Matches from Black Label Pro 2/2/19

Daniel Makabe vs. Rory Gulak

ER: Fun on paper match that totally ruled, real tight 11 minutes of cool grappling and almost lucha maestro submissions, with some nice strikes and a boss suplex peppering the action. Makabe is getting gigs all over the place now, so I didn't used to even think about "dream matches" as I felt lucky enough we got to see guys like Thatcher and Navarro work the PNW (and shoot, on this card I'd love to see him against Bateman), but even then I don't think I would have thought about Gulak as a "dream" match-up. But they're super complementary and Gulak gets hyper focused when in with a guy like Makabe. There's a lot of comedy Gulak out there, but he can be a real pitbull and I'm glad that's who we got. The minimal comedy we did get (Gulak being squirrely during a knucklelock) was put over nicely by Makabe, who then punished him for wasting his time. The ground game was really fun from both guys, especially liked Gulak tying up Makabe's arm and leg, and another time touching both his arms behind his back while wrenching his neck. That looked like a finisher sub right there. Makabe has a nice STF and a good brain that's always looking for a limb or neck to crank, always working to set up one sub only to pivot to grab the sub he actually wants. These two make something fairly innocuous - like a series of waistlock reversals - feel really exciting, simple single leg takedowns become highspots, and Makabe doesn't cheap out on things like snapmares, always throwing them tightly. The strikes were laid in tightly throughout, short elbows from mount, a nice brief stand and trade capped with the Big Unit punch, and my favorite quick sequence where Rory brags to the crowd and gets snapped over into a nice German. Makabe's corner dropkick lands hard and I liked his surprise Teddy Hart leg sell after that lead to Gulak locking in an absolutely vicious kneebar that looked like it was going to touch Makabe's sole to his head. This was super brisk and always violent, always cool. One of my favorite show openers of the year.

25. Sadkampf (Dominic Garrini/Kevin Ku) vs. WorkHorsemen (Anthony Henry/James Drake)

PAS: After Garrini's weekend stealing performance in NYC, I am tracking down all of the Sadkampf. This was a total blast, just four guys teeing off on each other. We get an opening mat section with Garrini and Henry and it really makes me want to see them match up in Bloodsport 2020, fast takedowns, cool reversals. Henry mostly is a workrate junior, but can really roll if he wants to. Everyone goes to the floor, and we get a great arena tour brawl, which ends with Garrini smushing Drake with a running knee into the wall. It is two on one for a while, until Drake comes crawling back for the tag. I think they went a bit long after the dramatic hot tag, and the finish run wasn't as good as the body of the match, but man these are four guys who will unload.

ER: I might have liked this even more than Phil. The only portion of the match I didn't really like was a middle section that saw Garrini and Ku kind of just standing around waiting to be hit several times. That slowed down the pace of what was - before and after - a smoking match. When a match is built around 100% asskicking and not cool moves, it's going to have a really high floor. And these guys can all hit. I was really impressed with Garrini's strike selling in this match, a feature of his I've never really noticed before. Henry has a lot of kick combos (and a lot of cool kick combos!) and I loved the way he attacked Garrini with leg kicks and a big variety of spin kicks and high kicks. Garrini sold them in a fun off balance way while finding many different ways to fall down. I especially liked him getting knocked off balance, teetering on one leg, before face planting. The crowd brawl was fun and peaked with Drake missing his cannonball into a wall and eating a nasty knee from Garrini. Sadkampf can throw some vicious knees and chops (Garrini's palms together chop to Drake's neck is just unfair) and we got those in spades. It can be hard to keep building up fans to a finish when you have multiple "all four men knocked down" moments, but I thought the pace did a good job of escalating and deescalating fans. I really liked the finishing stretch and felt it build like some of the hotter Kings Road tags, really liked the focus on painful partner saves (Henry doing a double stomp from the top to break up a pin, Garrini hitting a heavy senton), and it was cool seeing what both teams could string together for painful match finishing combos. This was an awesome tag.

