Jake the Snake is out of retirement again
. Honestly, he's kind of slow and doesn't do much in the match, relying entirely on the crowd reacting to him being Jake "the Snake" Roberts.
I'm looking forward to Friday Night Fights tomorrow with the International Wrestling Cartel although a lot of the drama building up has nothing to do with the wrestling and everything to do with a conflict between Justin LaBar of WrestleZone and ChairShot Reality who's been doing in-ring interview segments and Justin Plummer who does the IWC Aftershock post-shows.
I was also recently watching an archive video for IWC, saw Daizee Haze as a guest star. Fun wrestler to watch, but horribly skinny girl and the skin on her back and stomach do weird things during moves.
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You've got a point I suppose; maybe I've just got to wait for the old guard to pass so these guys can strut their stuff and let the new noobs be jobbers. That sounds like a vicious cycle kind of thing though.
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It actually does look pretty good, but I'm wondering who exactly came up with the timing. I know it won't hurt the sales that much, but it's a little awkward to see him shown as an evil bastard on the show and an inspirational success story on the commercial break.
I don't mind people doing jobs every once and while but I am not so much for people looking good all the time. I guess you can have a few nosell mcneverjobs like Undertaker or perennial jobbers like Colon Delaney or the Brooklyn Brawler but besides that I think jobs and pushes should be rotated around a little.
3MB and the Prime Tyme Players had everything needed to be successful heel teams, except winning records. And the Shield? What was the point of having them go so long undefeated just to have them job to Christian? Absolutely nothing came of this loss either! If there was no plan why not split up the wins and losses a little? It would make things more interesting.
As is, the only people I am really happy seeing being jobbers in WWE are people I'd rather not have on television to begin with (And the sad part is it is usually for reasons that are no fault of their own whatsoever).
edited 27th Sep '13 7:17:11 PM by Cider
Modified Ura-nage, Torture RackWell at least they let Ryder get in some offense on Smackdown against Bray Wyatt; Gabriel also carried Curtis Axel to a pretty good match on Main Event; he still lost, but it was a good match anyways. I am starting to get a little tired of The Shield, although I think this recent betrayal by HHH could be an attempt at turning them face, which could be interesting. Of course, train wrecks are interesting too. I was also pleasantly surprised by The Miz on Smackdown; I usually see him as rather mediocre, but he turned in a top notch performance this time. I'm even starting to hope a Miz/Orton feud develops after Battleground.
Well in 1941 a happy father had a son . . .Went to Friday Night Fights last night, screamed myself hoarse and decided to take a hot toddy to soothe my throat (having a cold already didn't help). Yeah... I just woke up a bit ago, but I'll try to recount what I remember.
Opening match: Haught & Cute versus Nutts & Brooks
Best match of the night. No, really! Well, that and the closing match were a close tie perhaps. Haught and Delaney entered in their usual high-energy crowd-pleasing manner. Nutts and Brooks followed close behind, unfortunately doing the glitter stick thing again. I say unfortunately because, as the saying goes, "glitter is the herpes of the craft world". Despite attempts by the ring staff to clear the area with brooms between matches, every single wrestler throughout the night sported a shimmer of glitter they'd picked up. It looked like Twilight all night long. Anyhow, there was an excellent back-and-forward action to the match. All four are excellent wrestlers and worked with each other not to advance their own image, but to make everyone look good. Nutts and Brooks did an excellent job of keeping Delaney away from his corner where Haught, as a proper face, merely leaned over straining for the tag instead of leaping in as so many wrestlers, heel or face, do these days. Ultimately, Nutts and Brooks prevailed, keeping the Tag Titles they took off of Haught and Delaney, but not without taking several falls, including one simultaneous 2 and a half count.Live Aftershock with Justin Plummer
Ostensibly, this was going to be another ChairShot Reality segment with Justin LaBar and the crowd had already been riled up on Facebook with suggestions of ways and means of protest (the prevailing idea was for everyone to come up with some sort of reading material and obviously tune out as soon as LaBar came in). After much booing as it was announced that LaBar would soon be entering, instead Justin Plummer came out in LaBar signature leather jacket to riotous cheering. After admitting that LaBar might be stranded at the airport due to Plummer walking off with the jacket, car keys in pocket, and ostensibly filming all of us on his phone to show to LaBar on Twitter (said video has yet to show up), Chuck Roberts showed up for an apparent dressdown but instead congratulated Plummer on how clever he was. Plummer then did an in-ring interview segment with Zema Ion on his return. I like Plummer and his Aftershock show. I do have to offer a bit of constructive criticism in that he needs to work on maintaining intensity in his speaking. After the entry with all of its yelling, he dropped down to a conversational level with Ion, which was a bit jarring.HD Cannon versus Remy LaVey
