Big Time Wrestling 7/29/16 TV

1. Christopher Black vs. Andre LeVeaux

Hosts Dragon Dave and Hank Renner Jr. keep telling us that the debuting (?) Christopher Black has a "worldwide reputation for violence" which, well...seems like a dubious claim. But I liked him, so that counts for something. Match was only 5 minutes but they accomplished enough to make the short time worthwhile. I've never seen Black before and only seen a little LeVeaux. They start with some amusing twisting wristlock reversals, silly but I liked the outcome. Black gains advantage by yanking LeVeaux to the mat by his dreads, which seems like an appropriate thing for a mean bald dude to do to gain an advantage over a guy with dreads. We get a couple of moments where Black transitions away from LeVeaux by yanking the dreadlocks, which is a great thing for a heel to do, but rarely has an opportunity to do so. I really liked LeVeaux's big comeback down the stretch, hitting a nice lariat and a really hard back elbow, then spiking Black with a dropkick in the corner. Black hits a big boot with nice follow through to end it in satisfying fashion, with LeVeaux going limp on contact, making me buy it. I'd really like to see more of these two, or shoot just know more about where they came from, how long they've been working, etc. (**Apparently they just debuted in April, which is really impressive**)

2. Victor Sterling & Jack Madison vs. Rik Luxury & Will Roberts

Man Hank Renner Jr. sure does say the word "kisser" a lot. Nobody can be punched in the face, it's always gotta be his "kisser". "Take a look at Rik Luxury's kisser." There's no way he just naturally talks like this. His shtick is...tiresome. You can also count on hearing "well-oiled machine" many times during every tag match. And this tag match was really good. Really, really good. But woefully short. They go 7, and I easily could have been down for 17. What we got was really good, but so cruel to have it taken away so quickly. Roberts and Luxury are a fun team (I dig teams with size differences) who kind of do a reverse Ricky Morton, with Roberts being in the ring more often but as a heel. It never went full heel-in-peril but it was an interesting layout. Sterling and Madison have some polished double teams and Sterling in particular had some of his best move execution all throughout. A simple Madison drop toe hold into a seated Sterling dropkick looks real great when executed so well and timed so nicely. Sterling throws some nice knees and Roberts makes offense look even better, I dug Luxury doing a sort of fisherman's suplex on Roberts to flip him onto Sterling, and the finish stretch was real good and excellently timed. But again, so cruel to keep this so short. Easily could have gone twice as long.

3. Christina Von Eerie vs. Davina Rose (6/26/09)

Davina Rose is obviously now Bayley, and this is a smart move by BTW to unearth a couple of her matches and showcase them. Eerie ambushes Rose to start and I don't know how Renner thinks it's ok to keep saying "Pearl Harbor job" over and over to describe what happened. When a really large wrestler gets knocked over does he call it "a realll 9/11"? He has an extreme problem just calling objects what they actually are, always has to have some quaint colloquialism for every damn thing. Von Eerie's boots are called "stompers". Good grief. yet he doesn't seem to know what any actual moves are called. "Guy who likes Gorilla Monsoon commentary and adds shitty changes to it" is never going to sound good. This is really early into Bayley's career, she probably had less than 10 matches at this point, and it shows. She's decent at selling and can get over vulnerability, but she doesn't know how to land when doing offense and doesn't really know how to take moves. She gets confused a couple times one time falling out of a bodyslam in a way I've never seen anybody fall out of a bodyslam before. Eerie looked better here than I think she presently looks, seemed like someone who got to a certain level and stopped trying as hard. Announcer Dragon Dave is a creep in this as he keeps bringing up Eerie's ass crack and complimenting the camera man on his nice work. We also cut to the crowd to see someone with a Quagmire sign saying "Alright Ladies". Yuck. Good move to show this match and let a new audience see Bayley's beginnings, and a terrible idea to not redo the commentary.

This was another good, tight episode. I know I keep saying they're good at filling their time, but it really is important when you only have 30 minutes to work with every week. Both new matches they showed were good, and while the final match was not good it's totally understandable and smart that they would show a Bayley match.