Tyler Bateman vs. Gary Jay

ER: Two guys I like, having a match that I didn't really like! Opening up a match with a lonnnnng chop battle isn't going to do much to win me over, no matter how beet red both guys get from them. We already had a zillion nasty chops and red chests during the tag match, stacking a card with a bunch of white guys getting their chests beaten red feels like BLP is catering more to a fetish market. And you have to make money where you make money, so if it helps the merch tables I don't really care. This match had a lot of good ideas but they weren't really integrated well into an overall match. There was a little bit too much of a disconnect to the bigger spots, Bateman obviously landing his head a foot away from the apron on the big DDT, an obviously thigh slapped headbutt on the finish, and honestly that's fine. I'd rather these two not brain themselves into CTE, but the close up magic has to look better. I still like both guys and both guys have cool moments here, a nice lariat from Bateman results in Jay getting absolutely upended, and both guys hit plenty hard, just not as often during the moments that were supposed to be KO shots.


ER: This show had some cool looking fat guys stuck in multimans that I didn't really want to watch, so I'll keep coming back to BLP. It's easy when there always seems to be a match as good as that tag, a real brawl with awesome build, an easy add to our 2019 Ongoing MOTY List. I was also a big fan of Makabe/Gulak, with Makabe really crafting a fun 11 minute match. I like these guys.

Read more!

PREMIER XII 3/6/16 Review

PAS: Premier is one of my favorite promotions in the world, it is kind of a NorCal EVOLVE focusing on a grappling heavy style and using Jeff Cobb and a bunch of lesser known but really talented guys

ER: Premier really seems to be the place where NorCal guys I like go to have their best matches. Definitely my favorite fed around my area (albeit with an annoying habit of running Sunday night shows 2+ hours away from me. Selfish.) and I love that they put their full shows up online (well, all except for that awesome show I saw last year with a great Thatcher/Graves match). Happy they made it to 3 years, hope they put in many more.

PREMIER XII FULL BROADCAST


1. Douglas James vs. Manny Mars

PAS: This was a opening juniors match, worked very much in the style of 2016 opening juniors matches. Pretty well executed, some cool if not unique spots, doesn't outstay it's welcome. I liked James a fair amount, he didn't have anything flashy which stood out, but his stuff looked really crisp and he hit a nasty corner dropkick after doing a World of sport style one foot turnbuckle climb in the other corner. Liked the finish a bunch too, with Mars putting on a guillotine choke and James lifted him into a vertical drop cutter.

ER: Well paced juniors bout with some well done if emotionless stuff in it, and some nitpicky annoying stuff. But pace, build and spot on the card are important factors, and it did well considering all of those things. There were little things that bugged me, like James not ducking at all when rope running past Mars, requiring Mars to miss clotheslines at an obnoxious 3/4 arm slot; but I liked that they didn't approach overkill, loved some of the moments (though the ones I loved that most were the dropkick and vertical suplex out of the guillotine that Phil already mentioned), and you get the sense that these two will be able to acclimate nicely to most opponents.

2. Buddy Royal vs. Marcus Lewis

PAS: I really liked this too Lewis is pretty green but has a lot of explosiveness. He had a nice looking pele kick, double stomp and has a really high leapfrog. This was the first time I have seen Royal and he was great. He has really simple but brutal offense, lots of stiff chops and violent attacks on Lewis's knee. At one point Lewis grabs Royal by the throat and Royal responds by stomping him right on the side of Lewis's knee. Finish was super cool with Royal pinning Lewis on a roll up by torqueing his bad knee so he couldn't power out.

ER: Killer little match with Buddy breaking out some things I haven't seen from him and Lewis showing himself to be a game underdog. I've enjoyed Buddy in his team with Levi Shapiro (The Classic Connection), but haven't seen him in many - if any - singles matches, so this was a nice treat. His attacks on Lewis' knee were great, and that short standing kick to the inside of his ankle/knee was sick, felt like something you'd see some lumpy Russian break out in RINGS. I loved how Lewis peppered in comebacks (though the deadlift fireman's carry was a bit much considering the story of the match), like Royal working the leg close to the ropes and getting kicked over the top to the floor (a sort of trademark Royal spot). All of those stomps to Lewis' knee while it was hung on the ropes were rough, and that finish was one of the coolest I've ever seen. I expect tons of guys to steal that it word ever gets out: Royal has Lewis' legs cradled the way you would after a victory roll, and while pinning him he twists Lewis' bad knee in an ankle lock. Just a nasty exclamation point on a super fun match.

