain's head, Pain has even more cool moves involving tossing Horus into the sky and hoping for the worst, and yeah this ramped up into some awesome stuff.


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EVOLVE 41 4/17/15 Review

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

1. Anthony Nese vs. Martin Stone

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

2. Caleb Konley vs. Rey Horus

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

3. TJ Perkins vs. Biff Busick

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

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

4. Ethan Page vs. Rich Swann

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

5. Davey Richards vs. Johnny Gargano

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

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

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

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

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


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Pro Wrestling Revolution Workrate Report 3/7/15

Not sure what they're trying to do with this episode as they have Derek Sanders come out at the start of the episode with the rest of La Migra, and then we get about 5 minutes of him running down Mexicans. You know, real groundbreaking stuff like "Go back to Mexico" repeated several times. Most of it we can't hear because it's indy wrestling and it's never mic'd properly, but based on what was audible it's a promo we've all heard hundreds of times before. Now Sanders' match wasn't even on this episode, and they didn't advertise a match for him on any upcoming episode…so I guess they just really wanted to show 5 minutes of him running down Mexicans, and then show a singles match between two Mexicans? What's weirder is this Sanders promo took place on the October 2014 King City show, and the match that aired afterwards was from a January 2013 show in Watsonville, but the commentary guy kept acting like it was from the same King City show. Now, I have no idea what's to gain with pretending you were in King City instead of Watsonville. That's like correcting a police officer with "Actually officer it was my WIFE I strangled to death, not my girlfriend. You are mistaken." Both towns are places you wouldn't want to visit, so I'd love to hear the thought process behind pretending you were in the illustrious King City, and pretending the Sanders segment was from the same show as the match (even though the people in the crowd were completely different, and the walls were filled with advertisements for local Watsonville/Salinas businesses) is a weird and seemingly pointless decision.

1. Bestia 666 vs. Rey Horus

Now, I can understand why they'd want to show a match with Bestia 666, considering he was working Brian Cage on their 2/28 show in SF, but if the point was to highlight Bestia then it probably would have made more sense to show the match a week or two ago before the new show he was on actually took place. Now, last week they showed a Juvy match, which made a lot of sense since their SF show was later that night and Juvy was in the main event (although I'm pretty sure Juvy ended up no-showing and/or sending his father in his place, which really I think there's a higher likelihood of Fuerza putting in a fun high school gym performance than Juvy). So not sure why they felt the need to show a 2+ year old match and present it as happening 5 months ago. What's the difference at that point?

So I figured it would be kind of pointless to write up the match they actually showed, since it's over two years old and these two are frequent opponents. A quick search brought me to a match from 9/6/14, so I just decided to link to that one, and offer some words about it. Now I think this match was better than the one that aired, although it's not my intention to dump on the match that took place in PWR. The PWR match had less exciting sequences, and added in an extended run of Bestia climbing the buckles to get booed by the crowd, following by Horus climbing the same buckles to get cheers. That kind of thing seems like it happens so damn much in PWR matches. Yeah, I know, it's an easy way to get a reaction but man it bores me every single time. So the 9/6/14 match felt like much more of a fight, and 2 years on each guy felt more polished. Both guys had flaws, but Horus especially worked some nice real fast exchanges. A couple times it looked like the video had actually sped up, had to rewind to see if the video glitches (it hadn't). Wasn't sure what to expect and then early on Horus takes a nutty bump into the guardrail, really flying recklessly into it. That made me stand up and take notice. They each take turns chucking chairs at each other's face, Bestia lands a few stiff strikes, Horus hits a nice dive and a nice rana on the floor, overall a real fun match that didn't overstay its welcome.

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