I may be getting a match or two out of order here. Sorry, part of the issue of not taking notes and trying to write things up the day after. This was LaVey's second match with IWC, his last one being at Proving Grounds also at White Oak. HD Cannon, of course, is a relative rookie in the IWC, but has more of a reputation (and has gotten more of a push). To be honest, I'm still not certain what LaVey's angle is yet. Pale-skinned guy with a shaggy haircut and bad black dye-job, enters with a leather jacket on. I'm not certain whether they're going for a pseudo-goth angle, a biker, or what. For the match itself, LaVey was pretty out-matched. Cannon has the physique and has the moves. LaVey is a bit pudgier and seemed to rely more on striking (although I have to say, he's got some of the most convincing hitting technique in the promotion. Most of the guys take half-hearted telegraph swings that miss by inches, but his punches actually looked and sounded like they connected). Cannon won with a pinfall. I talked with LaVey a bit during intermission. He seemed to be really favoring his right shoulder and sounded a bit out of it; I suspect he actually got hurt out there. Seemed like a nice enough guy, but either he's being counseled to come off as unimpressive (every promotion needs a jobber, I guess) or he needs to do more in the ring.Facade versus Ashton Amherst
This was an "unsanctioned" match, which apparently translates out to "official except no titles will transfer and no disqualification". Amherst had a good entrance, riling up the crowd with how he's trying to insult all of us in our stupid town and yet we lap it all up. Shades of Bobby Fish, to be honest. Facade did his usual except he didn't spraypaint a fan's sign (probably because there were none in the front row tonight), instead spraypainting his own, and giving it to Cray-Cray Lady (the angry grandmother who curses the heels). The match itself was good with Facade largely having the upper hand, but realistically knocked back on occasion by the larger Amherst. Amherst tried to leave the match at one point, proclaiming that Facade was "cheating" by "grabbing his hair at least three times" (Amherst is either heavily balding or has his hair cut in a close buzz cut, so this was a joke) and was told by Chuck Roberts that he couldn't leave the ring because this was "an unsanctioned match". Dunno how that works... maybe Chuck was implying that if he didn't wrestle now, he'd just get curbstomped backstage? Anyhow, the match was good with the referee (former wrestler, I'm told) thrice getting hit by moves and getting knocked out enough to not see Facade successfully pin Amherst. Ultimately, Amherst successfully hit a back-to-belly piledriver on Facade onto a steel chair and then pinned him for the win but not title. As I told my wife, it was an excellent example of making both guys look strong, since both of them could be argued to have gotten the win but without any title changing place. I would not put this one among my top Facade matches, but he's a good wrestler and they made each other look good.Zema Ion versus Brian McDowell
Zema Ion entered the ring and seemed ready to call out RJ City when Team STD came outand pre-emptively accepted his challenge. After a bit of friendly team beating, they left him in the ring with McDowell. It was an alright match, but a bit forgettable. McDowell seemed to be having cardio issues (he's a much bigger guy) and I suspect that Ion is still on the road to recovery, as he didn't do a number of his acrobatic moves (it might also be a matter of whether McDowell was able to follow such moves. A number of Ion's more flashy moves look like they require a wrestler who can execute a flip on their own without landing on their heads). Ultimately, Ion won with a submission where McDowell tapped out seconds into it for a somewhat anti-climactic ending.Four versus Four tag match: Team STD (minus McDowell and Marshall Gambino versus W.A.R., Matt Segaris (Blue Collar Slaughterhouse), and Mike Rayne