3. Dalton Frost vs. Gabriel Gallo

PAS: This was a big guy slugfest match and was technically fine, however if you are going to work this kind of Hansen v. Vader match you really have to hit harder. Frost had a nice clothesline and senton and Gallo had one potatoish punch, but most of this was a little too loose to really pull off what they were trying to do.

ER: Boy I did not get any of the looseness that Phil mentions, and can't really figure out what parts he thought were loose. For a big part of the match we mainly get the stationary camera set up at the back of the building, which might have taken away from how hard they were hitting each other (no clue why we didn't get the ringside camera for some of these shots), but these two totally hit each other hard for 6 minutes. Frost clotheslining Gallo to the floor was really impressive, like a big dirt mover going up a hill. Gallo's big powerslam later was just as impressive. But I dug both guy's shots, the big clubbing blows from Frost, the huge chops from Gallo that made Frost's chest glow an impressive shade of red (again, those chops and the clothesline to the floor were all shown from far away camera, on the far side of the ring, maybe that played into the perception). And yeah, the shots that looked the best were when they were actually using the ringside cam, with Frost landing his awesome falling lariat and splatting him with a senton, and that punch to Frost's eye in the corner was nasty and I love how it lead to the finish. Seriously, this match was not loose in the least.

4. Tyler Bateman vs. Jeff Cobb

PAS: This was totally awesome, maybe my favorite non-Matanza Cobb singles match ever. Bateman is woking one of the dozens of old-timey Sasparilla Brooklyn bartender gimmicks, but is a pretty skilled grappler and is willing to take a huge beating. He tries to keep Cobb at bay by ripping at his fingers and landing sharp 12 to 6 elbows,  but Cobb keeps hurling him with nasty suplexes, especially loved Cobb chucking him neck first into the turnbuckle, finish was really great too.

ER: Super fun match, Bateman is one of my favorite local guys at this point, someone who I think could get over anywhere in the country. When we first saw him live a year ago nobody knew what to think, and he totally won us all over in a really good match against Thatcher. He always plays a kind of conniving underdog, never really controlling a match but always one sly move away from doing damage and capable of surprising opponents. I loved him picking apart Cobb's arm here, and all the ways Cobb would punish him for doing so. Cobb does one of the all time great European uppercuts here, really looking like it would dislocate Bateman's head from his body. And Bateman does an all time great sell of a Cobb snap suplex, really nailing all the feelings. Most guys just do a dazed loopy sell, but Bateman walks you through everything he could possibly be feeling: hot fire shooting through his lower back, tailbone aching, fingertips tingling. Cobb launches him with a nasty delayed German, and then another into the buckles. Bateman comes back with a couple of big knees, and I loved how he would pounce onto Cobb after felling him, using his whole body to gain any advantage over a fallen beast. We get a great slick elbow pad removal, finish was a fun surprise, and I'd love to see these two continue to match up.

5. Shayna Baszler vs. Colleen Schneider

PAS: This is actually a rematch from the qualifiers for the Rousey v. Tate season of the Ultimate Fighter. Bayzler got on the show and had several UFC fights while Schneider (no relation) has been fighting in Invictus. Fun shootstyle match especially from two girls who are pro-wrestling rookies (this was Schneider's debut). Schneider actually may have looked a little better, he knees were especially nasty including one in the corner which looked like it cracked Bayzlers ribs. Bayzler had some very cool armwork and was able to make it two straight armbar submissions over Schneider.

ER: I really liked this, can't believe it was Schneider's first match and Baszler herself is under 10 matches. There were several cool moments and the whole thing really impressed me. I dig Schneider's look, she's like an anime bounty hunter. Her knees looked great and then she would break out something totally unexpected, like that axe kick while holding Baszler's arm, flipping Baszler into a prone armbar position. Then that awesome missed high kick spot in the corner, leaving Schneider's leg draped over the top rope so Baszler could pull off an awesome high angle powerbomb. Loved some of Baszler's little things, like kneeling on Schneider's stomach to secure a wristlock, and the grappling and scrambling looked expectedly great from both. Again, a really impressive debut, but it would have been a match I dug no matter what the experience level was.

