Project: Wrestling Guerrilla – End of the Road

It was a wild ride through the Southern California territory for Project: Wrestling Guerilla, and now we find ourselves at the end. I knew I wanted to put something of a cap on the mini-series, so I figured I would put a few things here in an epilogue, to sort out how I really feel about Pro Wrestling Guerilla now, for good or for ill.

I’ve assembled this into a few categories.

Stars of Reseda

I’d like to start by giving some flowers to the wrestlers who were the delights of the series.

• Chuck Taylor: My personal MVP of Reseda. Whether it was a goofy opening match or the actual goddamn main event, my love for Chuckie T only grew by seeing him in this environment. He was funny without feeling like he was begging for laughs, while showing a strong wrestling acumen that allowed both the comedy and the matches to hit. I loved the guy coming in, and this series only secured his place in my heart.
• Kevin Steen: As I mentioned in the couple of shows featuring him that I covered, Steen was not a guy that I completely “got” on the indies. Even in WWE, Kevin never quite tipped his way into “love” for me, settling into “really like” territory. I’m pleased to say that, seeing him here in an environment that he truly embraced and which embraced him back, I better understood not only his appeal, but how great he really is. No matter the name, Kev succeeds at the little things that make a character feel real, while tweaking his style ever-so-slightly to get the most out of his opponent in practically any situation. Add to that the excellent chapters in the Fight Forever War with Generico and I was a happy camper when Steen showed up.
• Chris Hero: Hero is someone that I’ve seen plenty of times, but I’ve always felt like I haven’t seen enough of him to form a true opinion on whether I like him or love him. I still feel that way at the end here, but I also feel emboldened to seek out more of him, because what I saw would often be my favorite part of a show. Whether it was the tall, lithe Hero of KOW, or the big bully character of the mid-2010’s, I always knew Hero was thinking (much like Steen) how to sell a match, opponent, or move through the little things. An errant curse, a shift in body language, or a facial expression told me that he has a mind for wrestling unlike others he worked with and I can’t wait to see more.
• Trevor Lee: It was a nice little journey to see Lee go from wet-behind-the-ears relative rookie into the character he adopted into the 2010s, which helped me to understand where his charisma as Cameron Grimes came from. An always-entertaining wrestler made even better with context.
• Willie Mack: Once more I ask, what the hell happened?! Early 2010’s Willie Mack was such a joy to watch because of his size and athleticism and it seemed a sure thing that he’d be a feature of shows to come, whether in PWG or elsewhere. Unfortunately, it didn’t seem to be so, but we’ll always have his fun performances here.
• AR Fox: A guy that I now know enough to know that he’s underrated. It’s awesome that Fox is still going today and that, unlike someone like Willie Mack, there’s still opportunities to see his terrific high-flying and personality shine through well after he made his mark as a youngster in PWG.
• The Ones I Already Knew Were Good (El Generico/Claudio Castagnoli/Candice LeRae/Roderick Strong/WALTER/Zack Sabre Jr/Keith Lee): This lot were the people that I liked going into watching the shows and who basically held up their end along the way. My estimation neither improved nor diminished and I was generally happy to see them in any aspect.

Fallen Stars

Just as there were those who made a show much more bearable, there were a few that I just never jibed with. I won’t go into great detail here, but I do want to make my feelings known.

• Brian Cage: This fuckin’ guy. I read someone on Twitter recently saying something to the effect that Cage is the favorite wrestler of your buddy who barely watches wrestling. He can be acceptable to even good in an opener, but if you ask him to try and hang with anyone remotely better than him, his shortcomings as a performer come into clear view; namely, the GMSI mentality that he claims to this day is not just a gimmick, but a clear description of how he approaches any match. It’s clearly still working for him today, but it’ll mean that you’ll never mistake him for somebody who puts thought or meaning into what he does.
• Kyle O’Reilly: What a blemish this was for someone I used to like unreservedly. Similar to Cage, putting Kyle in situations where he has to try and be a contemporary of wrestlers who are just out-and-out better than him is a surefire way to expose the fact that he does not have very good instincts when it comes to telling a story in the ring. Don’t get me wrong, I still have a bit of love for Kyle thanks to his better matches elsewhere and his penchant for comedy, but he’s no longer the sure bet I once thought he was.
• The Ones Better Off In WWE (Ricochet/Johnny Gargano/Tommaso Ciampa): Speaking of bad instincts. Not to play into the smark stereotype, but these guys are right where they belong now, in a place where attention to detail, cleverness, and rewarding an audience for paying attention no longer matters if the money is green enough. Good on ’em, make that paper, but you can definitely see in their work in this series (similar to Kyle) that their work doesn’t quite hold up against the clear frontrunners they shared the ring with.
• Davey Richards: This was another magic-killer akin to Kyle, but in a much weirder and more sour way. After starting off with my favorite match of the whole series, Davey’s worst self came into view in a different way to someone like Kyle O’Reilly. Instead of giving in to a more laissez-faire approach to storytelling, Davey instead seemed to get high on his own supply and start acting like he’s as good as people at the time (including me) thought he was. It became off-putting very swiftly to see him throw his weight around in his few matches and snuff out any chance for his opponent to make something for themselves on his account, a stark contrast to more giving opponents (or at least, those better at hiding their true intentions) like a Chris Hero. Simply put, I began to see why everybody thought (thinks?) Davey is an asshole.
• All Those Ones: You know who and why.

Favorite Show

Battle of Los Angeles 2011: Of the shows I decided to keep for myself, this one has the most lingering positivity around it. I was close to picking Black Cole Sun, but I still feel that although it’s a good card overall, there’s still enough thorns in there to make the overall memory of it not shine as brightly. BOLA 2011 has the benefit of being a one-night version of the tournament and feature enough varied matches and performances from some of the best wrestlers in the world to be a total blast to watch all the way through. After watching it, I often held the matches on the card as the high benchmark for other similar matches to clear (ie. the ideal use of the Young Bucks) and it’s the one I’m the most likely to watch in full again.

Favorite Match

El Generico vs Kevin Steen, Steen Wolf: Funny enough, from a one-match show springs THE one match. Many words have been typed online about how great Steen and Generico are together and especially about the sheer greatness of this match, including from me, so I’ll just say here that it was equal parts blood rivalry, indie spotfest, Dramatic, and fun. I’m glad to have finally seen it and even more glad to not be the low man on what is, inarguably, the best match of this series.

Do I Like PWG?

Beyond simply getting me to finally watch these damn DVDs cluttering up my shelf, I wanted to take this as a bit of a test to see if I actually even liked Pro Wrestling Guerrilla all that much. I will say, it is certainly odd to watch these shows outside of their respective times, as PWG has now become both a legacy indie brand and a signifier of someone’s age in online wrestling circles. These days, PWG feels far from the taste-maker promotion it once was, especially now that a large part of the brain trust of its biggest years are now focused more on world domination rather than territorial pissings.

I remember the times these were made in and I remember the person I was during them. To say that I’ve grown since then is no short statement, as I’d like to think we all have. In many ways, I’ve grown past the sophomoric presentation that often litters PWG’s shows, whether it’s off-color humor, dated references, or a real tokenistic and limp approach to gender parity. There’s not a lot in PWG that still appeals to me…

…but there is still something there. If I had wholesale hated my time watching these shows, I would have simply dumped them all in the garbage can, but I did still have my fun. The athletic displays, dives, and truly brain-dead spots still evoked a reaction from me most times and there was still a lot of very good professional wrestling to be found. This series not only helped me better understand some of my favorite (or purportedly favorite) wrestlers and what makes them good, but it helped me come to a clearer reckoning as to what it is I actually like about wrestling at my age today.

At the end of it all, I don’t think I’d refer to myself as a fan of PWG; however, much like my feelings at the end of watching my buddy Mike’s Super Dragon DVD, I feel that I better understand what other people still love about the good ol’ days. Like Dragon himself, it’s not totally for me, but I can still pump my fist and shout “Fuck yeah” when the spirit moves me.

What’s Next?

This series of articles proved something else to me, and that is that I now have a new way to interact with my wrestling media in a way that feels both enjoyable and transformative (in a very minor way). I have a lot of DVDs on my shelf that I’d love to watch and talk about, whether for the first time or for the umpteenth time. More specifically, there’s another stack of burned DVDs that I’m itching to tackle, but I’m not sure if a whole article series is the way that I would “cover” these. Whatever is next, you’ll hear about here and on the Twitter, @CC_PW.

If you’ve read any part of this series, thank you very much. If you enjoy my writing, please follow on Twitter and consider donating to my Ko-fi. Until next time.

Project: Wrestling Guerilla – Mystery Vortex V

SHOW TRAILER

This is it, the final show in our series, and my final PWG purchase to date. We’re not long removed from the past event, a good show followed by a travesty, so let’s see who turns up on Mystery Vortex. I’ll save the lookbacks and goodbyes for a later date, let’s do this.

David Starr vs Fred Yehi

Another unfortunate situation, as Starr is currently persona non grata in wrestling, so I’ll be brief. Starr and Yehi (in the latter’s only PWG match to date, for whatever reason) have a decent match that definitely should not have been the opener due to its more considered pace. I’m not super-familiar with Yehi and I feel this wasn’t the best intro to a guy that I’ve heard talked up, so I’ll seek him out elsewhere. Weird start to this whole thing on several levels. ***

Joey Janela vs Flash Morgan Webster

In early 2018, the pillaging of the then-hot UK territory has nearly begun, and wrestlers like Webster will soon begin their association with WWE through NXT UK. It has been interesting to see the British talent begin their introduction to American indies vis-a-vis PWG in this series, and ominous knowing what is around the corner for them. Webster and Janela have a typical flashy PWG match (one that would have been far better suited as the opener), with both hitting various suicide dives, and Webster donning his mod helmet for a running crossbody into the chairs outside. Janela gets in some big moves like a Death Valley driver on the ring apron, a package piledriver, and tops it off with a wild super brainbuster. One thing that can happen in these types of matches is overdoing the kick-outs near the end, to the point that when Janela hit said super brainbuster, I shouted “Fuck off” when Webster kick out. This is extra baffling when Janela pops right back up after that and locks in a crossface for the tap out. Not without its charms, but messy and overthought. **3/4

Rey Fenix vs Sammy Guevara

Continuing the thread of “messy but entertaining,” two current-day AEW guys bust out all the flips here, the difference being that both have a bit more physical poise to do them without killing each other…9 times out of 10. Both start out immediately with impressive dives, and Sammy gets an early near-fall with the 630. It’s all moves moves moves from there, but again, they do look pretty cool. Sammy takes a scary header off of Fenix’s trademark running hurricanrana off the ropes, but Sammy gets him back later with another 630 right on the poor guy’s knee. We get another weird, overthought finish where Sammy appears to hit a top-rope Flatliner (or get hit with a top-rope uranage) and follows up with a shooting star press for the win. While this was sloppier than the previous match, I enjoyed it more on a more visceral level. ***1/4

Keith Lee vs Zack Sabre Jr.

Two indie golden-boys meet up in a physical mismatch and it’s pretty damn good. Keith Lee is en route to winning the PWG title later in the year, while ZSJ is holding both the RevPro and EVOLVE titles at this time. As I’ve mentioned before, I just love when Zack tries to square up to someone either bigger or stronger than him, and the dynamic between he and Keith is further improved by the sheer hilarity in their physical differences. Zack tries to pick at him and open him up to submissions but, much like a certain era of the Smackdown vs Raw games, Keith is just too big for Zack to get anything going and he gets repeatedly whacked for his efforts. I adored a spot where Keith paraded around the ring with Zack futilely attempting a knee-bar on his leg, with Rick Knox on commentary likening it to playing with his nephews.

Eventually, Zack gets an opening and makes Keith’s left leg vulnerable, which is all he needs to be dangerous. Keith still gets his shots in to slow Zack’s ascent but it’s death by a thousand cuts as Zack continues to patiently wear down Keith. Zack capitalizes on some key mistakes by Keith but makes some of his own, like when Keith reverses a hanging triangle sleeper into the Spirit Bomb for a near-fall. Zack, never content to learn his lesson, continues to try and out-strike Keith, but eventually gets goaded into the Big Bang Catastrophe and Keith wins. Although Keith picked and chose when to pay attention to the knee at times, he used it to create a very fun dynamic with Zack in a pairing that I can’t imagine not delivering in some way. ***1/2

Marty Scurll vs Trent

Similar to guys like Flash Morgan Webster, Scurll will soon be on his way out of PWG; however, it will be something of a lateral move over to Ring of Honor and not to be gobbled up by Triple H’s vision, as darkly funny as that would have been. Similar to the opener, a supremely canceled guy has a decent match with a better wrestler, but this one goes on far too long to be especially enjoyable. At least the right guy won. **3/4

The Chosen Bros (Jeff Cobb & Matthew Riddle) (c) vs Ringkampf (Timothy Thatcher & WALTER) [PWG World Tag Team Championship Match]

This is the final successful title defense for the Chosen Bros, who will drop the belts in a couple of months en route to Cobb winning the PWG title for himself and Riddle eventually shipping up to New York. They face off against WALTER and Thatcher, who have been teaming together since 2016, and the former of whom will also win the PWG title this year. Admittedly for this one, my expectations were perhaps a bit too high for how this looked on paper, which is a summation of my feelings on both instances I’ve seen of Cobb and Riddle as a team.

