Check Out What Brian Kendrick Did on 205 Live in October

39. Brian Kendrick vs. Ashante "Thee" Adonis 205 Live 10/9

ER: This has been a 205 Live story the past couple months, with Kendrick reaching out to Adonis when he was still Tehuti Miles, before the hipster bike messenger shorts. They've had a couple other matches which Kendrick won, with the angle going that Kendrick was trying to motivate Miles/Adonis throughout the matches. It's a bit quick and short attention span for a really good master/student blowoff, but this third match is basically the student putting down his (in this case not wanted) master. It doesn't really work to that level of drama, and the only weak parts of this are when too much drama interjected itself. Adonis doing even somewhat convincing resolve sounded instead like "You're not my real dad!" high school acting, and I've seen enough Shawn Michaels agenting with long pauses before match ending superkicks to not need guys doing that voluntarily. But the match outshone the unearned drama, and Kendrick is perhaps the best person in the company (and in wrestling) to put on these gatekeeper veteran matches. 

Adonis had some nice uppercuts early and was able to overpower Kendrick a bit, but Kendrick is crafty and one of my favorite things about his matches is the ways he makes clever use of opportunities and makes match situations seem organic. He gains control after Adonis gets his foot snagged on the ring skirt, which feels like the exact kind of way Kendrick and his opponents work this kind of bad luck into a match. Kendrick makes cruiser offense hit harder than others, flinging his body with more last second impact. His Captain's Hook looked awesome, still my favorite submission in wrestling, and it always plays like such a convincing match ender. Adonis smartly rolls it into a pin to force a break (and, it looked for a moment, risk Kendrick being able to sink the choke deeper into his arm crook), and he chains offense together effectively and smartly. His high crossbody landed hard, and it was cool how he immediately picked Kendrick up to his a nice short arm DDT instead of going for a pinball and doing a shocked face upon kickout. I didn't love how Kendrick got polished off with a pair of superkicks, felt a little too I'm Sorry, I Love You and I think it could have been stronger. That said, this is a Kendrick match I'm always going to enjoy. 

PAS: This 205 Live stuff is buried so deep underground at this point that I had no idea who Ashante Adonis even was. This was from the 200th Episode of 205 Live, for context M*A*S*H had 255 episodes, this dumb show has nearly as many episodes as fucking M*A*S*H. WWE is like late 90s WCW at this point, it is hard to watch much of their main product, but they have so much of it that you have matches like this which just completely escape notice. This is Dandy vs. Dean Malenko on WCW Pro like stuff, and I am glad Eric is looking for and finding it. Kendrick is such a pro here, really the spiritual son of Fit Finlay. I loved how he pounced on the rookie getting his foot caught in the skirt and hit that vicious Russian leg sweep into the barricade. He uses his environment so well, nothing is contrived, he just sees the angles. The Captain's hook section was the highlight, Kendrick just constantly adjusts to get purchase, and it makes sense he lost soon after that. You see that in MMA sometimes when a fighter does everything he can to lock a choke and just gasses out. Adonis wasn't a huge standout, but his big stuff looked big, and he did get crazy height on the cross body. Didn't love the ACTING in the finish, but it was mostly kept to the last minute or so. 

35. Brian Kendrick vs. Isaiah Scott 205 Live 10/16 

ER: This is the first time these two have crossed paths (there was a bad Elimination match earlier this year, but Kendrick was out of that one without hardly any time spent in the ring), and it's a shame for Scott because Kendrick is the perfect opponent for him. I'm not a big Scott fan, as I get sick of the fruity embellishments he puts on so much of his offense. Some things just don't look better with a little rolling hopping tumble before them, and Kendrick brings that Finlay mindset into the match and puts an immediate stop to any of the flowery bullshit, and makes Scott's offense look more plausible than anyone else on the brand has been able to do. It's no shock that Scott's best WWE match so far was opposite Drew Gulak, but I think Kendrick makes for an even better opponent. Kendrick brings so much interesting detail to this, doing things that are completely absent from other Scott matches. 