6. Raze vs. Nicole Savoy

PAS: This is for the Premier women's title, and was a match with some very good stuff, and some fun ideas which I am not sure really came together. Raze is a big girl, and puts some girth behind her shots mostly, there was some stuff that looked off (her spear is more Edge then Goldberg), but I liked her and am excited to see what she does with Bayzler. Savoy had some good intentions, she was working this like a Premier style grappler, and had a nice counter from an armbar into a LaBell lock, but she tried some things she couldn't pull off, including a series of German suplexes where she couldn't clear Raze and a back handspring out of nowhere which existed solely to get countered. Not great, but I like what they are trying to do with their women's division.

ER: I liked this more than Phil, but also thought that Savoy's Germans looked good and didn't see the problem with her not clearing Raze. She is smaller than Raze, it would have looked weird anyway for her to be chucking her around. But I thought they looked good. The handspring on the other hand needs to just not be used by any wrestler anymore. Just drop it. Everybody. The only guy who does a cool one is Stuka Jr. with his crazy no hands "hand"spring, and even he does it more as a celebratory taunt, not to set up offense. Let's put a moratorium on the handspring! I felt a bigger problem with the match was working several full extension armbar spots right after a match that featured an immediate tap after an armbar, by two actual pro fighters. You could argue it didn't end this match immediately because Savoy is not a pro MMA fighter, so the application wasn't as strong, but you could also do the counterpoint of that and wonder why Raze's arm was able to stay hyperextended so much longer. Either way, unfortunate decision on this card, right after that match. But overall I really liked the match. I've seen Raze work a comedy slip and fall artist, and seen her as a bully, and seen her as a combo of both. Here she's all bully and it's good. She has some nice powerful thrust kicks to Savoy's chest that are really brutal. I think Savoy is a real good babyface, and I love that her presence on a card brings in some young kids who then get to also see other awesome pro wrestling. She's a good "quality pro graps" ambassador :) I like how Savoy set up her rope walk armdrag by getting caught with it earlier, liked some of Raze's big overhand chops, and loved the crossface ending, with Savoy locking it on tight and Raze making it look great. Good match.

7. Joe Graves vs. JR Kratos

PAS: Great, great match, pretty different from much I have seen in wrestling before, almost like if Yoshiaki Fujiwara got a chance to work Brock Lesnar in a shootstyle match. Graves was desperate to grab a limb and twist, while Kratos was attempting to pound his head in with some of the most brutal looking ground and pound I have seen in a pro wrestling match. We also go some very cool shoot throws including Kratos nestea plunging with Graves on his back. At one point Kratos throws a shoot piledriver which didn't look smooth at all, but looked like how you piledrive someone in a streetfight.  There was a running bulldog and top rope back elbow by Graves near the end of the match, which was really out of place for what they were doing before, but that was my only complaint, loved the finish, really perfect flash submission. Such good stuff, Graves is the best wrestler no one talks about.

ER: Man what a fight, totally different than any other Kratos match I've seen. This was all about Graves staying tight and trying to smother him, trying to rip his arm off, not wanting to put space between them so he could avoid any Kratos bombs. You can see the frustration building on Kratos' face, not being able to shake this guy, and Graves is like a giant squid in all the ways he stays attached to his prey. Kratos shakes him in several different nasty ways, the nestea plunge, blasting him insanely hard to the cerebellum with a forearm, trying to slam him a couple times, trying to choke him, and it seemed like no matter what he would do Graves would just latch on. Graves would fight for that arm, throw body shots, throw shots at random parts of Kratos' body that he wasn't expecting, in an effort to get that arm. And all that is why that shoot piledriver spot is so perfect: It works as a desperation move, it works as a move to get dominance, it works as a surprise to your opponent, it works as a game changer.  One of my favorite wrestling moments I've ever seen (and I'm sure I'm far from the only one) is the finish to the Arn Anderson/Alex Wright match at Slamboree '95.  Arn fakes a left, Wright ducks, Arn nails the ducking Wright with the DDT. Ingenius pro wrestling spot. So when Kratos threw a right, Graves ducked and Kratos didn't hesitate to immediately plant him with that piledriver, I flipped out. New twist on a great moment. Phil is entirely correct that Graves is the best wrestler than no one talks about. He doesn't make tape much, doesn't work east coast, yet is never short of awesome whenever he turns out. Kratos is one of the hardest working guys I know, and he keeps improving, keeps trying new things, keeps looking for ways to get better. It's exciting to see. These two really meshed for something special, can't wait to see how they continue to improve.