Both teams have a designated mat worker (Riddle, Thatcher) and a powerhouse (Cobb, WALTER), and we see combinations of both types throughout, and it’s generally pretty good. Interestingly, Ringkampf start off in the babyface role with Thatcher in peril before tagging out to WALTER. We also get the rare alignment shift, as Cobb gets to be babyface-in-peril after Ringkampf comes back and Riddle getting his own hot tag. The action throughout is what you’d expect from these four, but with the added modifier of it being in PWG, so it at times feels less focused or cohesive than you might get elsewhere. The Bros get the win with a Doomsday knee followed by a rocket launcher Bro 2 Sleep. Again, good and all (and not as baffling as the previous Bros match in this series), but I feel the result is not quite the sum of its parts. ***1/2

Ricochet (c) vs Chuck Taylor [Guerilla Warfare Match for the PWG World Championship]

After a disgusting display in their previous match, Ricochet and Chuck get one more shot to do it right and, thankfully, they don’t beef it.

As noted in the last review, Ricochet made a claim upon winning the belt that he was going nowhere. Fast forward only a couple of months and this is Ricochet’s final indie date before heading to WWE. Wah-wah. The Guerilla Warfare stipulation on this seems to be played up as a surprise, as Ricochet and referee Rick Knox both act surprised and confused when Excalibur says it. Both Ricochet and Chuck are largely babyfaces, but get scattered boos that remind me of their previous match that left a very bad taste in my mouth.

Ricochet jumps Chuck after his ring intro and gets to work on him with some unprotected trash can shots to the head and a Van Terminator, which is at least a spirited beginning. Chuck retaliates and produces a ladder from backstage with both guys take their turns getting tossed into it. Chuck also does a very indie-riffic spot involving creating a chair structure and suplexing Ricochet through it, but it’s a very endearing type of silly spot, so I’m okay with it. Chuck also ABSOLUTELY NAILS a running cannonball senton to the outside through a table, and it’s one of the most athletically impressive things I’ve seen either of these guys do.

Despite the cool stuff that both guys are doing, the crowd does end up flagging about 2/3rds of the way through, and seem generally less into the match the second time around (including the weird minority of people who are booing Chuck, all of whom I will die hating with my entire heart). Both guys get their big close near-falls, which leads to Chuck getting a Santa stocking of thumbtacks for a bit of extra rocket fuel (he also shoves the most prominent of his haters, because Chuck loves me and I love him). Chuck takes a couple of nasty tack bumps for his troubles, including the tacks-in-the-mouth trick, but props to Ricochet who takes a full-on 630 bump into them, which gave me sympathetic pain just watching it. Chuck takes advantage and nails a piledriver followed by the Awful Waffle for the win and his second PWG title. Like a lot of Guerilla Warfare matches before it, it’s fun and silly garbage, and is an improvement on its predecessor by virtue of having a better atmosphere (despite the aforementioned dips) and having the 100% correct winner. Chuck and Ric both take time to put each other over on the mic afterward, and although this win isn’t a patch on Chuck’s original big victory, I’m glad that I at least got to see him go home with the gold once. ***1/2

Shelf Status

I went back and forth on this one for a while, because it’s not so much a show of high and lows, but a show that exists on both sides of the middle. There’s nothing godawful in here, and the less interesting matches at least have something going for them; conversely, the matches I enjoyed were usually good-not-great, with nothing I’m necessarily clamoring to see again. I also found myself feeling that there were a couple of talents on the show that I’d be better off seeking out outside of the PWG atmosphere, either because they didn’t return (Yehi) or because the atmosphere is not a natural fit for them (Ringkampf). Ultimately, although I don’t wish it ill or regret my time with it, I’m calling this one Not Worthy because of my lack of desire to watch it again.

(This is not a sponsored article. PWG physical media is available on their website. You can also stream it digitally on High Spots Network.)

Next time, we end off Project: Wrestling Guerilla with a short piece on my takeaways from the project, for good and for ill…

Project: Wrestling Guerilla – All Star Weekend 13 Night 2

SHOW TRAILER

The first night of this double-shot weekend felt like a bit of a mixed bag from top to bottom, but one I was ultimately positive on, so let’s see if this second night can tie things together into a more cohesive package.

Adam Brooks vs Jonah Rock

After a good showing on the first night by Jonah, he gets another kick at the can with Brooks, a guy I thought was okay. They settle into a fairly typical match setup (the Big vs Little dynamic that worked so well on Night 1) and do fine with it. Brooks continues playing the mouthy heel, which is a role that works fairly well for him, but he’s not exactly a standout in any department. I generally like Jonah in all forms, but I do wish he took more advantage of the size difference between him and Brooks. Unlike his match with Keith Lee, Jonah tries to work closer to the style of Brooks and goes oddly even with his smaller opponent, which is inherently less interesting to me than if they played up the difference a bit more. They get their moves in and it’s a’ight, not something I’d put in the opener spot. **3/4

Mark Haskins & Flash Morgan Webster vs The Young Bucks

This was immediately interesting from a historical perspective. Over the course of this project, I’ve gotten to see the Bucks at various points in their wrestling careers, as well as embodying various gimmicks within their heel presentation. This match sees them firmly in the Elite era, with “Cease & Desist” and “One Sweet” chants (referring to WWE serving them an order based on their use of the Too Sweet) and FTR (Fuck The Revival) written on their trunks. Being The Elite has begun and its memes are taking off with the people pre-disposed to like them, leading to this feeling somehow the most dated of all the Bucks’ appearance. I’ve noted in the past what makes a Young Bucks tag match work best, but with their gimmicks turned up to 11 here, it hardly matters if they’re heels or not, the crowd near-unanimously loves them. In the words of a friend of theirs, they have become the New York Yankees.

The bright side is that Haskins & Webster don’t have to be dynamic babyface personalities to combat them, because practically no one can. Everything that the Bucks do pops the crowd, even if it’s blatant heel work, so the best that H&W can provide is a bit of flavor with their light-heavyweight move set. The latter half of the match is built around the Sharpshooter, which the Bucks had recently added to their arsenal, and the action is good enough leading up to the double tap-out victory for them. I’m obviously not on the Bucks bandwagon to the degree that Reseda is, but there’s still fun to be had at the Young Bucks Roadshow. ***

Joey Janela vs Marty Scurll

Other blog writers have been able to write about sex pests like Marty Scurll by giving them as little credit as possible while acknowledging their existence within the scope of a match or company. I’ve already spent words acknowledging the existence of a shitbag like Joey Ryan, as offensive as that existence may be to me, so it feels weird to draw the line here, and potentially dishonest of me. In retrospect, I should have established ground rules for myself in these situations earlier. I suppose it’s better to get started somewhere than spend more of my time writing about a bad person for basically no reason.

This match is not good. Marty Scurll has bad instincts, and Joey Janela is not much better as a wrestler. Nuff said. **1/4

Zack Sabre Jr. vs WALTER

After his initial title match against Roderick Strong a couple of years ago, Zack Sabre Jr went on to win BOLA in 2015 before beating Strong for the PWG World Championship in 2016. He lost it to Chuck Taylor only months before this, and is full-on heel here against Bigger WALTER.

As was the case against Ricochet, WALTER immediately destroys Zack, with Zack taking almighty bumps off WALTER’s chops. ZSJ is a favorite of mine (ditto WALTER), and one of my absolute favorite things in wrestling is when Zack decides to square up against someone bigger/tougher/a better striker than him and gets instantly laid out. WALTER beats the piss out of Zack for a while and it rules, before Zack’s focus on the right arm begins to pay off. I mean, even though Zack is targeting WALTER’s good arm, he still gets the absolute cock knocked out of him at nearly every turn, and again, he’s so good at getting destroyed.

WALTER being WALTER means that he’s good at paying attention to Zack’s arm work in a way that doesn’t feel put on. Zack putting him in a cross arm-breaker or kicking at the right arm doesn’t stop WALTER from doing his normal stuff, but you can see the discomfort on his face when he uses it. He isn’t forgetting about the pain, he’s just blocking it out, and there’s a difference in what that looks like from a performance standpoint. There’s a great exchange of moves and counters in the finishing stretch, ending with WALTER countering a cradle by Zack into the Gojira Clutch for the tap-out. One of my favorite matches I’ve seen in the series, terrific stuff from two greats. ****

Rey Horus vs Matt Sydal vs Trent

Similar to the lucha triple threat on the previous night, this is three junior heavyweights doing their thing in a fine little showcase match. The difference is that Trent has apparently bulked up by 14 grams (according to Excalibur) and is a “heavyweight,” leading to him overpowering the lighter two guys. There’s some cool stuff throughout this (shout-out to Horus’ pop-up DDT and to Sydal hitting a Vertebreaker), but it feels like the crowd is beginning to flag. It doesn’t help that the match feels longer than it is, so I also began to feel a bit tired as this kept going. Sydal breaks up Trent’s Crunchy with a shooting star press, but gets hit with one himself to get Trent the win (at least Sydal got to hit the Cyclorama, which I popped for). This is Sydal’s last appearance in PWG to date, a shame it couldn’t have been a bit more special. ***

Chuck Taylor (c) vs Ricochet [PWG World Championship Match]

If you’ve read the previous entries in this series, it’s no surprise to you that one of my guys in this whole series has been Chuck Taylor. He’s been funny without being cloying and is a talented worker who always brings it in whatever role he is given. He’s the classic underachiever, in that his talent is always apparent, but he just seems destined to be underrated forever. Well, wasn’t I pleased to see that this project includes a match with him as the goddamn world champion. There was no plan in either buying these shows or in covering them in this matter, so it feels extra special that I’ve seen Chuck do his stuff on the undercard, including a match against his trainee Ricochet years before, up to him being the top dog. Chuck is the MVP of this project, and I was very happy for him going into this.

Leaving this match and the show, the emotion I felt was disgust. I had a hard time reckoning with what I had seen, and how it had really turned me against PWG and Reseda in a way that surprised me. The idea of this match is that Ricochet is a heel now (as seen on Night 1) and is going to step over his mentor to get the belt, whereas Chuck is the smart-aleck who made good and lived up to his potential. A great dynamic, but for some reason, Reseda is not here for it. Ricochet is initially largely booed against Chuck, but there is a sizable portion of the crowd who are booing Chuck, too. I asked my buddy Mike (a long-time PWG fan) why some people would be turning on Chuck like this in his first title defense, and he couldn’t figure it out either. It’s a discontent that didn’t sit right with me and kind of poisoned the well for the match ahead which, unfortunately, wasn’t exactly up to snuff.

Credit where it’s due, this isn’t an out-and-out bad match; in fact, there’s stuff to like about. Chuck’s knee is targeted early by Ricochet and Chuck pays a decent amount of attention to it, including a great little spot where he hits a pointed standing elbow drop but clutches the knee afterward, as he had to fall forward onto it to achieve it. Ricochet’s offense is his usual stuff mixed in with a few more submissions to play up the knee, which is adequate. The guy is not exactly a naturally charismatic personality, so it’s pretty typical in the way of getting a crowd to boo you. Eventually, Ricochet counters Chuck’s Awful Waffle finisher by shielding himself with referee Rick Knox, then hits a dick kick and a belt shot and…pins Chuck to win? It’s a Dusty finish that is waved off by Knox (having recovered from being laid out after a new referee came in to replace him), and that a lot of people in the crowd visibly don’t buy. There’s 20 minutes left on the DVD, guys, I’m not biting either.

From there, Chuck begins to get more desperate to keep the title, and more people in the crowd begin to turn on him. Fair enough, I guess, as Chuck takes down the top rope (“Jump off the top rope now, motherfucker!”) and even chokes Ricochet with it like Roddy did with Kyle O’Reilly and ZSJ before him. Ricochet is also continuing to wrestle like a heel, and at this point, I’m so confused. The crowd doesn’t seem to be completely in either guy’s corner, and now I’m not even sure who I’m supposed to root for (I mean, Chuck, obviously, but I mean in a textual sense). Both guys get big flurries of offense as the match continues on and on. There’s a part where Chuck considers hitting Ricochet with the hammer he used to take down the top rope but also kind of fights with himself about it briefly, which is the opening Ricochet needs to dick kick Chuck again and hit him with two finishers for a near-fall. Even just typing out that sentence felt belabored and unsatisfying. After that, the crowd mostly turns over to cheering Ricochet, and I got real cranky. It certainly doesn’t help when Ricochet gets the abrupt win with a lifting Flatiner. That is the actual finish of the match.

There’s this one guy in the front row who, even as Ricochet is declared the winner, is cursing and screaming at Chuck until he’s red in the face*. What in the hell happened? The best I can figure is that Chuck decided to roll with the mixed reaction he was getting and changed up the dynamic a little bit to go with that, but it left a very bad taste in my mouth. Under more normal circumstances, I’d say this was a well-wrestled and at times exciting match from both guys, but it still sits with me in a wrong way. It also isn’t like Ricochet is this undeniable personality that outshone Chuck, because he’s the same athletic-yet-dull character he’s usually been, better to be seen and not heard. Speaking of, Ricochet cuts a post-match promo where he kind of tries to heel on the crowd, but also proclaims he’s in PWG to stay (he has one more show before leaving for WWE lol). A weird end to a deeply strange and bitter affair, one that I don’t ever care to see again. ***

(*Fun fact: You can see this same guy celebrating Chuck’s title win months earlier in the crowd. Fickle!)