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Big Time Wrestling TV 7/22/16

More matches from their training facility this week. I don't have any dates on these shows but they all seem recent (okay, got confirmation that they happened in June 2016).

1. Kimo vs. Dylan Bostic

This match was good enough, but it felt rushed. It felt a little more like an exhibition. Hank Renner Jr. annoyed and also begrudgingly impressed me by using "folderol" in a sentence without making it sound out of place. Both guys did some things I liked here, with Bostic impressing me more. I really liked the stooging bump Bostic took to the floor off a Kimo forearm. It was one of those fun 3 part bumps that reminded me of something John Tatum might do, where he flops through the ropes, rolls to the apron, flops off the apron to the floor, etc. Was also impressed by the height he got on a standing rana, nice cravate, and little things he would do like catching a mule kick to the shoulder but immediately holding his jaw, and how he would cheat when facing the crowd (the set up of the building means the crowd is all on one side of the ring), holding the tights specifically when the fans could see it. They were nice touches.

2. Rik Luxury vs. Tony Vargas

Short match, just 5 minutes. I was really hoping for a little more as Luxury is a guy who can work a fun 8 minute match. Vargas seemed to tire out early and I'm not sure if that factored into the quick finish. There was also some confusion as both guys worked heel for the first couple minutes. Luxury complained about a hair pull, but right after Vargas was biting him behind the ref's back. Renner awkwardly talked about how Luxury is the one who is always untrustworthy, but then had to act like Vargas flat out biting a dude's face was just business as usual. Luxury looked good here, love his spot where he locks up with a guy and then gets tossed face down into the mat. He threw a couple great right hands, nice eye poke, planted Vargas with a nice DDT off the ropes. Vargas for his part threw out a nice spinebuster bomb, and a decent enziguiri.

3. Synn vs. Devin Danger

I really liked this one. Synn is a big guy and while Danger isn't exactly small he's clearly smaller than Synn. So we did get some nice brick wall spots with Danger smacking into Synn, and this was maybe the best I've seen somebody work around Synn. I dug Danger's cannonball into the corner, and then he one-ups it by doing a crazier missed one right after, which then leads to Synn hitting a massive one! Danger had some nice straight right hands, loved him finding new ways to slam into Synn and then bumping off it, and the ways he would sneak in offense like snapping Synn's neck over the top rope from the apron and following that up with an unexpected slingshot twisting moonsault. Synn hits his standing splash and Danger kicks out, so Synn hits another and Danger kicks out of that. I was expecting that to be it so suddenly we have a nice fighting underdog on our hands! But Synn splats him with a nice powerbomb (apparently 12 feet in the air, according to Hank Renner Jr....Yeesh.) to end it. This was my first time seeing Danger and I really dug him, would love to see more. Synn is a really big guy, kinda shaped like Akebono (but not THAT big) and brings something different to these shows.

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Big Time Wrestling TV 6/10/16

1. Victor Sterling vs. Ricky Mandel (3/25/16)

It got time, but didn't do a whole lot for me. Mandel really isn't that good, still have no clue how he got the LU gig. Although him being good may have been what lead to his eventual LU murder. He comes off real clumsy, so when he does standard cruiser stuff it always looks stumbly. He falls on his head doing that silly little backflip with his leg over Sterling's neck, falls short on superkicks, hits spin kicks in slow motion, just rarely looks good. Sterling had some nice stuff but didn't have a whole lot to work with here. Sterling's best stuff is always on the mat, as he's really good at grinding things out, pressing forearms into jaws, not showing tons of light on exchanges. But Mandel was really bad at taking some of his slightly more complicated offense. Some of the layout was there, this could have been much better with not-Mandel in there.