ER: Well this was just another typical great Premier show, the guys really ramp things up when they work this fed. It's really something to see, and I can't wait for more. Cobb/Bateman and Graves/Kratos were both awesome enough to land on our 2016 ONGOING MOTY LIST and I have no doubts that we'll see other Premier matches show up on that list before the year is out.

Read more!

Big Time Wrestling TV 6/24/16

1. Ruby Raze vs. Kahmora (2/19/16)

They've added a "ref cam" for a couple parts of this match, which is wholly unnecessary. I don't think a ref cam has ever looked good. Modern ref cams come off looking almost exactly the same as when they first toyed with this gimmick 25 years ago. The benchmark is still early 2000s AAA ref cam which would have an ear piercing BEEP sound every couple of seconds while we were in ref cam view. Anyway, I had seen these two on the opposite side of a Premier tag match last year, with Raze and Kikyo opposite Kahmora and Savoy. I really liked that tag, but this fell a little short. A lot of strikes whiffed, there was some miscommunication moments, Raze had some awkward moments backing into position for moves and sandbagging Kahmora on a German. It went pretty early into big move epic feel, with a DDT on the apron, big neckbreaker with Kahmora draped over the top (which the hilariously inept Hank Renner Jr. calls "out of nowhere!" even though she carefully set it up for several seconds, and the only other move she can do from there would have been a high angle DDT), and then planting Kahmora with a nice back suplex for the win. I could see them having a better match, as several moments seemed a step off. They do each seem better in a tag setting though.

2. Jack Madison vs. Tyler Bateman (5/13/16)

Bateman is a guy I really like, who often seems to match up against opponents who aren't really used to his style. I did see an awesome match with Thatcher once and loved it, but typically he's working nasty wrist locks on vanilla babyfaces. Here he is working nasty wristlocks against a vanilla babyface with a Top Gun gimmick! Disappointed that Bateman cut off his long locks, I really liked his jerk ponytail. Now he just looks like a skinnier modern Anthony Kiedis. But the arm and wrist work is still nasty. This match was real fun with Bateman wrenching on Madison's arm, bending his wrist at some seriously sick angles, bending and biting at his fingers, while leaving plenty of room for Madison to make comebacks. Bateman would always come back to the arm and Madison was game for selling it. At one point Bateman had Madison's arm over the top rope and was pulling hard on it back through the middle rope, really rough stuff. Finish was pretty standard 80s babyface stuff, selling for 85% of the match and then hitting a couple moves to win, but the moves looked nice and Bateman got nice height taking a rydeen bomb. Madison really needs to figure out how to do a legsweep though, as it looked far more like Bateman dropped him with a DDT. Madison is pretty new though, so hopefully he grows out of the phase where he looks like he does moves to himself. Bateman is a real fun talent and I hope he pops up on TV more. I always dig seeing him.

Hank Renner Jr. is just the worst though, officially one of my all time least. Everybody is a "student of the game" or some shit, and whatever his phony ass Gorilla Monsoon catchphrase gimmick is, it's failing badly.  His vocal and verbal presence on TV is a net negative.

Read more!

APW 6/12/15 War at the Shore Road Report

APW has been running quarterly shows at a community center up the hill from the Cow Palace, and they've been getting some good, lively crowds with tons of kids. We've been to a few of them (maybe all of them?) and figured hey, why break the streak?

1. Truex vs. John Redito

This was a "dark match" so it was kept to about 3 minutes. Truex is a real great slime, skinny with long greasy hair and a real punchable face. The kind of guy who should not ever work face. Redito is a short chubby Filipino guy who did not look very good. Truex had a couple nice suplexes, but this wasn't much.