Scott targets Kendrick's left arm a couple times early (including hopping through the ropes to tangle him up in an armbar), and Kendrick is great at calling attention to his weakened arm without making it into a hammy school play performance. His arm keeps him from doing a couple things, affects his timing by making him hesitant on certain offense, and the ways he acknowledges it are interesting without needing any bad wrestler acting. I like the way he shakes it out, and the best instance of that is when Scott hits his top rope uppercut to a seated Kendrick, and Kendrick's immediate focus is not on the uppercut to the back but the shockwaves it sends down his arm. Donovan Morgan once told me about how his arms went briefly numb after getting kicked in the back by Takayama, and Kendrick's selling reflects actual real body damage in an impressive way. Kendrick evades Scott in interesting ways, always managing to slip in yakuza kicks right under the chin, locking in engaging headscissors, and blocking Scott's offense in cool ways. I loved how Kendrick handled that rolling armbar attempt, as he immediately clasped his hands together and not just maneuvering his body to a rope break, but thinking beyond that and getting his body to the floor, then yanking Scott violently out of the ring. The storm cradle driver finish worked really well, as Kendrick made it look like he was actually trying to reverse Scott into a victory roll type pin, before Scott just dropped down on it to finish him. Kendrick has been putting in excellent work since returning, and that statement applies to his 2020 return and his return to WWE in general. 

PAS: I agree that this really minimized the more irritating parts of Scott's game. I loved the yanking of Scott to the floor, just another example of how Kendrick is viewing the entire chess board. I enjoyed all of the early mat attacks by Scott, he had a very Minoru Tanaka vibe to him, and while I don't like Minoru Tanaka against other Minoru Tanakaish dudes, Kendrick is as close to we get in US wrestling to Fujiwara or Ishikawa. I loved how Scott went for the hammerlock bodyslam but didn't fully grasp the arm. Most wrestlers would keep the arm there even if it wasn't cleanly hooked, but Kendrick rips it out, still takes the bodyslam and sells the impact of the bodyslam jamming his bad arm, so smart and so rare.

Brian Kendrick vs. Mansoor WWE 205 Live 10/23

ER: Since returning in August, Brian Kendrick has been on this great streak working as a self-imposed gatekeeper of 205 Live. He had a fun three match series with Ashante Adonis that had a great finale, then had Isaiah Scott's arguable best match of his WWE run, and now gives us this gem as a scumbag playing heel off a modern Ricky Morton. Mansoor has existed at the fringes of WWE for the past few years, putting in a genuinely memorable performance against Cesaro at Crown Jewel, then kinda kicking around NXT and 205 Live until the next Saudi show rolls around. This was probably the most standout performance of his since that Crown Jewel match. Kendrick is such a timeless bumping and relentless heel, so good that he really elevates anyone across from him. I'm not saying Mansoor hasn't had good showings before, but I don't think I've ever seen him in such a strong babyface role, and it felt like Kendrick was constantly putting him in position to succeed. 

All of the early headlock control was cool, and Mansoor had some neat armdrags around that, and Mansoor working what honestly came off like modernized Ricky Morton got me really into this. Prime Morton vs. 2020 Kendrick would be an awesome match, and Mansoor's armdrags, dropkicks, big floatover suplex, all of it felt like Ricky offense sometimes spun with a modern twist (like rolling through a couple verticals and then powering up into a falcon arrow in an awesome spot). Kendrick is so cool in this role because - while he doesn't win often - he comes off like someone not committed to finishing any one specific way. He's not a heel only trying to win with his finisher, he's someone always switching up his strategy as if he's trying more to keep opponents thinking in the ring, keep them on their toes. Brian Kendrick: Intentionally Sacrificial Gatekeeper. He's not out here looking only for Sliced Bread, he's someone who will take you down and work an arm while tying up your legs, or hitting a big butterfly suplex, or diving in with a Captains Hook choke attempt. They worked struggle into the match in cool ways, so that it never came off like a series of juniors nearfalls. Mansoor really fighting to lift Kendrick into a falcon arrow, or really fighting to block his rana into a sitout powerbomb, things like that make the moves mean something and makes them look like they aren't just part of a sequence. Kendrick is unstoppable right now, essentially filling the same role that Kassius Ohno was filling, in his own trusted way. 

PAS: I liked this a bit less then Eric did. Kendrick is unassailable at this point, he is lost in the woods a bit, but he is putting on bangers weekly on a WWE show while getting much less acclaim than say Cabana Man Dan. He found a bunch of interesting ways to work around Mansoor, who is clearly pretty green, I am not sure those cool armdrags weren't Kendrick armdragging himself.  I also loved his counters, slipping the knee in to catch Mansoor coming, slipping quickly into the Captain's Hook. Still I thought Mansoor worked this a bit too much like a guy with all the answers, cutting off Kendrick at every turn. If he tried for something he would get countered into some almost Nova like chained offense. In some ways this felt like a money mark bringing in a veteran hand to put himself over. Kendrick is a hell of veteran hand to put in that role, but I am not coming out of this wanting to buy a Mansoor 8x10.

2020 MOTY MASTER LIST