2. Rik Luxury vs. El Guerrero vs. Shane Kody (3/25/16)

When you get a Shane Kody match, you know what you're in for. Kody is the owner of the fed, the champion of the fed, the guy who never loses in the fed, the guy who rarely bumps in the fed, the guy who can't even let a heel get a visual pin, the guy who throws mostly chops. There are plenty of immobile workers in their 50s that I dig, but they all tend to be guys I loved or would have loved in their 30s. Kody works like a guy who was never actually a good worker at any age. The match goes far too long, and really only survives because it had a guy like Rik Luxury in there to glue things together. Guerrero is a real zero, a guy who looks athletic but never does a single athletic thing, and genuinely looks untrained. He hardly does anything you could even call offense. So Luxury had to have his boots on in this one, and luckily for me he did. He ably stooged around for Kody, at one point hilariously going up for a Flair turnbuckle flip but stopping half way through and delaying the upside down portion of the bump, before belly flopping back in the ring. He takes all of the bumps to the floor, makes a good point of falling into a bunch of front row fans as he's getting chopped around the ring, adds whatever ebbs and flows the match has (Kody essentially stands around the entire match, outside of one nice bump he takes after taking a shot with his cowbell), setting up the other two for their moments. Rik even breaks out a gorgeous asai moonsault. Did think Rik had it in him. So yeah, you knew this was going to be a Kody match. When the ref gets bumped after Kody takes a cowbell shot, he even kicks out of a fake pinfall counted by Luxury. The guy shows absolutely zero ass at any point. He's like HHH, but if HHH wrestled like five-years-from-now Jim Duggan. It's really a bummer. Still, Rik Luxury. Class all the way.

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Pro Wrestling Revolution Workrate Report 5/2/15

1. The Grapplers (Grappler III & VI) vs. Los Campesinos vs. Anarkia & Cazador del Alma vs. Los Chicanos (Memo Cuevas & El Pistolero)

You know you're hilariously bad at pacing your TV show when the show starts with ring entrances, then has to take a commercial break in the middle of the ring entrances, only to return for the rest of the ring entrances. I mean damn, guys. But you know? This match was actually quite good. Sometimes their multi mans can be kind of a mess, and this was still kind of a mess but had plenty of good. The Grapplers looked really good here. They're Rik Luxury and Bay Area vet Bobby Hart under masks with their long ponytail braids popping out the back. They're both the biggest guys in the match, but that doesn't stop them from breaking out some large dude topes. Hart has some cool offense and nice presence, his Psycho Driver looks crushing and rightly gets a pinfall, and I dug him slingshotting Anarkia into an ace crusher. He and Luxury bump around nicely for bigger guys. The dive train in this was a nice one, Anarkia especially had a nice one getting backdropped to the man pile. Oddly the match felt a little clipped, which would be amusing if they clipped the match but showed full ring entrances. Pistolero only got in towards the end, and other things felt rushed or skipped. Some of the match was designed to put over new valet Sada Simone who is a curvy pretty gal who apparently was on a TV show called The Real L Word, which existed, and she was on it. I don't know if it was reality or scripted reality or a drama or what. But she was on it. It is kinda funny to book a woman as distracting and foxy to men, when she's most famous for being a lesbian. The distraction spots were all clunky, through no fault of her own. The finish comes when a Campesino has Cuevas pinned for the likely win, but boneheaded referee Tom Castor stops counting the pin to tell Sada to get off the apron. I'm....unsure why he couldn't have finished counting the pinfall, as she was several feet away on the apron and not affecting the finish in the least. But then of course, as a tecnico, that Campesino has to threaten to forcefully tongue kiss Simone, while the announcer creepily chants "Beso". This leads to him losing. Woof. Still, with this fed it's best to ignore as much of the braindead stuff as possible and try and enjoy the good, and this match had more good than most. A bunch of big dives, really good performance from the Grapplers, some fun armdrags, and some decently paced action (until the too-quick eliminations).  This may have actually been the quickest paced match I've seen from this fed. Normally there is a lot of cliched rudo stalling, or ref shenanigans, or just guys that aren't good at working fast. Here they made good use of having a lot of fresh guys, as multi man matches always should. A pleasant surprise.

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Uprising: Lucha Libre Workrate Report 1/11/14

According to Pro Wrestling Revolution's website, this 7/28/12 show from Watsonville, CA was a show "that Watsonville, CA will never forget!" So either Watsonville had their socks knocked on their ass by some awesome wrestling, or there was a horrible tragedy that will necessitate in memoriam t-shirts printed up so that they never forget that one horrible, tragic day in Watsonville.