Shelf Status

My immediate reaction to the main event had me saying that it unshelved both All Star Weekend nights on its own, because I was quite upset about how sour it came across. In retrospect, deciding to take them as separate events is a much better idea, as I genuinely liked a lot of Night 1 and I wouldn’t mind watching most of it again. In contrast, I really disliked Night 2, despite it having one of my favorite matches of the whole series in WALTER/ZSJ. Similar to Steen Wolf, this is a one-match show, but unlike Steen Wolf, I don’t believe I had as much bile for the performers or matches on that show as I do for this one. This is absolutely Not Worthy, and I banish it forthwith from my sight.

(This is not a sponsored article. PWG physical media is available on their website. You can also stream it digitally on High Spots Network.)

Our journey ends on the next article, with a mysterious stop in 2018…

Project: Wrestling Guerilla – All Star Weekend 13 Night 1

SHOW TRAILER

During one of the few sales I took advantage of with PWG, I knew that I wanted both nights of an All-Star Weekend for sure. I guess I picked this one because the cards looked good, and I bet it was recent enough at the time that I was excited about a lot of the talent in play here. I’ll be covering both nights, so let’s start as we mean to go on.

Brian Cage vs Flash Morgan Webster

This is the point where I would give a textual sigh and bemoan having to watch yet another Brian Cage match, but, and I’m completely serious, this is the best Cage match I’ve seen in this series and one of the better matches on the show.

The keys to how this works are similar to how Cage has had decent matches here in the past: A short opening match with an uncomplicated no selling, no limb work). This checks all of these boxes and adds the fact that Flash Morgan Webster is someone who can be thrown around like a tackling dummy at will, which is both cool and a wrestling story trope as old as time: Big vs little. Cage is bigger and stronger than the pasty Brit, but throughout the match, Webster gains the advantage through hit-and-run offense that only lasts so long. This leaves room for both guys to impress with how they can throw or be thrown, with some cool power spots from Cage and Webster believably using momentum and strikes to get ahead.

The finishing stretch totally sucked me in thanks to the bumping going on, and even caught me by surprise when Webster rolled up Cage out of his finisher for the surprise win and a big pop. I’ve seen wrestlers that I regard more highly than Webster have worse matches with Cage in the past (as you, dear reader, know well by now), so I left this one completely taken by surprise in the best way. ***1/2

Adam Brooks vs Mark Haskins

I couldn’t resist the joke. The match is not that bad, it was just a cool-down from the hotter opener, and with two guys I’ve never really encountered before. I’d seen maybe one Mark Haskins match before this, and literally had no idea who Adam Brooks is, so this was going in as fresh as possible (especially considering this is Brooks’ debut).

This is fine. Haskins wrestles in a snappy way that reminds me of Trevor Lee in places, while Brooks settles into the mouthy heel role. It almost doesn’t feel like a PWG match, more like a traveling indie match between two guys who have wrestled each other a bunch and have their one match that usually gets the crowd going. There’s a couple of neat moves here and there, including a cool transition by Haskins into a floatover bridging Fujiwara armbar, but the rest of the match is just okay, and the finish kind of came out of nowhere with Haskins tapping out Brooks all of a sudden. Arright, move on. **3/4

Joey Janela vs Trevor Lee

I’ve been mildy critical of Excalibur as a commentator in the past, but one thing he is quite good at is getting across the ongoing stories and character motivations of the various players in PWG. Whereas Janela is a relatively new guy, Lee has now been around for years (and is even a former tag team champion) and Excalibur catches the viewer up on what his trajectory has been in that time, especially helpful as Lee assumes the bully role he used to be on the other side of.

Lee is great here, as he has been in basically every other appearance so far. He takes over the role of domineering young veteran, putting in a lot of methodical heel work (crowd taunts, a rest hold or two) that gets across how shitty he can be. Janela is fine enough here; at this point, he’s one of the big indie guys du jour thanks to a presence on social media and a daredevil attitude, and that’s most of what he’s up to (aside from a weird moment where he puts Lee in a Figure Four). We get the second shock win of the night, as Janela reverses a roll-up into his own and pins Lee, similarly to how Lee stole one against Chris Hero before. Not bad. ***

Keith Lee vs Jonah Rock

Two more semi-new faces to PWG collide here, with one clearly on the track to stardom. No offense to Jonah (who I like), but Keith Lee has already debuted and made it to the BOLA finals in 2017, and he will go even farther than that before long. I mean, it’s Keith fucking Lee in 2017, he’s already so good and he’ll only get better.

What I really like about this match is that both guys end up doing what is expected of them in this environment, but it’s meted out at a pace that makes it feel a bit more earned and with half the literal maneuvers as other (lesser) PWG matches. We get the typical “big guys barging into each other” routine for a bit before we move into showing off some of the bombs, and to his credit, Jonah looks good in the parts he’s given (shout-out to the DDT reversal out of a waist lock, that was new to me). Eventually, we get the real good stuff: Lee (taunting and selling in his verbose manner) catches a running senton by Jonah into the Spirit Bomb, before both do an enormous superplex. The latter is teased and built to well, so it gets a huge reaction. Lee takes the match with another catch into the Big Bang Catastrophe, and both come out looking better. Great stuff. ***1/2

Flamita vs Sammy Guevara vs Rey Horus

Yet more debuting-in-2017 PWG talent, reminding me of how PWG was the first I’d ever heard of Flamita and Sammy (I knew Rey Horus from Lucha Underground). This is a more typical PWG moves match in a three-way, but a bit more obviously lucha-flavored, and it’s a fairly entertaining one. Obviously, Sammy plays the heel to the more inherently likable other luchadors (by virtue of not being Sammy), and all three trade advantages throughout the match along with their own cool dives. There’s not much to say about this one, other than it’s a good one of these. A good lucha thing. ***1/4

Ricochet vs WALTER

Ricochet is basically king shit at this point in PWG, but then he runs into another remarkable 2017 debut, Bigger WALTER. Of course, Bigger WALTER easily overpowers Ricochet (a sight we’d see years later in front of a lot more eyeballs), so Ricochet is operating on the back foot. However, the big difference here is that Ricochet is a heel now, so he uses shady tactics to get his advantage, and we get the rare Big vs Small match where the big guy is a babyface.

Thankfully, it’s WALTER, so he can pull it off by being himself. Ricochet bumps like himself for WALTER when he’s on offense, and WALTER knows how to effectively sell when Ricochet goes after his leg. This theme comes back throughout the match and is the only way for Ricochet to get any meaningful, lasting offense against WALTER. They’re a good match for each other and are able to use each other’s strengths to do some neat stuff together (like when WALTER blocks the Benadryller by just swatting Ricochet’s leg). WALTER nearly gets Ric in the choke a couple of times, but the final time is thwarted by a lowblow and a roll backward into a flash pin (that’s 3 tonight). I liked this quite a bit; granted, I was expecting even more from it, but I think my imagination got away from me. I’d prefer Ricochet to not be doing the heel stuff, but it is what it is. ***1/2

Lucha Brothers (Penta el 0M & Rey Fenix) (c) vs The Chosen Bros (Matthew Riddle & Jeff Cobb) [PWG World Tag Team Championship Match]

These four are recent debuts, but not 2017, so that’s that theme broken. The LBs have been tag champs since March, and the Bros are on an undefeated streak since late 2016. I figured this had to be some level of good to very good based on sheer talent, but…it’s not!

This was a weird, weird match. Like, I know PWG often plays fast and loose with rules and generally books matches on the Rule of Cool; however, there’s a point early on where all four guys are in the ring at the same time, and nobody tags in ever again. They just do away with the idea of tagging completely, and nothing is ever made of it. This drove me crazy, because it’s the most blatant ignoring of the rules that I’ve seen yet, in a way that didn’t even makes sense with the normal ways that PWG looks the other way. As well, for a main title match between two hot teams, the crowd are weirdly low-energy. A lot of the spots you’d expect to get big reactions are a bit more mildly received, which isn’t helped by the fact that the action itself often feels like disorganized riffing.

There are some cool spots, though. I’m admittedly not the biggest fan of the Lucha Brothers, nor of Riddle (for various reasons), but they know their way around a spotfest for sure. Add to that the appeal of Cobb’s freakish strength (my Suplex Husband is easily the favorite of the bunch) and you get cool moments like the visual of a combined leglock/surfboard/Gory special by the Brothers and a sweet back drop dive by Fenix onto both Bros outside. The match continues happening until it just stops, with the Bros winning the belts kind of out of nowhere. It’s a cap on what feels like a sludgy, awkward encounter with no real direction. Despite really only loving one of these guys, my expectations were still fairly high, and absolutely not met. ***

Shelf Status

Despite some dips here and there, this was a very enjoyable show. There’s no shortage of standout singles matches between some really talented guys, as well as a couple of good-not-great fights that help to keep the momentum up (until the main event kills the vibe). It’s mostly a really fun time and it sets the stage well for the next night to follow up on. This one is easily Shelf Worthy.

(I was originally going to do what I did with my first multi-night PWG event, and rank the two shows cumulatively as to whether I would keep them or not. Upon actually watching the second night, I decided not to do that. You’ll find out why soon.)

(This is not a sponsored article. PWG physical media is available on their website. You can also stream it digitally on High Spots Network.)

We continue the All-Star Weekend next time…

Project: Wrestling Guerilla – Don’t Sweat The Technique

SHOW TRAILER

This is the final show in this series that I have watched previously. I remember basically nothing from it, so this is going in clean. This is also the final PWG show in 2015; by next show, we will be jumping ahead a bit farther and seeing a lot of new faces. I’ll do what I can to appreciate what I have had, before it potentially goes south…

Biff Busick vs Brian Cage

The monkey’s paw curls on my previous wish to see Biff in more singles action, I see. This is the by-now standard “Brian Cage gets to look cool” match, and Biff really shines him up with some bumps off of power spots throughout the match. Biff, bless him, does target Cage’s left knee at points, but of course he was never going to sell that. Now, I’m not pre-disposed to like this sort of match (ie. one featuring Cage), but the match was just a little over 10 minutes and was the opener, so I can’t get too mad at it. **3/4

“Speedball” Mike Bailey vs Trevor Lee

The now seemingly-ubiquitous Speedball is on only his 2nd PWG show here, having debuted for the company earlier in 2015. This is the start of a larger rise in stock for him in America, as he kind of catches indie wrestling off-guard with his unassuming look and reserve of spectacular martial arts and high-flying moves. On the other side, the former super rookie Lee is building himself back up after a loss to Roderick Strong, and assumes the Chris Hero role by bullying around the rookie-er Bailey. These two are a keen match, as they are both very fast and explosive with their offense styles, albeit in slightly different ways; if I had to describe it, Lee is more explosive, while Bailey is sudden, if that makes sense.

Bailey impresses the crowd early with his now-trademark spots (running twisting shooting star press, hurricane kicks, etc.), and the two settle into a fairly short match that is all killer, no filler, just near-constant cool moves. The highlight of this move-fest is the one that made the inside cover of the DVD: Bailey hitting a reverse hurricanrana while both are on the apron, and looking like they both brained themselves. It’s a monster reaction and a memorable visual, so thankfully, they don’t go too far beyond that. Back in the ring, Lee reverses a top-rope shooting star press into a small package driver for the win, but Bailey continues to leave a lasting impression on the tastemaker crowd of the 2010’s. It’s a match that is all explosions, but the explosions are pretty. ***1/4

The World’s Cutest Tag Team (Candice LeRae & Joey Ryan) vs The Beaver Boys (John Silver & Alex Reynolds)

Seeing the name “The Beaver Boys” on a PWG show reminds me of where I was around the time of this show. I remember following PWG via results (I was and still am too poor to buy their shows), and when I started seeing teams names like theirs, I realized that there were people on the come-up on the indies that I didn’t recognize anymore. It felt like a shifting of my own place as an independent wrestling fan; it was no longer the late 2000s, when it felt like the sun rose and set on Ring of Honor and its contemporaries, and I was beginning to be left behind by what I didn’t know.

I certainly wouldn’t have guessed how familiar I’d be with Silver & Reynolds half a decade later thanks to AEW, and I’m glad I have that rapport with them as a team, because they didn’t do much for me here. Granted, they are locked into the Joey & Candice tag team formula, so it’s not really the best way to be introduced to a team, full stop. As usual, they do the lollipop bit, Candice gets her spots, they do a face-in-peril, a hot tag or two, and the champs win. Thankfully, as opposed to last time where it was all Candice getting beaten up only to be saved by her awful friend, they invert the formula by having Candice taken out early and Joey playing the face-in-peril; unfortunately, that doesn’t really work for me either because it requires me to care if Joey Ryan lives or dies, a tall order. The Beaver Boys have some neat double-team offense, and Silver is already showing promise with his swift offense, but this knows what it’s trying to do and never shoots beyond that. **1/2

Tommy End vs Chris Hero

Over the course of the past couple of shows, Chris Hero’s matches have been something of an oasis for me. Hero is standing out as one of my favorite performers in the PWG space, as he frequently takes the time to tell a story around the cool moves of him and his opponent, so it’s easier for me to invest in it. This time, however, Hero decides to do a more PWG-style bombfest, and I found myself a bit let-down by what seemed like a sure thing.

