Monday AIW: 200th Show 11/2/19

CPA vs. Wes Barkley

PAS: Not sure what the point of CPA is. He doesn't seem to be doing the clip-on tie gimmick anymore, and now his gimmick seems to be middler at a local comedy club. There was some OK stuff with a knee injury, and I like Wes, but undercard singles match isn't what he does well. CPA goes over with a facebreaker on his bad knee, and I am perplexed.

Danhausen vs. VSK

PAS: What is it with crappy three initial wrestlers going over cool AIW regulars on this show. Danhausen is a great tag guy, but as a singles wrestler he is a little too concerned with trying to get over his memes. Still his actual work was pretty good, while VSK seemed to over enunciate every action, and his offense seemed to be all complicated ways to drop a guy on his own knee. They do some thing at the end where Danhausen drinks a White Claw, and spits at Derek Director, and yadda yadda. Tik Tok wrestling stinks.

Zach Thomas vs. Wheeler YUTA

PAS: Thomas is pretty fun to watch, he is a big kid who bangs away. YUTA is pretty dancy and the dancy YUTA parts of this match aren't great, although Thomas looks pretty good throwing fast armdrags. When the match settles down to Thomas throwing bombs and YUTA avoiding him and using his speed it gets fun. I really liked the couple of times Thomas just hurls his body into Yuta like a fullback trying to open up a hole.

Lee Moriarty vs. Alex Shelley

PAS: I was absolutely dreading this when I saw it on the match list. Moriarty is a guy with a tendency towards swing dancery and Shelley is the all time maestro of that style. While this match certainly had more than it's fair share of somersaults and dipsy dos, it had some other stuff which made it watchable. Shelley actually worked pretty stiff, and did a nice job as a pissed off veteran against a young guy, and Moriarty did some nice arm work leading to some big Fujiwara near falls after some pretty La Mistica's. I still don't think I would recommend this match, but I liked it way more then I thought I would, and it is Shelley's best match since coming back to AIW.

65. Bitcoin Boyz vs. Bear Country vs. To Infinity and Beyond vs. 40 Acres

PAS: This is what I came here for. The AIW four way tag match is pretty much a guaranteed blast every time. This is almost all new teams for this format, so it cements my belief that To Infinity and Beyond are the glue of this match structure. Fun structure here with two teams of beasts (Bear Country and 40 Acres) and two bumping heel teams (TIAB and Bitcoin). There is a fun spot early where Colin Delaney stumbles in between a face off between Bear Country and 40 Acres and ends up getting smashed by all four dudes. AJ Gray has really leaned into fucking people up and I am here for it, when I first watched him he was more of a thick highflyer and now he wrestles more like shorter Stan Hansen. Bear Country are a fun indy version of the War Raiders, perfect for this kind of match as they can hit their big dude spots and not have to put a full match together. Bitcoin Boys are neat, two tiny opportunistic little jerks who absolutely get obliterated.

ER: Love this. At this point I'm going to be shocked whenever AIW runs a 4 way tag match that doesn't wind up on our MOTY list. And this one has Eddie Kingston on commentary, which is such a beautiful combination of the very best things that it would be like In N Out also becoming a dispensary. Kingston talks about how he thinks Cheech is an ugly dude, compares him to Giant Baba, drops gems like "What is Delaney gonna get powerbombed for the fifth time?" or "He probably learned that from Quackenbush. So did I. Doesn't mean I use it though." Kingston loves this kind of chaos and the glee in his voice while the chaos is happening just makes me enjoy my favorite match structure even more. We get some great sequences and set ups all throughout, too many to mention. Bitcoin Boyz are super new, and they fit in nicely by bumping big (Taylor takes maybe the bump of the match when he gets tossed over the top, tries to hang on, and basically falls down the ring steps and winds up 15 feet away from the ring; at the same time Mikey was taking a cutter from Delaney into a Cheech German suplex that landed him on his neck and shoulders), Delaney and Cheech continue to run everything - my favorite team in 2019 - and here's Delaney getting crushed by everyone bigger than him, then coming back and working nutty spots on Cheech's shoulders (ducking  a Smooth clothesline that sends Smooth to the floor on a low bridge), then flipping over (baaaaarely) when Mikey hits a crossbody off the top while he is still on Cheech's shoulders. AJ Gray was out here murdering folks with lariats, PB punched Boulder right in the face, Boulder hits his cool powerslam/powerbomb combo on TIAB, the dive train lands big, it all rules. And The Duke is out there, you know he's gotta take a shot that allows him to sell better than anyone else in the match. He eats a punch on the floor and then sprawls perfectly into the guardrail to hold himself up. After the match he even gets into it with Ted Dibiase, and AARP Dibiase throws a great punch and then a shockingly gorgeous Russian legsweep while holding Duke in the million dollar dream. Another AIW show, another great 4 way tag.