2. Reno Scum & Nicole Savoy vs. Joey Ryan, Candice LeRae & Ryan McQueen

This match was a blast and probably the best of the night. Scum were supposed to team with Christina Von Eerie but for reasons not given she was replaced by Savoy, which only helped the match. CVE is not good, and Savoy looks better every time I see her. Ryan and LeRae have their schtick down (dig their matching gear and Joey's white members only jacket), and it works. McQueen was pretty bland. Savoy gets to be the star of the match which I was not expecting, but she totally worked up to it and looked awesome. She has long legs and throws big high kicks, decking LeRae at one point (who did a nice falling tree bump) and throwing nice strikes all around. This all builds to a triple dive into the entranceway, with  Savoy's being particularly wild as she flips completely over (think those wild old Shocker dives). We get an absurd tower spot with McQueen taking the worst of it and doing some great Terry Funk fish flops, and we get tons of suplexes all around. LeRae throws her ball grab suplex to Lester, Savoy dumps LeRae on her head with a nasty German, Joey Ryan does a sleazy suplex on Savoy while grabbing her boobs, everybody gets left in a pile. Fun match, went the right amount of time, and Savoy is somebody I want to see more.

3. Pistolero vs. "Out of Control" Matt Carlos

Ahhhh, one of my least favorite gimmicks in wrestling. Matt Carlos - aside from making the choice to devote his life to professional wrestling - is oftentimes the most in control wrestler on a card. He has a normal haircut, he has no tattoos, probably drives a fairly fuel efficient car, has likely never shared needles when doing intravenous drugs, has likely never committed arson, and wrestles just about the most boring indy style you can imagine. You can call Matt Carlos plenty of things, but "Out of Control" is really not one of them. Carlos has a bunch of moves that need to be set up by kicking a guy in the stomach, and not only do the kicks to the stomach look bad, but the moves aren't too inspired either. Pistolero throws a couple of decent punches, plants himself nicely on a DDT, and has hair and facial expressions that are clearly more out of control than "Out of Control" Matt Carlos, and man this stunk. It all built to what was supposed to be a big spot, which was Pistolero giving Carlos a Russian leg sweep into the ring post, with Pistolero in ring and Carlos on the apron, but Carlos missed the post completely and just kinda fell to the floor, and Pistolero ended up looking like the one taking the move. Not good.

4. Timothy Thatcher vs. "The Butcher" Tyler Bateman

Hmmmm, maybe *this* was the best match of the night. Tough call. The 6 man was a fun spotfest, these guys went out working a body part based mat match. Personal preferences I suppose, but both hit the right marks. I had never seen Bateman before, and he's...well I don't quite get what he is. He's called the Butcher, and I suppose he vaguely sorta somewhat looks like Daniel Day Lewis in Gangs of NY (he has the quirky handlebar mustache at least), but then has a long ponytail, wore weird capri leopard print tights (I thought there was a pro wrestling rule that only islanders can wear capri tights...) that had a cartoon bunny with a handlebar mustache. But he doesn't really act quirky or odd. I just don't see how the whole package fits together. The match itself was just 9 or 10 minutes, but everything was paced nicely so that it didn't feel too short. All the opening mat stuff was good, as you'd expect from a Thatcher match, with Thatcher locking in some nasty wrenched in cravates, and then Thatcher began working over Bateman's right hand. Thatcher is a guy who always has compelling hand work, but it doesn't always factor in to anything later, so it was awesome when Bateman broke free of Thatcher's mat stuff, then belted him real good, only to have to shake out and hold his fist, which gave Thatcher time to belt him back. Bateman abandoned the mat game and started throwing strikes at Thatcher, hitting him with a nice straight kick that allowed Thatcher to do his really great sell where he drops to his butt. Thatcher lures him back into exchanging elbows, but it's a trap to set up Thatcher's great out of nowhere Fujiwara arm bar for the win. This was a pretty basic Thatcher match but that will always be a good thing, and Bateman's selling added to things. So basically the two matches I was hoping would pay off on the card, have paid off. So I'm a happy camper.