Tommy End here is making his PWG debut after spending most of his career fighting in Europe and the UK. He and Hero have a back-and-forth dynamic to their match that starts early, with both of them gaining momentary advantages before ceding to the other. It’s an interesting approach, and certainly a different one than I’ve seen from Hero so far, but there’s another element to this that began to take me out of what they were doing. Early on, End no-sells a rolling elbow from Hero in a show of his toughness; soon after, Hero no-sells an Ace crusher to regain control. This theme is peppered throughout the match and seems to be their interpretation of the PWG fireworks match where, instead of huge high spots and dives, they shrug off big attacks again and again to get to the next big attack. It can be an effective tool when used sparingly, but here, it gets to feeling like too much candy after a while.

This is certainly /an/ approach to this kind of match, and it’s one that is entertaining from time to time, but I couldn’t get super invested in a fight where, at any time, either guy could just decide that something didn’t hurt and just move on. By the end, Hero has to hit 4 rolling elbows and follow it up with a jumping tombstone to win, leaving me to wonder if his strikes are that effective if he needs to use so many. This works for the crowd and ultimately endears them to End (a performer I like today), but it left me a little cold. I think it’s good and all but, much like the previous match, it knows what it wants to do and will not be shooting above that target. This is spiritually the same match as ones like Lee vs Bailey, but at least those spot-fests are a bit more fantastic and don’t have me going “Come the fuck on” at the near-falls. ***1/4

ACH vs Tommaso Ciampa

I think I need to see more ACH matches elsewhere. I’ve been waiting for a performance from him that shows me what people at the time saw in him, and it seems like all of his matches in this series so far have been too comedic to really give me a sense of him as an in-ring performer. Here, he does a bit of basketball panto with Ciampa, and he gets into the Stone Cold ACH routine again, neither of which particularly move me. Outside of that, he and Ciampa go back and forth with some interesting moves and manage to end the match in decent time, but I couldn’t bring myself to care. Oh well. **1/2

Monster Mafia (Ethan Page & Josh Alexander) vs Love Gun (Chris Sabin & Matt Sydal)

Another act debuting in 2015 gets the spotlight in Monster Mafia to continue the theme of the night. Also, this match is the last one for Sabin & Sydal teaming together in PWG (so much for a new tag team being born), and the last for Sabin in PWG to date. As with the previous match in this series against the Bucks, Sydal & Sabin get a pretty good match out of MM that wouldn’t be out of place on an episode of wrestling television, but it never gets too far beyond that. Page & Alexander are a decent-enough team, with Page working the crowd as he is wont to do (especially the very-inebriated Horsewomen), but they didn’t stand out as much as someone like Mike Bailey previously did. Sabin & Sydal win their final tag match together, in the now-classic PWG move of putting over guys who won’t be here later. ***

Andrew Everett vs Ricochet

A battle between two high-fliers begins with both men doing their flippy version of a face-off, with Everett continuously springing out of Ricochet’s then-iconic backflip headscissors. After a great performance against Kyle O’Reilly at the end of last year, Ricochet still feels like a fairly big deal in PWG, but between him and Everett, neither have much going on between the high spots. The action in this feels strangely formless: After hitting a cool dive, either guy will hit some weak elbows or some vague set-up move to get to the next spot. Obviously, this is the niche both of them have long since settled into, but it doesn’t do much for either guy to have them go 20 minutes in a match that feels like it’s got too much air in it.

Not to say that this is bad or anything, just that it’s the match on the show that feels the least honest about the fact that it’s a stunt show. Everett pulls off some fantastic spots, including a beautiful springboard shooting star press to the outside and a shocking double moonsault, and Ricochet gives him quite a lot before beating him. This match had the vibe of old-school high-flyer vs new school, but if it’s all the same, I’d rather that Ricochet be put in there with guys who can lead him as opposed to being expected to lead himself. ***

Roderick Strong (c) vs Zack Sabre Jr. [PWG World Championship Match]

Zack’s rise in PWG continues with his first title shot. He and Roddy wrestle in perhaps the most straight-up indie match of the night, meaning that it’s based more around counter-wrestling, holds, and a few high spots as opposed to the approach of practically every match before it. Specific to this one, Roddy establishes early on that he cannot hang with Zack on the mat, so he uses a bit of brute force to take the advantage in a cool spot where he guillotines Zack between the middle and top rope while he is trapped in the latter’s armbar.

Given that it’s a Zack match, he concentrates on Roddy’s left arm when he gets the chance, which works decently. Roddy mainly pays attention to it when Zack is on offense and kinda drops it when he’s not, but he does enough to keep it in your memory. What’s interesting is that the crowd at times doesn’t seem all the way in on Zack, to the point that Chris Hero notes that the crowd is the most pro-Roderick they’ve been in his reign so far. Zack is hardly a forceful personality at this point, so the match focuses more on the ring work to try and make up for it. Roddy continues trying to press the advantage while Zack scraps for hope spots here and there, leading to a very hot finishing stretch of near-falls, ending in Strong dumping Zack onto his head and tapping him with the Strong Hold. A very solid, at times great, main event. ***1/2

Shelf Status

The word “mid” is thrown around a lot these days, but coming out of this show, I don’t really feel strongly in any sense. This felt like a very typical PWG show that you’d get around this time, with a lot of matches trying to outdo the others through sheer force of spots. Don’t get me wrong, cool moves are fun and I like them, but there was not a whole lot that I think I would be missing if I had just watched the trailer for this show instead of sitting down to watch the whole thing. I was never upset or bored, but I was never really thrilled either, so this one is Not Worthy.

(This is not a sponsored article. PWG physical media is available on their website. You can also stream it digitally on High Spots Network.)

A new era is at hand as we jump forward to 2017 next time for a double-shot…

Project: Wrestling Guerilla – Black Cole Sun

SHOW TRAILER

This is another show that I’ve watched before, and there’s a mildly interesting story to how I got this one. This is the only PWG DVD that I didn’t get from a sale; instead, I won it in a Twitter contest!

Big ups to TheBarrylad and the Chairshot Podcast for the copy of this show. I don’t have any lasting memories from this one, so let’s close out 2014 and see what happens.

The African American Wolves (AR Fox, ACH, Rich Swann) vs Best Friends & Moderate Acquaintance (Chuck Taylor, Johnny Gargano, Bobby Fish)

(I was so tempted to call them “Bobby F.I.S.T.”)

This is your typical PWG 6-man tag opener, albeit with some very entertaining and fun wrestlers to start us off. Given that this takes place in December, a running gag is ACH putting on a fan’s Santa hat, giving way to the chant of “Ho Ho ACH.” Pretty much everyone will return to that for some holiday fun here and there. Around that, the action is pretty fast and contains a lot of neat flips and dives. There’s also a waist-lock bit in the middle with all six which is the big comedy spot, but it works pretty well. In the past, I’ve gotten a bit grumpy about how broadly some comedy in PWG plays, but it always goes down easier when it’s in one of these opener and/or multi-man matches than in the semi-main event or something. Good fun, this! ***1/4

There’s a brief note made by Excalibur early in this match that Roderick Strong will not be able to appear on the show due to a Pineapple Express-type storm in the California region. Remember that for later.

Cedric Alexander vs Adam Cole

There’s a “””””hilarious”””” bit off the bat where Cole gets ring announcer Excalibur to read a special intro that he wrote, which includes a note about Cole confusing Cedric for ACH. Once the Reseda fans start a “That Was Racist” chant, Cole’s notes (snort) anticipate this reaction and respond with the “”””classic”””” Cole bit of “Suck my dick.” As I’ve made clear, I have little love of Adam Cole in general, and this heel run has been at times painful for me to sit through (though I’ve thankfully had to abide relatively little of it, compared to the PWG faithful a decade ago). This is one of two very hacky heel bits of the night and got this started off on the wrong foot.

Cedric attacks Cole quickly after his intro and, although getting a fiery start, is put down by Cole fairly soon after. In a classic example of PWG both-sides-ism, the dastardly heel Cole teases a moonsault, but fakes into a boot scrape and a chinlock, which gets a “That Was Awesome” chant. Cole stays on control for most of the match, allowing for some flashes of Cedric’s impressive moveset, and Cedric gets to kick out of the Panama Sunrise. Eventually, Cole gets the win with a big flurry of signatures off an anti-air superkick; after the match, he cuts an out-of-character promo about how his shoulder (heavily taped up here) requires surgery, which he postponed in order to make the show. This precedes an extended absence for Cole until his return a full year later. Thankfully, by all rights, his shoulder healed up fine, so I can say that I will enjoy seeing less of him going forward. This was fine, didn’t do much for me. **3/4

Chris Hero vs Trevor Lee

On the previous show, Chris Hero had my match of the night with his fight against Sydal, so I’m delighted that he decided to run it back with super rookie Trevor Lee to nearly similar results.

Hero is even more demonstratively the bully here, as he jumps Lee during his ring introduction and immediately starts whacking the crap out of him with some heinous boots. Much like the previous match in this series with Sydal, Hero effectively nulls any hope of meaningful offense Lee tries to mount and just cracks him over and over with strikes. Lee is somewhat bigger than Sydal here, but lacks the experience, and the story of him trying to get something going against Hero is a natural set-up. The basics done brilliantly.

Lee’s brief moments of offense are quite spectacular, as he is such an explosive and quick wrestler that it feels like his attacks really do come out of nowhere (especially an impressive Orihara moonsault). Hero impresses again with a similar spot to the Sydal match, this time catching Lee in a cravate off of a frog splash and suplexing him over. Hero nips up and, in that moment, seems more like a Dark Souls enemy than anything; he is truly invincible here. Lee remains defiant and even manages to get a couple of key suplexes in here and there, but as always, Hero has an answer for everything. Well, almost everything, as Lee follows up another suplex with a slightly botched rope run into a small package, which gets the flash pin victory to a big pop. This match had me hooked the whole way and was a treat to watch. Man, I gotta see more of this era of Chris Hero! ***1/2

World’s Cutest Tag Team (Candice LeRae & Joey Ryan) (c) vs The Addiction (Christopher Daniels & Frankie Kazarian) [PWG World Tag Team Championship Match]

We come to our second of two hacky heel bullshit sections, and of course, it’s in the intergender match. On the last show, I had found Candice’s opener with Rich Swann to be refreshing as it laid the gender dynamics aside for a fairly even and straight-up match; here, Daniels and Kazarian are all too eager to engage in said dynamics for this tag title match, and it sucks the life out of both the crowd and me.

What initially seems like a benefit to the match turns out to be its undoing, as Kazarian hits Joey with a title belt, causing the latter to be helped to the back. This leads to an extended heat segment by The Addiction, which includes some genuinely gross ideas from Daniels to garner sympathy for Candice, including doing his own Joey Ryan lollipop spot by rubbing one on Candice’s back and throwing it into the crowd, followed by rubbing his boot around her crotch and asking if anyone wants to lick it. The whole thing is very uncomfortable, leading to a “This Is Awkward” chant from the crowd. Agreed!

Also bad is Joey returning to the match as the fiery babyface and being Candice’s hot tag. Excalibur on commentary remarks that the dynamic of their team is that Joey typically protects Candice, while she comes in for the flourish. As much as I appreciated seeing her put on more even footing on the last show, it seems she is still regularly shunted to the role of hitting her spots while the men do most of the match. Sucks. The match is whatever, the World’s Cutest win with a Joey Ryan superkick. I was thoroughly put off by every idea this thing had that I was more than ready to move on. **

Biff Busick vs Brian Cage vs Tommaso Ciampa vs Uhaa Nation

A rare appearance in PWG/America for Uhaa Nation, by then an established performer for Dragon Gate. This is his second of two appearances for the company, as he will be snapped up by WWE only a week or so after this show and become Apollo Crews in NXT. This is the third match of the night that starts immediately with a blind-side attack, as Ciampa and Busick get straight to business. Most of my notes for this are just the big moves, as this is all that the match wants to be and, likely, is capable of being. Luckily, the moves are pretty neat, and even better (especially where Brian Cage is concerned), the thing is barely over 10 minutes. Big, dumb, loud, and short, this one is hard to hate. ***

Love Gun (Chris Sabin & Matt Sydal) vs The Young Bucks

This is Sabin and Sydal’s first time teaming together and, contrary to what this finish may have you believe, one of their only times doing so in PWG as of today. This one is in a tough spot, having to follow the chaotic 4-man spotfest, and settles into a more classical tag team groove with some quick and crisp mat work before leading to the Bucks on control. Contrasted to running buddy Adam Cole, the Bucks are not nearly as over-bearing as they usually are as heels here, so the focus is much more on the in-ring, which is where Sabin and Sydal are more likely to succeed as opposed to character work.