1. Kafu & El Dinamita vs. Rik Luxury & Famous B

Man Kafu just brings nothing to the table. He's sorta big, he has no presence whatsoever, almost all of his moves are horrible 2008 Roderick Strong backbreaker variations (a chokeslam into an over-the-knee backbreaker is so fucking stupid that he deserves crippled arthritic knees in his late 30s. That is the most indy-riffic move I have seen in a looooong time. I'm surprised it wasn't a chokeslam into a backcracker), he throws some wimpy clotheslines, he constantly telegraphs his spots, etc. He's just a bad worker, and he's not only been working for over a decade, but he's been pushed as a top Bay Area indy guy for almost as long. He was signed to WWE developmental  and worked as a doofus Brody clone for awhile. He wore big fur boots and did every trademark Brody spot, and then hilariously claimed in an interview that he had never heard of Bruiser Brody. I wish I could find some Brian De Palma interview circa-"Body Double" where he claimed he had never heard of Hitchcock, never seen "Rear Window, only heard of "Vertigo" in reference to dizziness. It should be noted that I *LOVE* Brian De Palma, and have never enjoyed a Kafu match in the slightest, so any "Blow Out" fans out there don't get all worked up thinking I was making a direct De Palma/Kafu comparison.

Pro Wrestling Revolution seems really obsessed with getting over their referees. The announcers talk about them constantly, way more than they mention the workers by name during a match. Sparky Ballard and Tom Castor, Sparky Ballard and Tom Castor, Sparky Ballard and Tom Castor. Tom Castor is a hispanic referee who works like a totally normal referee, but the announcers talk about him so much during the match it comes off really strange. You would never even notice him as a referee if they weren't constantly talking about him. It's so bizarre. A tecnico will take a big move, kick out, and the announcers will praise Tom Castor for being in position to make the call. Can you imagine CM Punk kicking out of the RKO and hearing the announce team put over Mike Chioda for counting? WWE has fucking Scott Armstrong as a ref and he's only even been referred to by name a few times over the last 8 years on TV. You know why? Because nobody watching pro wrestling gives a flying fuck about who is refereeing the match, even if it's somebody fucking killer like Scott Armstrong. Refs are fucking wallpaper. Keep that shit in the background.

Tag match itself was pedestrian. Kafu stinks, and Dinamita is a slightly better Kafu clone (they look really similar, Dinamita seems more athletic). Match structure is kinda killed as Famous B/Luxury have to act like Kafu and Dinamita are giant monsters, but Kafu and Luxury are essentially the same size, so you get a lot of fear stooging, but Kafu doesn't have an ounce of fearsome presence so this is kinda dead on arrival.

Also, not one second of lucha libre in this (there was an armdrag, so...there you go). I may have to retitle these "Uprising Lucha Libre: Not Sure What They're Going For Here" since I find myself saying that outloud whenever I watch it.

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Uprising Lucha Libre Workrate Report 12/1/13

These matches were from the 5/31/10 show at the Sacramento County fair. Outdoor show, probably blazing hot. And also, next week Blue Demon Jr. will have a big announcement! I'll give them credit for advertising a big name the week before.