5. Idris Jackson & "The Mad Tongan" Sione Finau vs. Buddy Royal & Mikko Maestro-Shapiro

Well this was a waste of everybody's time. Short match with not much happening anyway, and then it ends when Finau turns on Jackson. Finau/Jackson have been teaming for awhile, but they haven't teamed much at the Bayshore shows, and most of the people at these shows only go to the Bayshore shows. So the break-up didn't really mean much to the majority of the crowd. As far as bright spots, Donovan Troi is always an amusing heel manager, usually more entertaining than the guys he manages. And I had never seen Mikko before and he's a great entitled white douche, wearing a wrestling singlet that says "Varsity", and he has this obnoxious fluffy white hair and rosy cheeks. You know he'd have an awful flesh beard if he could grow one. Couldn't get much of a feel for him as a worker, but his douche presence was high end.

6. Willie Mack vs. MVP

The battle of secondary TV wrestling promotions!! Slow-paced but smartly worked match. It's nice seeing MVP not dogging it post-WWE. The guy has worked hard in TNA and in the indies, just nice to see. He and Mack worked pretty stiff, with MVP at first laughing him off and Mack laying in some insanely loud chops, with MVP responding nicely with some hard forearms to the jaw. They took it to the floor with MVP hitting a pescado and then a mean yakuza kick over the ring barrier. Back in and Mack hits a couple of his impactful and beautiful dropkicks, but misses a huuuuuge frog splash, really committing to that miss and doing a big belly flop. Finish could have been better as MVP hits a couple Plays of the Day that Mack kicks out of, which is good as that really doesn't seem like a viable 2015 finisher. But then MVP kinda whiffs on the Drive-By and it gets the win anyway. It seems like it would be easy to work out a secondary finish ahead of time, something like "hey if my kick doesn't land I'll yell something like ONE MORE and do it again". Something like that wouldn't even look like a re-do, it would look like somebody putting an exclamation on the finish. MVP would look better as the kick would land better, and Mack would look better for looking like it took two of them to put him down. It's surprising that more guys don't work out audibles like that ahead of time.

7. Bobby Hart vs. Virgil Flynn

Had higher hopes for this one as I like both guys, but it barely goes 4 minutes. Virgil hits a nice SUWA pump dropkick that Hart bumps kind of recklessly into the corner, also hits a wild standing corkscrew senton off the top, and a stiff cannonball senton. But Hart kinda just brushes him off and crushes him for the clean win. Would have liked to see more from Hart as this was kinda worked like Virgil getting his highlights before Hart just decided it was time to go home.

8. Marcus Lewis vs. Roberto Rodriguez

Well this was really fun! It's possible RR was not using that name, but I missed what name he's using on the indies now. This was another match that went just the right amount of time. Rodriguez gave Lewis a lot here: leaned into a big shoulderblock, and admirably bounced his face off the mat taking a  rana while on his knees. Rodriguez gets a nice fast snap suplex, but really Lewis took most of the match with some pretty awesome stuff: big dive to the floor, and then an insane reverse rana that RR takes like a complete lunatic. I mean RR just planted himself vertically and stayed that way for a split second. It looked disgusting and was easily the spot of the night. Lewis hits the 450 and that's that. Nice little showing from both guys. Damn that rana was gross.

9. "Mr. Athletic" Jeff Cobb vs. JR Kratos

Was really excited for this one, and it delivered. Both guys are meaty tough guys so seeing them slam into each other is always fun. Cobb has freakish Backlund strength so seeing him do a one arm vertical suplex to a guy as thick as Kratos is always eye popping. Cobb has added a nasty headbutt into his arsenal and it always adds with a gross smack. Both guys throw some rough shots to the other's jaw, Cobb ends up laid up over the bottom rope and Kratos hits a great running knee on the floor (think Roman Reigns' dropkick but as a nasty jumping knee), and later does his nice running dropkick in the ring. Cobb didn't do as much flying as he normally does and this was worked more like a slugfest which is fine with two big guys. Finish kind of fell flat. On paper it wasn't a bad idea, it was a KO stoppage with Kratos beating Cobb unconscious. But their ring placement could not have been worse. The way the crowd is situated is three sides of the ring have people on them, with the entranceway taking up all of the 4th side (and the most seats being the side opposite entrance). Well the did the mounted punches on the side of the ring with no fans, meaning Kratos' back was to 60+% of the crowd and you couldn't see any of the shots landing. So not only did anybody see the finish coming, but most people literally couldn't see how why the shots would be devastating enough to KO Cobb. The idea doesn't sound bad on paper, but it wasn't executed great.