There’s a couple of hinky spots here and there, but all four manage to work past any rough patches and put on a pretty good match together. It reminded me of Sabin’s match with Ricochet, in that all four seem to settle into a TV-style match pretty easily, as there are defined segments of the match that don’t really drag and move quickly into the next part. The ending sequence gets the heat up a bit more, as Sabin & Sydal counter More Bang For Your Buck, and hit a combination shooting star press/neckbreaker for the surprise win and a nice pop. Despite what Excalibur shouts on commentary, we have not really witnessed the birth of a new tag team, but at least their short time together will likely be pretty solid. ***1/4

Kyle O’Reilly (c) vs Ricochet [PWG World Championship Match]

2014 was a big year for both of these guys. On this show, Kyle has belts in 3 major promotions, while Ricochet has begun his first major exposure on television through the newer Lucha Underground, holding their championship as well. Good on PWG to capitalize on this matchup in this important context while it was hot and made sense.

After a bit of mat wrestling, Ricochet hits the People’s Moonsault, and gets a bit too cocky, which allows Kyle to begin his arm work in earnest. Now, previously, I’ve griped about Kyle’s matches and how a lot of them feel like they want to be seen as technical classics, but without putting in the actual work to be regarded as such. The biggest offender, to me, was his match with Johnny Gargano at BOLA 2013, where both men ignored any kind of limb work in favor of what they typically do anyway. I’m happier to say that, here, Ricochet actually does pay a bit more attention to the left arm after Kyle works on it, albeit also forgetting about it for certain stretches to get his shit in. It’s not perfect, but compared to how bad it could be, this is a pleasant surprise from someone (Ricochet) who I figured would also similarly not care about that sort of thing.

And hey, even if Kyle’s focus is more on looking cool than anything substantial, at least his moves do indeed look cool. Kyle twists Ricochet in some interesting submissions (thank you, commentator Chris Hero, for helping to parse out some of them) and hits a neat cradle hammerlock suplex. Of course, we get the silly Kyle/PWG no-sell routine at one point, but again, it’s brief and doesn’t make them look like complete dopes. As the match gets into the section involving the big bombs, I appreciate some attempts by Ricochet to convey a sense of struggle; even something as small as him yelling “Get off my hand” when Kyle maintains wrist control is something I appreciate.

Eventually, Ricochet hits a sequence of impressive moves including a Space Flying Tiger Drop (no regard to the left arm), but Kyle catches him in a triangle off of a top-rope shooting star press. Ricochet tries to muscle out as he had earlier in a similar situation, but Kyle transitions to a leg-and-armbar and Ricochet taps. This was pretty damn good for both what it was, and in recognition of the fact that I expected it to be worse. Well done, both of you. ***1/2

Kyle takes the mic afterward to seemingly “address some rumors,” but is jumped by Roderick Strong, who is not as waylaid by the storm as previously indicated. Roddy challenges Kyle to a title match then and there, which Kyle accepts under Guerilla Warfare rules. And now, to our true main event…

Kyle O’Reilly (c) vs Roderick Strong [PWG World Championship Guerilla Warfare Match]

This match is the climax of a year-long Roderick Strong story in PWG; previously on the series, we’ve seen him take on Anthony Nese, with attention paid on commentary to Roddy’s role as “the gatekeeper.” Outside of this series, Roddy has made it clear to Kyle that he wants the PWG World Championship, and that he resents being the company man who only has good matches. This heel turn occurred half a year before tonight, leading into a title defense against Roddy that he lost (he also lost in the finals of BOLA). This is Roddy’s chance for the big-time, something he’s wanted his entire PWG career, and he’ll get it no matter what.

The match starts off hot, of course, and consists of very snug offense. It’s novel to see two guys like Kyle and Roddy, more known for their technical wrestling ability, have a plunder match. At a basic level, a lot of it is them hitting their typical moves, sometimes aided by weapons. It’d be a bit less interesting if the crowd wasn’t completely up for it. Nobody is sitting down and all eyes are on both men as they fight it out. The atmosphere is far more chaotic than PWG normally is, which adds to the frantic feeling.

They do indeed go all out with the plunder, even leading to Roddy taking off the top ring rope and choking Kyle with it; however, despite all that he’s doing and despite that Kyle is coming off a 20+ minute war, the champ will not yield. Roddy’s desperation is added to when he squirms out of an ankle lock by getting out of his boot altogether, so he’s got one bare foot out for the rest of the match (which the crowd do not let him get away with, changing out the “Shitty little boots” chant for “Shitty little foot”). There’s some real whopper bumps here, including a brainbuster through stacked chairs, a suplex to the outside through a table, and the final End of Heartache by Roddy through chairs. After this, Kyle passes out in the Strong Hold (or verbally submits?), netting Roddy his first PWG World Championship after a real corker of a fight. Roddy cusses out the fans to end the show, naturally. Although I did have to do some homework to get the full context of the animosity between the guys, both of them did quite well in putting on a heated brawl with some really scary spots; extra kudos to the much-maligned (by me) Kyle, who put on a great performance in two entirely different back-to-back matches. ***3/4

Shelf Status

I was a bit nervous going into this one, as a lot of times in this series, a show can appear to be an absolute knockout but ends up as a dud or just okay. Thankfully, not the case for this one, as this is one of the strongest overall shows I’ve watched thus far. There are two matches in here I really didn’t care for, but that aside, there is double the amount of fun matches throughout, and even a couple that are up there with some of the best I’ve seen so far. Plus, I’m always happy to recognize when a performer I’m not crazy about goes above and beyond my expectations, as Kyle O’Reilly did here. I’m pleased to say that this one is Shelf Worthy.

(This is not a sponsored article. PWG physical media is available on their website. You can also stream it digitally on High Spots Network.)

We’ll be making a single stop in 2015 next time as we enter the Roderick Strong heel champ era…

Project: Wrestling Guerilla – Mystery Vortex II

SHOW TRAILER

Another one where the trailer absolutely hooked me, as did the buzz for at least two of the matches on the card. I snapped this up in a sale, and I believe I actually have watched this at least once. It’s been nearly a decade for sure, so let’s find out what’s going on.

Cedric Alexander vs Andrew Everett vs Trevor Lee

This was one of the matches that sold the show for me. I remember the hype around this match being huge at the time, and it was considered a star-making performance from all three, a real statement match. Although Alexander had been an ROH regular for several years at this point, this was arguably the biggest stage thus far for both Everett and Lee, both journeymen who frequented lesser-known companies like CWF Mid-Atlantic. All three are debuting for PWG with this match, and what a debut it still is.

This is an ideal opening match for any PWG show, but especially as a way to introduce three young talents to a new audience. It’s all killer, no filler from these three, but there’s plenty of space for each to establish their own identities as well: Alexander possesses great technique, precision, and physical charisma; Everett is a breathtaking high-flier; finally, Lee is the one of the three most comfortable playing a character, and effectively marries the skills of his opponents while adding his own spin. The match is relatively quick, but it gets the crowd to their feet with cool moves and big dives that are still impressive today. There’s really not much to be said about it, you just should watch it yourself. Everett takes the win with a, frankly, unbelievable Shooting Star Press onto Alexander, which is the right call as he needs the win the most of the three (Everett is easily the least charismatic here). A great fireworks match and a romping stomping kick-off to the show. ***3/4

B-Boy, Willie Mack, & Joey Ryan vs Peter Avalon & The RockNES Monsters

It’s a good call to follow up one of the hottest matches of the night with one that doesn’t live and die on crowd heat, ie. the traditional comedy/pity multi-man tag. The usual suspects are as they usually are, with Joey Ryan doing a pre-match bit about if he can say the N-word. It’s really nice when someone as odious as him refuses to be at all likable at every turn in this series. On the flip side, it is nice to see Avalon getting over as one of the company’s meme wrestlers, especially coupled with the fact that he’s still making it work today. PPA all day.

The match itself (ill-aged racial humor aside) is fine, whatever, but I must once again (and for the last time) bang the gong about Willie Mack and his state in the company. Even in the pity tag, Mack’s offense is exciting and crisp, and the heels sell big for him. I would really be interested to know what it was that kept Mack from the upper card in the company, as an odd bit of trivia from this year intimates a potentially less-than-stellar reputation. Mack is only booked once more in PWG this year and then never again (in a show I won’t be covering); he apparently did a farewell promo to the company before moving on to other American indies, but in a tweet (photo below), Excalibur explained that the promo didn’t fit on the DVD of his final show and that it would be posted on YouTube. Years later, fans were still asking where the promo is, as it has seemingly never made air. A really weird end to a promising-yet-unfulfilled tenure for Willie Mack. **1/2

(Arrested Development narrator voice: “He didn’t.”)

Anthony Nese vs Roderick Strong

An interesting story thread mentioned by Excalibur is that Roderick Strong’s career in PWG has seemingly been about nearly making it to the top as a singles wrestler, but not quite getting there, with Excalibur referring to him as “the gatekeeper of the upper echelon [of PWG].” As such, Roderick is in another of his by-now common gatekeeper matches against Nese here.

After Nese grabs an early advantage in the mat wrestling portion, Roderick takes over as usual with stiff strikes and backbreakers. Nese is a good opponent for Strong, as both wrestle somewhat similarly, but Nese has enough gymnastics in his act where he can get up for Roddy’s big moves and add a little sizzle to the proceedings. While Strong’s matches around this time rarely differ radically, they are usually a pretty good time. There’s a concept I was introduced to during my time in community college, and it’s one I’ve always liked to return to: The basics done brilliantly. When put into this mid-card role in the company, Roderick’s matches usually exemplify this adage and are always a quiet highlight of the card. ***1/4

The African American Werewolves (ACH & AR Fox) vs The Inner City Machine Guns (Ricochet & Rich Swann) vs Unbreakable F’n Machines (Brian Cage & Michael Elgin)

Two of these teams are new to me, as the Wolves began teaming together at the 2014 DDT4 (PWG’s annual tag team tournament), and I’ve missed the other shows that the Machine Guns (“The Martin Luther Kings of Wrestling”) have been on. I was looking forward to seeing both teams in play, especially the latter after hearing good feedback about them, but I don’t think this is the match to really get a sense of how either one performs in a tag setting.

Similar to the first match, this one is very much about the antics and the spots, which isn’t bad on its face. The F’n Machines get a lot of shine here against four guys who can bump and post like crazy for them. A lot of the match (and I mean, A LOT) is dedicated to making them look strong, which I’ve seen before and am not really interested in, so I was disappointed that the shine for the other two teams was so short in comparison (although there are some terrific hops and dives from all involved). The big difference between the triple threat opener and this is that this match is nearly 30 minutes long, which goes past indulgent about halfway in. You can put all the cool moves you want into a match like this, and they do, but stretching out to this kind of length just burns out the viewer (although the live crowd is very up for it). By minute 29, the Machines get the win, which (spoilers) never really leads to anything. This match is pure video game bullshit, which I don’t say as an insult, but the most fun video game matches I’ve played were nowhere near this long. ***

Tommaso Ciampa vs Chris Hero

This match was interesting on its face; Ciampa comes in as the current ROH World Television Champion, and Hero is back on a tour through the American indies in a big way after being released from WWE the previous year. Hero takes a back foot in the match early and lets Ciampa lead a lot of it, which may be why this doesn’t really work for me.

Not that I especially dislike Ciampa, but the matches I’ve seen him have tell me that, at least at this point in his career, he doesn’t have a lot of interesting ideas. He’s a gritty striker with some neat maneuvers, but his “Sicilian Psychopath” character is just a bit too on the edgy side for me, amounting to him throwing the double bird a lot and no-selling. Similarly, Hero is a guy I enjoy but he seems to be in between two distinct phases of his career. He’s no longer the slender athletic marvel of the late 2000s/early 2010s, nor is he the larger bruiser character that he is slowly morphing into. As such, his persona now feels like a meeting between both sides of the coin and not especially evocative of either one. Together, the two don’t stink it up or anything, there are some decent parts here and there (especially with Hero’s little added touches), but there’s just not a lot to grab onto, conceptually. The match eventually devolves into no-selling from both as they trade bombs and KO shots, before Hero taps Ciampa with the Stretch Plum. I would say I’m disappointed, but I didn’t have much expectations going in, so I guess I’ll know better for the future. ***

Johnny Gargano vs Kyle O’Reilly

The Kyle O’Reilly defamation tour continues, unfortunately. I don’t go through these shows looking for things to complain about, but as I’ve said before (especially in reference to O’Reilly), watching these matches closely brings to light the shortcomings that were always there, but I was all too eager to either overlook or assume didn’t exist.

What drove me crazy in this match is how, although Kyle and Johnny seem to want to do a technical-style match, that’s really not what this is. Kyle certainly focuses on the left arm of Johnny from very early on, but all throughout, Johnny ignores any damage to throw left-handed strikes without even so much as an “Ouch” to sell the arm damage. One of the ways in which a match can stand out in PWG amidst all the cannon-fire spotfests is by committing earnestly to a “pure” wrestling ideal, and this one doesn’t know if it’s coming or going. There are some cool spots, like Kyle reversing the Gargano Escape into a Regalplex and the generally very pretty counter-wrestling, but it all just feels…there. Much like the seemingly granted sequence of no-sells leading up to the Nigel clothesline from Kyle, it all feels perfunctory. This is the presentation of an ROH-style technical classic, without actually committing to the bit. There’s no big story in play in any sense, which isn’t a sin or anything, but it just means that the match itself has a ceiling when compared to the other whiz-bang matches on this card. It may not look like the triple-threat tag match, but it has more DNA with the way that match unfolds than with the type of match these guys might have elsewhere. If this were half the length, I’d probably be kinder to it, but it’s the second match on this card pushing 30 minutes that absolutely didn’t need to. ***

The Young Bucks (c) vs Best Friends (Chuck Taylor & Trent?) [PWG World Tag Team Championship Match]

After the last couple of matches, I was very much in the mood for this. Best Friends are now established as a 2-man unit after having won DDT4, while the Bucks are in one of their primes, holding 4 different company’s tag belts. The match they have has two distinct halves, devoted primarily to comedy and then spectacle wrestling, and both work quite well.