49. Manders vs. Big Twan Tucker

PAS: This was the rubber match of my favorite indy series of the year. The first match is still the best, as it was totally out of nowhere, but this ruled too and these guys have some real chemistry. Tucker has an awesome intensity which is hard to teach, when he comes out it feels like some shit is about to pop the fuck off, and Manders is a perfect foil for that as he is unwilling to do anything but charge into the abyss.  Both guys only have one speed. There is a hilarious moment on commentary when Eddie Kingston mentions that Twan was trained by Johnny Gargano and Manders was trained by Tyler Black and I just imagine how horrible that battle of the trainers would be. Loved Manders breaking out Twan's elbow combos early, only for Twan to fire back and smash him right back. There is another great moment where Tucker has Manders in the corner and he unloads with a 10 punch combo to the body, working his kidneys like a heavy bag. Twan also has some awesome strength spots,  including snatching Manders mid air during a three point stance clothesline spot attempt. I did think Twan's rana out of the corner may have been a bit too cute for this match, but it was a big pop.  I think this may have gone a couple minutes long, as it is hard not to get a bit gassed working their pace. Still what an awesome collision, I love both of these guys unconditionally.

ER: Yeah these are two guys I seek out at this point, but I've yet to see them look quite as good against others as they do against each other. They have real chemistry and really bring out that something from beyond. Manders throws the Twan elbows and that is a mistake as Twan lays them right back in, then tenderized his torso with a punch of great corner punches all fired at the body. The chops land hard, shoulderblocks look like they would put most cars up on two wheels at least for a bit, Twan hits a boss Thesz press, there are a few huge slams and suplexes, and I actually like the Twan rana. These two were both just eating every nasty slam and strike and then getting up for more, and I liked how the rana shifted things from just another big slam into something that distracted and sort of threw off Manders. The Twan spear is iconic, and these two really can't do wrong against each other.

PME vs. Dr. Dan/Parker Pierce

PAS: PME has really mastered the art of the old school southern tag, and while Dr. Dan and Parker Pierce aren't close to the top heel team in AIW (no diss as AIW has an amazing tag division), but this is great stuff. Really reminds me of a Rock and Rolls tag against a fun random heel team like Jake Roberts and the Barbarian. You can just plug and play. Pierce is a blast in this, some real hard shots, a great spinebuster and even a hook kick. Dr. Dan has some fun stooging and takes his one horrific bump per match (dropping off the top rope through a table). PME had some fun wrinkles in their formula including some nifty stuff with the legal man and how that effected their near falls. I hope PME keeps these titles for a long time because there is a seemingly endless batch of fun teams to match them up with.

Erick Stevens vs. Matthew Justice

PAS: Meathead ECW brawl which is something Justice is adept at. Goes way into overkill as you would expect, but we do have some big stunts, including a spear through a door, an avalanche death valley driver through a table, tons of head drop suplexes and a spot where Fonzie lays a half a dozen chairs and pieces of doors in front of Stevens face for a coast to coast dropkick. There were 10+ times this match probably should have ended, and it eventually lost me a bit. Still a fun spectacle, and Stevens gets to cross this kind of match off his bucket list.

58. Eddie Kingston vs. Tre Lamar

PAS: This is Eddie as old man Tenryu which is a really great Eddie look. He works over Lamar and makes the kid earn his stripes. He does all of the parts of the Tenryu shtick well, the contempt, the grudging respect, the panic when things aren't working out, and finally the determination to finish the kid off. I liked Lamar in this a bunch too, he hit and run well, and really timed the big moves well. I especially loved the double stomp near falls, with Kingston rolling around the ring in pain and Lamar shocked in disbelief.

ER: This feels like the kind of tough match that Kingston can have in his sleep at this point. I love domineering Kingston, because few guys are better at being domineering in a ring in 2019, and I don't know if anyone is as good as Kingston at being the domineering guy who starts to lose control. I love him stalking the ring, knowing Lamar's moves before Lamar is throwing them, always there waiting with a big chop. And I love once Lamar starts getting a couple over on him that Kingston's big mouth keeps getting him in trouble, like when Lamar comes up a little light on a running knee and Kingston calls him out on it, only to then eat a much harder running knee. Kingston sells that kind of stuff like a god, going loopy and grabbing a muscle memory double leg from the ground, even selling a nerve twitch in his neck from yelling. I did think Lamar came up a little tentative in spots, unnecessarily physically moving a standing Kingston into a spot to take something from the apron, and he was a beat behind hitting the enziguiri after a Kingston backfist (I was already not going to like him hitting immediate offense after taking a backfist, so it really should have looked devastating). But Kingston must have sensed my dismay as he decided to just throw backfists until Lamar stays down, and I am fine with that.

Nick Gage vs. Joshua Bishop

PAS: I thought this was a fun performance by everyone in this match although the match itself was a little disappointing. I don't think Gage is a great wrestler, but he really has a presence and means something in way few wrestlers in the the world mean something. Bishop getting the win over Gage feels like big moment in his career. It is tough to work a big stunt show like this after Stevens and Justice pushed it to 11; no chair shot or table bump is going to mean much after that explosion. Wes Barkley was great on the outside, he took the two biggest bumps in the match, and was Jimmy Hart level annoying.


2019 MOTY MASTER LIST