10. Jinxx, Jeckles, Dylan Drake, Jody Kristofferson & Will Cuevas  vs. KMJ, Damien Grundy, Will Rood, The Almighty Sheik & Boyce LeGrande

Well this was a giant mess. This was billed as Team APW (that first team up there) vs. The Animal Farm. But the match structure was pointlessly absurd. Instead of just doing a 10 man tag, it was War Games rules, where a new person would come in every minute, but eliminations could happen at any time, and you could get eliminated by getting thrown over the top rope as well as pinned. It was also No DQ, but you couldn't pin the guy outside the ring. So basically not too long into this you just had guys wandering around the ring hitting each other, but to eliminate them they always had to find a way to implausibly make their way back to the ring. It was billed as a team based match, but there was minimal semblance of teamwork throughout and it came off WAY more like an every man for himself match. Since there was no sort of flow whatsoever to this, and parts really dragged, I'll just hit a few notes on certain guys: standouts in the match were Will Rood and amazingly, The Sheik. I've never seen Sheik look good in any match, but a no DQ match where he can wander around and hit people with shit seems to be an environment he thrives in. He showed a lot of personality and came across great running through the crowd and hitting people with chairs and trashcans. Rood had some nice stuff too, including a molar rattling clothesline. Kristofferson showed some fire and got a surprisingly huge reaction. I had no idea he was so popular. He kinda looks like Bison Smith and acts like kind of a reckless asskicker, but needs to tighten up his strikes a lot more. It would be one thing if they looked dangerous, but they just sort of look not good. Jinxx hit a nice dive and a massive corner dropkick, and seems to be improving. I think he hasn't been wrestling very long. A bunch of his stuff still looks bad, but he's looked better each time I've seen him. Dylan Drake is the most forgettable wrestler ever. I have seen him live at minimum 10 times, and my friends and I always marvel how we never remember a single thing he did in his matches. If he was really horrible we'd remember that, and if he was actively good we'd remember that. But he's just an instant distant memory. Amusing anecdote: Our friend Brian joined us this time, and he is not in on our Dylan Drake "most forgettable wrestler" joke. But he's definitely seen him live several times before. So when Brian asked "Hey who is this guy? Is he new?" we all burst out laughing and poor Brian thought we were laughing at him, but we were just tickled he helped prove our point. The best thing about Drake is his robe, and he didn't even wear his robe tonight. He has this really awful full back piece tattoo that just looks like colorful spin art, and it seems to get bigger every time we see him. It is a tattoo completely devoid of interest, creativity, personality, etc. It is a tattoo somebody gets if they have no idea what to get a tattoo of...except they keep adding to it and adding to it, for reasons they possibly don't know. They're driven to add to this shapeless splattery mess of a tattoo, it is beyond their control. What is driving me to keep making this bigger!? It is slowly taking over my body, slowly spreading to my lower back. Soon it will creep around to my stomach and onto my arms. What could be happening to me!? What am I infected with!? Why does my back now look like a blurry polaroid of a sunset reflected in a murky lake!?!? Dylan Drake threw surprisingly nice mounted punches. The end.

Show went on way too long. Ten matches is just wayyyyyyy too much wrestling. I was yawning by the end and it wasn't even that late. It's just too much and we really don't need to find a way to get *34* wrestlers on one card. THIRTY FOUR!! That's far too many wrestlers to shoehorn into matches. There ended up being a lot of dead weight, and it distracted from some of the very fun matches. A tight 6 or 7 match card would be best for everybody. And 10 matches is WAY too many when you still plan on having a 30 minute intermission. Also, shows at Bayshore have been $10 in advance, and this show was $15. Maybe that's because they had some names like MVP on the card, or maybe it's because they've been drawing well there so why not try and make some extra scratch. I get it, smart move. If you sell 85% less tickets than before, you're still making more money since you're charging more. Why not play around with the price point a bit. Plus they only run every 3 months so $5 extra wouldn't quite be enough to make me skip it or not. If a card looks good then I'm game. So overall it was a fun night, but also had potential to be better than it ended up being. But a fun show is a fun show, and my time didn't feel wasted. That's a win.

Read more!