As is usually the case with Chuck’s matches, the comedy is genuinely funny in a way that doesn’t feel too cloying or pick-me toward the Reseda crowd. Hell, even Matt Jackson got a laugh out of me when he hit a chop with his hand in a cast and immediately did a big, goofy wince. There’s a very good bit where, after the Bucks deny the BF’s trademark Trench Coat Man spot (where Chuck and Trent wear a giant trench coat and pretend they’re one guy), Nick tries to wear the giant coat himself, and commentators Excalibur and Chris Hero giggle at how silly he looks (Hero: “He looks like Sigmund the Sea Monster, just a pile of trash”). It sneaks up on me when a match in PWG makes me earnestly laugh, because a lot of the comedy bits from other wrestlers often have the metaphorical PLEASE LAUGH stamp on it.

We eventually get to the spectacle, the kind of match that either team could have in their sleep. The crowd is very up for a title change and Best Friends are the right team to tease as winning the big one. Of course, after an accidental ref bump, the Bucks keep their titles alive with a second, intentional ref bump. This allows the clown car to unload, as Adam Cole breaks up the climactic pin, and is then intercepted by referee Rick Knox, who hits Cole with a superkick, allowing Trent to take him out with a tope. Alas, Matt hits Chuck with a low blow with the cast behind the referee’s back, and the Bucks steal another one. Nobody ever went broke assuming that the Best Friends will never win the tag belts. ***1/4

Adam Cole (c) vs Candice LeRae [PWG World Championship Match]

This leads seamlessly into the main event, as Adam Cole challenges anyone in the back to a title match, which is swiftly responded to by Candice LeRae. This is the other match that sold the DVD for me, as Candice was the biggest pure babyface on the roster at this time, and it felt right for her to be the one to step up to the hateful Cole. The crowd is completely behind her, in a welcome change from Mount Rushmore’s cool heel dynamic, and it does feel good to see her in the true main event spot at least once, seemingly a testament to the work she put in to be respected by the company’s fans.

Unfortunately, this is an Intergender Match, and as we’re ten years behind the current Discourse of men wrestling women, there is basically only one formula this match has in America: The woman gets the plucky hope spots, but the man’s offense does double damage; even when Candice fires up, Cole only has to hit her once to swat her back down and kill the momentum. It gets the goat of the fans, but it’s boring to watch, as I’ve seen this match told in this same way a million times by now. As much as this main event spot puts over Candice, it doesn’t exactly help her coming out of it if she wilts at every move Cole does (who isn’t that much bigger than her). There’s also only two endings this kind of match can have, and the one that they pick sucks the wind out of the room. As cool as it is to see Candice hit her spots and seemingly be taken seriously, this never feels like more than a token acknowledgement, a fun one-off. Candice will get her big win later this year in one of the biggest matches in the company’s history (I’m to understand), but this failed to move me in the way it wanted to. It really doesn’t help that Candice gets the “facetious respect from heel followed by sneak attack” ending, and has to be saved by the sex offender. **3/4

Shelf Status

I was very much looking forward to watching this one, and it does have its highlights (the great opener, the fun tag title match), but it’s a very middling show with not a lot that I’m interested in going back to. The match to see is the singles triple threat, which still absolutely holds up. The rest is based on your personal tastes, but I’ll be fine if I don’t see them again. Being that it’s a card that is less than the sum of its parts, I’m afraid that I deem it Not Worthy.

(This is not a sponsored article. PWG physical media is available on their website, although this show is sold out. You can also stream it digitally on High Spots Network.)

We’re staying in 2014 next time for one night of BOLA action…

Project: Wrestling Guerilla – Battle of Los Angeles 2013 Night 2

SHOW TRAILER

If you haven’t read my review of Night 1, which you should, you’ll know that I’m coming into the second night of this show a little under-enthused. I’ll also assume you read about Night 1, so that I don’t have to explain any continuing threads. That said, there’s still plenty of good matches on paper to speak of, so let’s not waste time.

Brian Cage vs Drake Younger

Well, might as well take my medicine right away…is what I might usually say upon seeing this match graphic. I was fully prepared to dislike this, as I’ve made no bones about the many ways in which I do not care for Brian Cage in this series. Now, finally, we’ve found the ideal match for him, and it’s actually pretty good!

This is a great use of Cage, and certainly the best match of his that I’ve seen on a PWG show so far. The match itself is short, it’s the show opener, and it is based around a very simple concept, as explained by Excalibur: “Brian Cage, the living weapon. Drake Younger, the human target.” There’s no chain wrestling or pleasantries to start with, as Drake jumps cage and immediately hits an orihara moonsault. Cage then military presses Younger onto chairs on the outside, and the rest of the sub-7 minute match is just Cage killing Younger until Younger wins. It’s just their spots in front of a hot crowd, and even better, Cage loses here so that’s all we have to see of him. The biggest surprise of the series so far. ***

Johnny Gargano vs Kevin Steen

We move on to an intriguing styles mix, which both guys play into from the get-go: While Johnny is faster and has a more polished technique, Steen is wilier and more experienced, and so the match swings back and forth on that axis. As much as I’ve been hard on certain wrestlers throughout this series, someone who has improved in close watch is Kevin Steen. As I mentioned in my first article, Steen was someone I always liked well enough but didn’t love. Upon watching him over the 2011-2013 pack of shows, I realize that there was always a bit more going on in his matches than I understood (or cared to understand), and he’s a far smarter wrestler than I ever gave him credit for. He knows how to adapt himself to a variety of opponents, and how to get the most out of his matches in every sense.

This manifests here as Steen’s attacks mainly focusing on Johnny’s mid-section, a strategy that never calls too much attention to itself but informs a lot of Steen’s offense. Of course, both he and Gargano settle into the roles they’re comfortable with, allowing Johnny to assume the babyface role against the domineering Steen. It’s also no mistake that Steen faced Chuck Taylor in the first round, since he and Gargano are teammates, which allows for a great finish: Steen teases beating Johnny the same way he beat Chuck on Night 1 (pop-up powerbomb into package piledriver), but Gargano reverses it into the Gargano Escape for the tap-out win. Great match. ***3/4

Michael Elgin vs Roderick Strong

A strong outing, but not much to chew on besides that. Roddy, of course, brings his usual high-level game here, with concessions made to Elgin’s power in the early-going. This feels like a similar put-over to the match Strong had with AR Fox the night before, even going so far as to repeating a couple of spots, but they’re good spots, so I hardly mind. The only thing really missing is a bit of extra personality from either guy, which would likely push this match even further. As it is, it’s a fairly good, straight-up wrestling match, with Elgin tapping out Strong with a crossface to move on. ***1/4

ACH vs Kyle O’Reilly

In life, I always try to keep my mind open to being changed, positively or negatively. I certainly came into this PWG series with pre-conceived notions and opinions but, as you’ve likely read by now, some of these thoughts have changed upon closer inspection. It’s the close-read nature of what I’m doing that is causing me to take a more detailed approach to watching a match than I normally use when just watching wrestling purely for fun, and it can bring to light both the shortcomings and unsung value of a lot of performers.

I start on this note because I’m beginning to think there may be less to Kyle O’Reilly as a performer than it seems, which is certainly different than I’ve ever felt about him. I’ve been a fan of Kyle’s since I first saw him in ROH as one half of Future Shock with Adam Cole, as I’m a big slut for technical wrestlers of many varieties. Kyle is a very accessible version of a technical wrestler, as he does a lot of neat-looking submissions, peppered in with stiff strikes and other interesting, varied offense. He even has a couple of meme chants with Reseda (more than I remembered), which illustrates how willing people were at the time to latch onto him, and how much he’s willing to play into comedy here and there. However, this match with ACH led me to feeling a certain way about him that I’m finding hard to shake.

This is a bit nascent and hard for me to explain currently, so I’ll do my best: I feel like Kyle doesn’t have a lot going on in his matches beyond the big spots. Even though Kyle has some cool techniques and grappling in this match, it’s the spaces in between his spots that I feel like he doesn’t have as much going on as some of the most talented people on the roster. I don’t get the sense that he’s working through a strategy or executing some kind of character-based movement in between the spots, so I feel less compelled to pay attention until he’s doing some big move again. Again, I’m still working on figuring this out, and admittedly, this could be that he and ACH specifically aren’t able to inject this kind of thought into their match together. I’ll be keeping my eye on Sleazy Kyle.

This match is good, though! I know I did this big wind-up that looks like I’ll dislike it, but I don’t, it’s just a bit more of a straightforward thing than I figured they would do. Kyle targets the left arm of ACH, and it kind of matters but also kind of doesn’t. ACH gets to do his trademark snappy offense, even when it kind of doesn’t make sense with the flow of the match. They do a couple of cool mat transitions, and the match heats up to some really cool sequences at the end. ACH, in what I’m coming to see in typical PWG fashion, gets to look really cool even in defeat, and gets the “Please Come Back” chants after a successful first weekend. ***1/2

B-Boy, Tommaso Ciampa, & Willie Mack vs Best Friends (Trent & Chuck Taylor) & Joey Ryan

(Joey Ryan is keyed and introduced as a Best Friend but I refuse to acknowledge him as such)

The typical BOLA loser six-man comedy match, and also B-Boy is here. It’s said that comedy ages the fastest out of any form of entertainment, and boy, did I feel aged at seeing some of the indie comedy spots du jour of ten years ago. Whether it’s Chuck’s signature grenade spot, a spate of eye-pokes, or the “everybody puts a submission on the next guy” routine, we get almost everything save for a slow-motion spot. I certainly liked those at the time, but I’m less moved by them today. There’s also a couple of scary moments in here (Chuck getting tangled up in the ropes on a dive, superplex to the outside) that really had me shaking my head. Guys, it’s the Night 2 comedy match, it’s not worth it!

That’s not to say this is completely devoid of yuks, as I did get a guffaw out of Chuck trying to sneak an entire folding chair into his pants. Then, in another Brian Cage-centric surprise, Ciampa goes for a powerbomb outside (which was nearly disastrous the night before), but Cage appears behind him. Ciampa then offers himself to Cage as a mea culpa, and gets powerbombed onto chairs. I have to admit, that’s pretty good. **3/4

Michael Elgin vs Johnny Gargano [Battle of Los Angeles Semifinal]

Much as Johnny’s first match of the night settled into a clash of styles, the second one follows suit as he tries to match speed to Elgin’s power. Both have also gotten their crossface submissions over as finishers, so there’s a lot of interplay around that. Elgin really dominates Gargano for the first half, to the point where I look back and realize that Johnny didn’t actually get that much offense at all compared to Elgin housing him. The action is quick and big as it should be, your typical PWG moves fest with a bit more attention paid to the fatigue of both guys after already wrestling. Elgin moves on after an avalanche Elgin Bomb; good match, but I might’ve shaved a few minutes off. ***1/2

Kyle O’Reilly vs Drake Younger [Battle of Los Angeles Semifinal]

So far in this series, I’ve been impressed with Drake Younger’s willingness to be the tackling dummy in his matches. His matches with Steen and Cage across various shows have been whiz-bang affairs that are memorable because of the nasty stuff Drake both did and had done to him. Now, he’s in the BOLA semi-final, and this is where my goodwill for his style of wrestling begins to wear thin.

Coming off the two paragraphs I wrote about how Kyle O’Reilly’s style (O’Reilly), and how it seems to have a bit less thought behind it than I originally took for granted, we now have a match of his where there is no space for thought at all. It’s all silly decisions, which works for the crowd, but had me shaking my head. Don’t get me wrong, there’s some spots in here that were truly maniacal (helo by Kyle to the outside onto chairs, Drake missing a senton onto chairs, etc.), but it felt like the two were speeding through all the spots they wanted to do, resulting in neither guy selling all that much. There are two separate occasions in which a guy has a big move done to him, and then immediately goes on offense as if nothing happened. I have to put up with Kyle’s Nigel clothesline in his matches, but some of this stuff is a step too far. Ultimately, it’s a fun but brainless affair that has me giving both these guys the side-eye from here on out. ***

AR Fox, Candice LeRae, & Rich Swann vs Adam Cole & The Young Bucks

Now we’re talking. After a Night 1 tag that I had a lot of trouble finding the energy to care about, we swap out the nominal babyface team with an actual babyface team, and we get ourselves a corker.