1. Vinny Massaro & Rik Luxury vs. The Polyester Express (Matt Carlos & Dave Dutra)

This match was okay, something you may be mildly entertained by if you were there live. But when you think about it within the context of "we are paying money to air this match" then I wouldn't make sense to most people to have this representing your company. The Polyester Express is one of the lamest duds of a gimmick you could possibly saddle a couple guys with. It appears to be a disco gimmick, and both guys wear white bell-bottomish pants. That's the joke. But what's the point? There aren't any disco puns, they don't wrestle as if they were kooky disco dancers, they just have names and wear the pants. Matt Carlos is super bland, and wrestles the same no matter what the gimmick, so why have a gimmick? Disco Matt Carlos worked the same as Out of Control Matt Carlos who worked the same as heel Matt Carlos. It's just a lazy, irrelevant gimmick. It's like a shitty, easy Halloween costume. "Oh I'll just throw on some old pants and a zany shirt and be disco guy!" "Look, I'm a luchador because I wear this mask and sometimes I throw a dropkick!" It's disco portrayed by somebody who not only has not heard of disco, but isn't a huge music fan. The last great disco records were released almost 30 years before this. Who is their reference supposed to appeal to? If their entrance music was some cool Arthur Russell track or a Moroder b-side I'd shut my mouth. It's completely irrelevent to dress these guys in white pants and just go "Hey...Disco! Right!?" How is that pertinent at all to any sort of audience? Unless they are looking at working up to a bunch of long term music type gimmicks where we can build up to some sort of Disco Demolition match with a Dead Kennedys team against our Disco Defenders. There, look what I just shot out! Disco Defenders. My brain just spat out a better name for the team, as long as they're insisting on shoehorning them into a braindead do-nothing disco gimmick. Within the name Disco Defenders it already is implying how passe and irrelevant it is for two guys in their 20s to be working a disco gimmick in this decade, but at least gives them some sort of vague justification of them defending disco from the badmouthing it's (mostly wrongly) received since before they were born. But nope. We get Matt Carlos in white pants, working the same spots with the same mannerisms that Matt Carlos in black tights works.


2. Octagoncito vs. Pequeno Pierroth

We get a lot of stalling at first as Pierroth is super proud of his Puerto Rican flag. But Octagoncito is super proud of Mexico. So we have some capture the flag shenanigans, and I'm not sure why a war between PR and Mexico in front of a bunch of white people at a fair seemed like something that needed to happen. They work their standard match, although something seems a bit off and I'll probably just chalk that up to a couple of guys in masks working outside on a 90 degree day. Still they hit a cool dive sequence which looked extra nutty due to no mats around the ring, just the dirt.

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Uprising: Lucha Libre Workrate Report 11/17/13

More matches from the 5/30/09 show from Milpitas. Milpitas is the land of endless strip malls and a seemingly constant ass smell thanks to a large landfill. You *gotta* brag about running a show in Milpitas, so I totally get unearthing every match from that card, no matter how old. I actually emailed the owner of PWR asking him why they are showing old matches and hardly any new matches, while not actively pushing upcoming live events or any sort of merchandise. I was very polite, saying that I was very interested in seeing the two recent Santo matches that took place and wondering if they would ever be shown. I got a response fairly quickly that just said "Glad you watch our show. We air our library, sorry you don't agree." You see, they have a library that they have to show off, outside of any sort of context. What if some Joey Ryan completists were watching local paid-for programming on a Saturday and happened to catch this match, presented without any sort of date or purpose? Made that kids night. More than anything, that response told me that they don't actually have any idea why they air what they air, and have given minimal thought into why they air it.

1. Joey Ryan & Rik Luxury vs. Golden Lion & Chimaera

Fun tag that threatened to be ruined by lousy editing (cut to commercial right when the hot tag happens, back from commercials and the rudos are in control with no explanation of what happened). Luxury is one of the best Bay Area workers  and is kinda like a more modern Arn Anderson. Works cool spots that should be used more (like raking eyes with boot eyelets) and can build heat. Not sure who Golden Lion is but he had some nice headscissors (including a real cool one where he got vaulted over someone's shoulders and then hit a rana). Chimaera is the WWE's Ricardo Rodriguez (though hilariously I don't think they ever brought that up. Gotta keep that kayfabe alive!) and I've never actually seen him in a serious wrestling setting. Dude looked good and took some nice bumps. This was some perfectly fine wrestling, bizarre editing aside.

2. Derek Sanders & Zack Reeb vs. Human Tornado & El Amante

Short decent match. Derek Sanders was in both 2013 PWR matches opposite Santo, but I guess it's probably a better idea to show a 5 yr. old match against two guys who haven't worked the promotion since 2010. That should make your fed seem like a bigger deal. They also regularly talk about Amante's normal tag partner Ulysses a lot during the match, who again hasn't worked the fed since 2010. Sanders looks pretty meh here, normally looks better. Here he leaned way out of spin kicks and stuttered on some bumps. For some reason they keep calling Human Tornado "El Snowflake" here, despite him just dressing and wrestling like Human Tornado. Makes sense. There were fun spots here if you turned your brain off. But good lord this show makes my brain hurt.

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