Fox, Swann, & LeRae are all naturally likable for various reasons, so I actually felt joy when the heels pouted and stooged for them, as did the Reseda crowd who gladly played along. The crowd is very up for this, which makes all the difference, and are especially responsive to heat segments involving Candice, who plays her role quite well. By the time we get to dessert with the big dives and near-falls, it feels a lot more earned than the night before, as the crowd are living and dying on the near falls. There’s an absolutely nuclear sequence at the end as the babyfaces get their big hits in, and the fact the match didn’t end on the stereo 450 splashes from Fox and Swann is kinda bullshit, but then again, whose promotion is it, anyway? Candice’s shoulder is up on the winning pinfall, but whatever, it’s nice to actually enjoy one of these matches. ***1/4

Michael Elgin vs Kyle O’Reilly [Battle of Los Angeles Final]

In 2013, this felt like a prescient meeting of the two biggest talents in indie wrestling. The match that made the most sense in terms of who in the scene was poised to be a star. In retrospect, the booking of this isn’t exactly Nostradamun (a verb I just invented), but PWG can hardly be faulted for going with what made sense back then.

This match is pretty good, all told, but as with a lot of Elgin’s matches (and some of Kyle’s), the lack of personality from both does hold it back. There’s a lot of cool moves, sure, and this is a super-impressive display from two guys wrestling their third match of the night, but it’s very much about them trying to sell how tough and strong they are, which didn’t do a whole lot for me. In Kyle’s case, it also feels like he’s trying to do a bit too much by being Mr. Technical Wrestler, but also he does comedy stuff, but also HIT ME HARD STRONG STYLE RAAAAAAH! Again, there’s nothing super wrong with this match, it’s just kind of old hat after the tournament we’ve had (and don’t get me started on the over-use of head-drop suplexes, as was the style at the time). Kyle taps Elgin to the cross armbreaker, despite Elgin’s efforts to swat him off, and seals the tournament. ***1/4

His big moment is interrupted by Adam Cole and the Bucks, who swarm him after the former offers a facetious congratulations. Super babyface Candice LeRae tries to stand up to them, but gets beaten down (Kyle tries to cover her with his body). Some more babyfaces run in, including Joey Ryan doing a face turn (jerk-off motion), but the big headline is Kevin Steen running in to seemingly beat up his nemeses but instead siding with them, piledriving Candice and breaking the BOLA trophy. The Reseda crowd chants “What the fuck?” as the rest of the locker room chases them off, and having watched the promo after this attempting to explain the turn, I can’t say I get it, either. Kyle does get a gracious babyface promo after all that, and we’re done.

Shelf Status

I think this review comes off sounding a bit negative on this show, but I really did like it quite a bit. A lot of solid-to-great matches, including a couple of big surprises for me in terms of quality (Cage/Younger, Bucks & Cole/babyfaces), and it does make Night 1 look a bit better; or at least, like it’s part of a greater whole. After a bit of a shaky start the night before, I’m happy to say that these shows together are very much Shelf Worthy.

(This is not a sponsored article. PWG physical media is available on their website, although this show is sold out. You can also stream it digitally on High Spots Network.)

Next time, we time-hop for a stayover in 2014. What could be on the card?

Project: Wrestling Guerilla – Battle of Los Angeles 2013 Night 1

SHOW TRAILER

Peeling back the plastic once again, and this time, for a two-night special. Back when I figured my collection of PWG DVDs would be a lot bigger, I knew I wanted to get at least one full BOLA weekend, so I decided on this one due to the sheer indie star power on display. My first foray into BOLA went pretty well, let’s hope this one is just as good or better!

(Fun fact: Night 1 took place the day after my birthday)

Kevin Steen vs Chuck Taylor

Starting off with what is, for the most part, a comedy match. These two go from goof to goof: Hitting moves on a baseball cap after Steen clowns Chuck’s hair; a sequence of eye-based offense; both men getting on commentary at the same time (that’s something I haven’t seen before) and asking Excalibur who the better commentator is…only for him to eye-poke them both. I was initially a bit disappointed, as I would have liked to have seen a more straight-up match between them, but I admit that a match between them without a hint of comedy would have felt wrong. As far as openers go, a comedy match helps to distinguish this one from the pack and is a decent way to get the juices flowing. **3/4

Brian Cage vs Tommaso Ciampa

Ciampa makes his PWG debut, and an inauspicious one, in my eyes. Early on, Ciampa tries to powerbomb Cage on the outside; the first time, he loses him, but the second time, he drops him seemingly right on his head. It’s a scary spot and, in a truly surreal moment, the Reseda crowd goes ghostly quiet as Ciampa backs off and the commentary hushes at the uncertainty of Cage’s status. Thankfully, Cage is seemingly A-okay, and the crowd rallies behind him big time. So, what does Cage do, now that he has the ability to fight from below as an instant babyface?

Nothing! After a couple of count-out teases, Cage returns to the same offense he would normally do in any other match. He doesn’t sell his head or neck, nor does he even acknowledge what happened, he just…[sigh] gets his shit in. Neither he nor Ciampa are quite smart enough to change the match to reflect what happened, to the point that even commentary tries to cover for Cage acting like he’s fine by emphasizing how much of a Machine he is. Look, I get that that’s his gimmick, but frankly, having your gimmick be “My opponent can’t hurt me in a way that matters” sucks. The only way this could have been interesting would have been to add a dynamic to it, like the one they were practically handed. They don’t, so they hit moves until somebody wins. Wasteful. **1/4

Johnny Gargano vs Willie Mack

A return for Willie Mack on the column, after an impressive BOLA debut two years earlier. Mack is just as impressive here, but not quite in a way that serves the match overall. He and Gargano have a fairly good match; I’m not super into it, but what I do love are the parts where Willie Mack gets to be Willie Mack. Two years after his BOLA debut, Mack is still an athletic marvel and charismatic to boot, with my favorite spot being a huge Pounce followed by a tope to the outside. Gargano is good at selling for Mack’s stuff, but then ends up winning the match, which felt at odds with the way the match itself highlights Mack as a performer. This was fine, but it kind of felt like they were holding back a little, which is par for the course with tournaments. Unfortunately, this means that some of these matches (like this one) come across like a half-measure. At least they left interest in me to see a rematch…***

AR Fox vs Roderick Strong

Spoilers: This is my match of the night. Roddy is Roddy here (ie. great) against the rising star Fox, who is game for everything. Their match follows a bit more of a traditional flow as Fox gets an early advantage with a bit of aerial offense, but Roddy takes control with his array of chops, backbreakers, and submissions. The difference here is that Fox is both a capable high flyer who can make Roddy’s stuff look extra-good, and he’s also still as strong with selling and acting a natural babyface as he was in the Bucks match from the previous column. Fox was part of a class of up-and-coming high fliers around this time, but PWG especially seems to have a bit of extra time for the guy, including having Fox kick out of a Sick Kick, and generally give Roddy a run for his money. I’ve always known Fox is a good talent, but now I’m understanding why he’s a great talent, and it sometimes takes an all-timer like Strong to really put that across. ***1/2

Joey Ryan vs Drake Younger

I do believe this is the most canceled match in this series so far. Thankfully, they have a sub-10 minute nothing match with Ryan playing heel to Drake’s plucky babyface. Not only is this just a basic-ass match, but neither guy has much to say or add to it, as it devolves into a moves match before long. How much they both have nothing for each other takes center stage when they break out the Jolly Ranchers and the LEGO to do moves into, with Drake doing Ryback’s finisher into the LEGO (a reference only weirdos like me understand a decade later). Next! **

ACH vs Anthony Nese

Another PWG debut in ACH, as he takes on New York indie staple Nese in what amounts to another moves match; however, the moves are at least pretty and spread out, so there is that. These two both have major hops and are at early points in their careers, such that they’ll do some wacky and wild stuff to get noticed and get you to remember them. Here, this amounts to some flippy taunting, along with impressive dives, with ACH especially notable because of how crisp and snappy his offense has always been. Nese does sell his left knee for a bit before ultimately forgetting about it, but hey, at least he tried. Commentary implicitly acknowledges that, unlike Cage before him, Nese is actually bothering to sell a supposedly injured body part. Certainly a pretty-looking match, but not super substantive. **3/4

Trent vs Kyle O’Reilly

This is not Trent’s first PWG date, but he is still in the part of his career where he’s establishing himself across the indies (as well as NJPW and TNA), and also the part of his life where he strongly resembles Creed frontman Scott Stapp (he looks much better today). It’s interesting to watch this with the knowledge that Trent was in the WWE system as recently as the same calendar year, as the match builds similarly to an early NXT main event. Trent is also wrestling in a similar style to how he wrestled on TV, in that he isn’t always super-flashy, but keeps it fairly safe and solid. This more patient approach leads to the longest match on the card, and the one with the strongest pacing yet. Kyle’s big spots don’t come fast and furious, but are teased out to make the most of them, as are Trent’s biggest offense flurries (a top rope belly-to-belly suplex followed by the Gobstopper knee sequence, topped only by the Crunchy piledriver outside). Trent also sells big for Kyle throughout, and by the time Kyle hits his own finishing spree and taps out Trent, it feels like Kyle really had to earn his victory. I like both of these guys, but even I didn’t expect this match from them together. ***1/4

Michael Elgin vs Rich Swann

I didn’t realize how much I missed this version of Rich Swann until he got to talk his shit. Swann, already a true journeyman in the scene and part of the Inner City Machine Guns tag team with Ricochet, is fully into his “All Night Long” shtick, and he really feels special here. He manages to add personality and charisma to this match in a way that most of the other matches certainly tried to, but not as effectively or naturally. It’s hard to make dance-off spots and Scott Hall tributes(?) come off as not annoying, but I think they manage it.

After my having to reckon with Elgin’s presence in PWG on the previous show, this felt like more of a showcase for the wrestler I responded to so strongly back then. Watching now, I don’t think he’s “next big thing” material like I once believed, but Elgin still comes across like a good power wrestler who is a bit more light on his feet than somebody his size ought to be; plus, I bet his specific look here (thinning hair, singlet, Canadian looks) would be ironically embraced today, as it feels like a throwback to the strong white guys of the early 90’s. These two mix together quite well and have some fairly cool sequences, with my favorite being Elgin absolutely SOCKING Swann with a lariat after the latter attempts a handspring. A good mix of styles makes for a solid match buoyed by young Swann’s inescapable charm. ***1/4

Adam Cole & The Young Bucks vs Forever Hooligans (Rocky Romero & Alex Kozlov) & TJ Perkins

I’ve mentioned, several times at this point, that the best Young Bucks matches involve them stooging for strong babyface personalities. Not only does this match not follow this ideal, but being that Adam Cole is here, it also involves one of the most annoying aspects of modern wrestling to me: The cool heel.

First off, neither Forever Hooligans (the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Champions here) nor TJP are compelling characters, and that’s never really been their appeal (save for Rocky every once in a while). In fact, they get downright booed at points here in favor of the forever tag champs and the current world champion with his beloved “suck his dick” chants. As much as DX getting millions of children to yell “Suck It” likely caused some sideways glances from non-wrestling fans, it’s truly a marvel as to how ostensibly straight male audiences will embrace the most flagrantly gay pageantry possible. As such, between the cold fish “babyface” team and a team of heels for whom I’m the only person not laughing at the joke, this match has to live and die on its in-ring quotient.

It’s fine, I guess. These six are all capable and exciting wrestlers given the chance, but often times, the action is broken up to make way for chants, over-the-top selling, and bits. The crowd eats it up, so it hardly matters what I think; to paraphrase the great Kevin Nash, they already got my money. If I want a better match between the Hooligans and the Bucks, I’m sure I have handfuls of Road To tags that beat this one from an in-ring standpoint hands down. The whole thing ends in a spot-fest with, of course, the Bucks and Cole winning handily to send the fans home happy. Hooray, the heels won. **3/4

Shelf Status

When I first bought this BOLA weekend, it was off of the strength of the names attached. If you can believe it, there was a time where these shows had (at least what I considered to be) the absolute best indie guys available. That was probably true then, but now, it’s as much a harsh reminder as it is a fond look-back, thanks to where some of these fellows ended up. Frankly, I expected more out of this show, which may be due to the fact that most of the matches are the opening round of a tournament, so the guys want to save their best stuff for Night 2. That doesn’t exactly make this the most compelling show on its own, nor does the very not-for-me main event. That said, I will hold off on the shelf status verdict for this one until I follow up with Night 2, as I could see this appreciating in value with the other half of the story, so to speak. As a stand-alone show, I’m left a little cold.

(This is not a sponsored article. PWG physical media is available on their website. You can also stream it digitally on High Spots Network.)

Next time, we finish up the BOLA weekend. Can Night 2 redeem its so-so first half?

Project: Wrestling Guerilla – Is Your Body Ready?

SHOW TRAILER

Unlike the previous entries in this series, I actually have watched this show once before. This is the first PWG DVD that I ever bought, and I did so thanks largely to the trailer. I link to the trailers for these shows normally as a way for you and I to start on somewhat equal footing; if you don’t watch the show, you can at least grab clips of some of the salient moments and have them in mind as you read. This time, I feel it’s important that you watch this trailer first, so you can understand the kind of card that finally convinced me to give PWG a real try.

I actually don’t have a strong memory of watching this show, however. I think, even this early on, I found it very difficult to sit down and watch a full PWG show from start to finish. This would much later turn out to be a familiar symptom of then-undiagnosed ADHD, as I alluded to in the introductory post to this series. Today, I’m hepped up on goofballs and my body is indeed ready!

The RockNES Monsters vs Unbreakable F’N Machines (Brian Cage & Michael Elgin)

Ah, crap. I’ve made my feelings clear about most of these guys so far in previous reviews, so adding a figure like Michael Elgin to the mix is unlikely to take away from any bad lingering feelings. Now, I must be honest, I was a HUGE Elgin fan in 2013. After seeing him squash dudes on Ring of Honor’s new weekly TV show (which I had to DVR as it aired late on a Saturday in my eastern Canadian town) and getting way into his presentation, I was a full-fledged Elgin homer and utterly convinced he could be The Guy in ROH, and maybe even beyond that. It took many a year before I was able to shake that notion but, ten years ago, the sickness was upon me. We all have our missed calls.

Thankfully, in the nearly 2 years since the date of the last show I covered, the RockNES Monsters have turned heel, so I no longer have to try and imagine them as an act people like and are excited to see. What’s more, since the last PWG tag match featuring RockNES and Brian Cage in this article series, they’re more appropriately placed at the very beginning of a card, where their antics are better suited. However, the fact that this match is 12 minutes belies the entire problem behind it: Cage and Elgin, two of the biggest dudes on the entire roster, should eat these dorks alive, but for some reason, they don’t; in fact, them not rolling Johnnys Yuma and Goodtime into little balls and chewing them up like gum kinda makes the Machines seem worse. The funniest example of this is Brian Cage playing face-in-peril, an inherently silly idea involving the baffling visual of Cage getting pushed around by men who look to be at least 100 pounds lighter than him. By the time that the finishing sequence kicks in (which isn’t bad, for what it’s worth), I was left asking, “What was stopping you from doing that ten minutes ago?”

I put most of the blame on Cage, whose problem (to this very day) is that he seems to want to be every kind of wrestler at the same time. While I understand this desire to a point (I also play wrestling video games), it makes me wonder about the parallel universes in which either Cage didn’t balloon himself up and just stuck to Getting His Shit In (a la his mentor, Kanyon, but not as good), or where he committed to the bulk-up and wrestled like a dude his size. Again, this is exactly where these guys should be on the card, and the ensuing match isn’t offensive, but it’s still not for me. **1/2

Kyle O’Reilly vs Davey Richards

We press fast forward from Steen Wolf on both Kyle O’Reilly and Adam Cole tonight, and find them both on different footing. Here, Kyle is coming in as an ROH Tag Team Champion, having established the (still-running) team of reDRagon with Bobby Fish, and has begun to break out in PWG thanks to leaning into his comedic sensibilities. Of course, the DR in reDRagon is back again and, thankfully, seems to have adapted himself better to the PWG atmosphere, albeit in something of an overcorrection.

Y’see, as much as PWG is a lighter atmosphere and leaves plenty of room for “shenanigans,” it feels out-of-place to have these two guys (more so Davey) peppering comedy spots into the more straight-laced kind of match they end up having. After seeing Davey bulldoze his way through his kind of match previously, it feels like a “Happy now?” kind of concession. As such, the comedy spots (usually involving hip gyrations and an extended got-your-leg bit) comes off a bit broad and forced. I chuckled more at the Reseda crowd imitating the “shhh” exhalations that both men do than anything either of them did to get a chuckle.

The match itself is fine; it builds to a good final stretch, but it also feels like both of them are in first gear for everything beforehand. Not a lot feels quite as snappy or immediate as I know either of them can be, save for a moment where Davey catches Kyle with a buzzsaw kick after the latter misses a sweep, and it makes an unearthly sound I was wholly unprepared for. Davey is very much looking to put over his student in a big way here, and taps immediately to a cross arm-breaker before putting him over on the mic afterward. I expected a bit more, but I’m beginning to think that my expectations for PWG Davey are too high. ***

DojoBros vs F.I.S.T. (Chuck Taylor & Johnny Gargano)

(I know that’s not their name here shut up)

White-hot indie wrestling superstar Johnny Gargano* makes his first appearance along with three other PWG regulars, and they have a kick-ass match.

I want to contrast this match with the one preceding it, because it really struck me how much better this match is, both in general and at incorporating comedic elements without feeling like it’s trying too hard. The master of this, of course, is Chuckie T, who is on top form here. Really, this match is something of a time capsule for Chuck, as I feel it can be all too easy to forget just how great he was, especially in the wake of his significantly reduced role in All Elite Wrestling. The fact is, Chuck was a sneaky good athlete among many others in the indie wrestling landscape, but could also effortlessly add personality and charm to anything he did (a la Kevin Steen). Whether it’s blocking chops from Eddie Edwards by putting a sweater on and laughing in his face about it, or following up a tope by picking up a commentary mic and declaring that he is “eatin’ pussy and kickin’ ass,” the guy is just the greatest. Chuck Taylor in the 2010’s is one of the most underrated American wrestlers of his time.

Chuck and Johnny, already an accomplished team in CHIKARA, slot into a babyface role against the DojoBros by virtue of them both wrestling like faces, and Chuck being too damn likable. However, much like Chuckie T, Roddy and Eddie also seem plenty at home spicing up their usual presentation with some fun additions (ie. Eddie getting fans to Irish whip him into a dropkick, Roddy chopping Chuck in the cock). They both seem to have a much easier time than someone like Davey Richards at letting their hair down and going for a few laughs, without it feeling conciliatory or showy.

The match is great fun with these four and genuinely captivating by the end with a couple of solid near-falls. Put this right up there with KOW vs The Bucks as the best tag match I’ve seen on the series so far. ***3/4

(*Referring to him as “white hot indie wrestling superstar Johnny Gargano” is an in-joke that my buddy John and I bring up now and again, as the amount of times he was referred to as something resembling this around this time became parodical)

Kevin Steen vs Drake Younger

This is a first-time meeting between these guys, and my first look at Younger in general. He is, of course, one of the many unpleasant modern-day individuals one will run across during a PWG watch, so I tried to put that out of my mind as much as possible in assessing him here. Being that he was a long-time wrestler for places like CZW and IWA-MS and with a penchant for deathmatches, Drake is a huge blind spot for me, but I remember he was always spoken of fondly by fans at the time. What struck me immediately is how in-shape he is; maybe it’s bias on my part, but to look at Younger here, he doesn’t fit the stereotypical look of a deathmatch wrestler (although that wasn’t his sole calling card). He’s shredded here, physically speaking, and he’s damn spritely on his feet, which make up for what I saw as a lack of personality.

Someone who doesn’t have a lack of charisma is Kevin Steen, who is On One in this match. Steen starts out early in antagonizing the crowd, mocking the ones chanting “We can’t see” when he and Younger brawl on the floor. He gets into it with a couple of particular fans, and the first five minutes are just him riffing and being an ornery SOB. Sometimes, Steen’s heel work can feel a bit ho-hum for me, but it was much appreciated here to make up for Younger’s less dynamic approach.

However, once the bombs start flying, I began to see what Younger brought to PWG: Being willing to take huge amounts of punishment. There are many head drop suplexes that are certainly par for the course in this environment, but less so is a trio of powerbombs Steen delivers to Younger across various parts of the floor and ring. This is soon topped by Younger delivering a sit-out Death Valley Driver to Steen off the apron onto a cadre of chairs. As commentators Excalibur and Chuck Taylor cackled with glee at the violence, I was beside myself in disbelief that these guys were doing these kinds of bumps here. The first half set me up for what I thought would be an average match, but these guys knew how and when to turn up the heat. ***1/2

The Young Bucks vs AR Fox & Samuray del Sol

Of course, this was the match that sold me on this show. This actually isn’t THE Samuray del Sol PWG match that captivated the internet in 2013, that being the tag with Fox against Ricochet & Rich Swann at that year’s All-Star Weekend, but I think my rationale for buying this one is that is was a one-off show, and I didn’t want to feel “pressured” to buy a 2-night event.

Samuray del Sol had something of a moment in 2013, as a clip of him and Ricochet went viral (in wrestling circles) early that year, and it seemed like he could be in position to be the next super-hot indie star thanks to his flashy offense and cool look. He also drew quick comparisons to Rey Mysterio at the time and it seemed like we could be seeing the takeoff of the second coming of him in SDS. 10 years later and with the benefit of hindsight, I was not as impressed as I figured I should be here. SDS would go on soon after this to NXT as Kalisto, where he would enjoy a decent little career, but never quite to the level of “Mysterio 2.0.” Really, for as visually exciting as SDS is here, he doesn’t have the physical charisma that a masked wrestler really needs to get to that vaunted Mysterio level. He isn’t as expressive with his body as he should be, so when he isn’t moving or diving or hitting, he’s just kinda there.

The real star of this match, however, is AR Fox. As it should be, since Fox would be the one sticking around afterward, so no sense in putting too much shine on SDS. Beyond that, Fox outshines SDS simply in being a more engaging performer, based on how well he plays face-in-peril during the Bucks’ heat segment and how much better he is at selling. Commentary also puts him over in a big way (save for when Excalibur calls him on a “lackadaisical” rolling elbow that he likens to a Michael Jackson dance routine). Now, neither he nor SDS are very engaging as personalities overall, which leads to the problem inherent in a Young Bucks heel match where you need to be an engaging babyface foil in order for the match to really work. There are so many fun spots and sequences, but it really is more of a stunt show than anything else. ***1/2

Adam Cole (c) vs Sami Callihan [60-Minute Iron Man Match for the PWG World Championship]

One of two matches that I wrote “Hoo boy” as my first note.

An Iron Man match, no matter who is involved or where, can be a tough sell to even the most seasoned wrestling viewer, and doubly so for the full 60-minute variant. Truth be told, I put off this article for a while knowing that this was the main event, both due to the guaranteed length and the fact that I’m no great fan of either of these guys. I’m less familiar with Callihan (another CZW alumnus), but I’ve seen enough of him and Cole by now that I know I’m not interested. As well, the show to this point was in need of one more match to teeter my opinion on it one way or the other, so a lot (relatively speaking) was riding on this one.

The smartest thing these guys decided to do was to eschew the type of match people think of when they hear “Iron Man match”. As neither Cole nor Callihan are necessarily known as A+ grapplers, they decided to instead tell a more sports-entertainment type of story in the ring and, for what it’s worth, I think it kinda worked. They managed to pull off a 60-minute match that was not as boring nor indulgent as it could have been, and smartly used broad story beats to keep the audience engaged in what was going to happen next. This is really a lot closer to the John Cena/Randy Orton Iron Man match from 2009 than any of the like you’d expect to see on a workrate-focused indie, and it’s all the better for it.

After a hot start for Callihan, heel champion Cole (now truly in his era by debuting his trademark smarmy bad guy character throughout the American independents) gets 3 falls up on the challenger in quick succession, and uses this to milk the ensuing minutes for all they’re worth. There’s a thread in the first half where Cole works over Callihan’s legs and they get a fair amount out of it, with an admirable bit of selling occurring when Callihan goes for a springboard after several Figure Four Leglocks, and his knee gives out. Cole then tries to take advantage of Callihan’s bad legs by cheesing a count-out win, but Callihan rallies back to tap out Cole twice in a row, and then gain two more falls in a roll-up battle, putting Cole on the back foot. The first half of this is very wisely laid out and is fairly engaging.

Then we get to the second half, and we enter into a less-focused period, where both men gain near-falls off big moves and mainly sell their exhaustion. At some point, they basically throw selling limbs out of the way, and it’s just trading big moves with equally big pauses in between. It’s this second half where I was especially grateful for Kevin Steen on commentary, who gets some genuine laughs from some of his observations and helps to distract from the more languid pacing. Eventually, we move into the indie-riffic no-sell portion of the match near the back quarter, which is harder to believe than usual since both guys have been wrestling for 45-50 minutes, and should be more susceptible to big moves/finishers. This feels like an easy story to tell compared to the beats in the first half, and as such is easily the least-engaging section of this. In a neat callback to earlier, Cole rolls up Callihan to gain the lead, and then tries to run away in the remaining minutes. Callihan captures Cole in a horse-collar leg lock, but Cole outlasts the countdown to win the match.

I wouldn’t say that I like this match especially, but I do respect it. I appreciate that these two guys in particular decided not to put on a wrestling clinic, and instead layered up the match with gaga wrestling bullshit that allowed them to keep people’s attention in the long-term. As I said, I think it mostly works, except when they run out of ideas before the end sequence. I am pleasantly surprised that I didn’t really dislike this at all. ***1/2

Sami gets a farewell send-off from the locker room after the match, as he is bound for an ill-fated NXT run. It’s a bit darkly humorous knowing what he’s going off to, but it is sweet in its own way to see Steen and co. see him off.

Speaking of Kevin Steen, here’s three quotes from him on commentary that I had to include:

• “Heavy breathing goes along with dick sucking in my house”
• “[Cole] looks like Lucky Cannon”
• [Cole shushes crowd] “You’re an asshole!”

Shelf Status

On paper, I did not have high hopes for this one, but surprisingly, I think I’ll be hanging on to this. Despite the lackluster opening matches, the show finds it groove by match 3 and is a lot of fun in the middle. The main event, while not something I’d regularly return to, is pretty well done for what it’s trying to do. This is the most efficient use of a card so far in PWG, and is good and lean, especially if you don’t stick around for the Iron Man Match. A surprise, to be sure, but a welcome one, that is indeed Shelf Worthy.

(This is not a sponsored article. PWG physical media is available on their website, although this show is currently sold out. You can also stream it digitally on High Spots Network.)

Next time, we’re staying in 2013 for our first double-shot event…