I don't like oversized tag matches, but Chuck seems enamored with them. Because of the complexity of so many people in and around the ring, it's actually less exciting than a regular tag match because it so often devolves into either a straight-up brawl or little bits of action happening simultaneously all over the ring. The addition of Mike Rayne was a surprise addition. I guess one of the members of BCS couldn't make it (I think it's Segaris who was out there... I get him and McBride confused on occasion). Well, it started out with the brawl situation until the faces were the guys left in the ring whereupon the match in general happened. They actually maintained this as a regular tag match for a good bit of it with only one person tagged in at a time. At first, the faces dominated the action, tagging in a fresh guy occasionally as they would dominate a member of Team STD and then let them tag out for another guy. Aiden Veil did a bit where he beat up each of the four members of Team STD in turn, then slid out of the ring and tried chatting up the Gambino valet (Madison? It's the girl who's always spilling out of her shirt) before playing a bit of grab-ass with her and getting clouted over the head. When he re-entered the ring, Marshall was very unamaused, and had had time to recover, and long segment of Aiden getting beat up in the Team STD corner ensued. Ultimately, Aiden managed to fight his way out and make the tag. There was more tag action, pretty standard stuff, although there were some odd bits like Palace going for his signature AVIATION!!! top rope maneuver when the only person anywhere near the ring was Chest Flexor, his teammate, on the ring ropes (and, as is typical once he puts on the goggles, Palace missed even the wrong target and tumbled off the side of the ring). Ultimately, Marshall got into a yelled discussion with Flexor, I assume indicating that he didn't think much of them, and Team STD left the ring en masse, leaving Marshall to fend off all four members of the ostensible faces, who proceeded to disregard the tag match rules entirely and all enter the ring to beat up on him while the referee basically looked at the pigpile and shrugged. That is, of course, my other big pet peeve about tag matches, that no one pays any attention to the rules. Gambino was pinned and it looks like the team-up of Team STD and Marshall may be over.Dennis "War Machine" Gregory versus Sam "The Natural" Cassidy
Short match. Dennis largely dominated the action, delivering his signature constant commentary throughout the action, including a shouting match with one of the fans and reprimanding one kid at ringside for swearing. Cassidy was a bit awkward again, missing at least one move where we was supposed to hook Gregory's arms and legs up behind his head and then drop onto his back, slamming Gregory to the mat. As it was, he missed hooking the legs, resulting in Gregory landing awkwardly and recovering for a bit outside the rign, shaking his wrist and complaining about Cassidy's bad technique. After a few minutes of wrestling, Gregory got Cassidy into a submission hold and it was all over.Logan "Heavy Metal Jesus" Shulo versus John "Big League" McChesney
Two veteran wrestlers, both with impressive skills in the ring, what could go wrong? Well, nothing did. It was an excellent match, very much worthy of being the main event. McChesney acknowledged that Chuck had stipulated that the rest of Team Big League (which, these days, seems to be only Nutts and Brooks, probably since Bobby Fish is busy with Ring Of Honor matches) leave ringside, so McChesney ordered them to go to the commentary table. What followed was an excellent example of face versus heel. Occasionally, people accuse McChesney of only being able to win via cheating, but he showed excellent wrestling skills in the match, wrestling smart, repeatedly targeting Shulo's leg in what looked to be progressively painful attacks. McChesney is about the same height as Shulo, but less built, so it made sense for him to take what advantage he could and run with it. Shulo, of course, fought back, but it was largely McChesney's match as he dominated the action and showed that indeed, he can stand on his own as a wrestler. There was a weird bit later in the match where McChesney, staggering after a beating, proceeded to climb the corner post and sit there, but it turned out to be set-up for him stealing Logan's signature move of getting an opponent handing upside-down from the corner ropes and stomping on their face, jumping from the post. There were also two lovely Boston Crabs (also signature moves by Shulo, although ones I haven't seen him do in the ring for a while) by McChesney where Shulo had to struggle for a rope break, unable to get out of the hold otherwise. Near the end, Shulo was getting the upper hand and Brooks tried to enter to interfere with Nutts holding him back, providing enough of a distraction for McChesney to rally. After the second time this happened, Chuck ordered the ringside staff to escort Nutts and Brooks outside, banned from the building for the rest of the match. I have to say, seeing Brooks literally picked up and carried out by the short black guy in the ringside staff was one of the funniest bits of the night. Shulo finally landed his signature piggy-back spin-around slam (I think it's entitled his "Halo Bomb") and I'd swear that they rang the bell for the pin before Shane Taylor came in and blindsided Shulo, necessitating all of the faces from the night to come out and run him and McChesney off and carry Shulo out.Chuck Roberts has since posted that Shulo had to go to the hospital and blames Norm Conners (who wasn't present) for the events. Honestly, I got more of the feeling that Taylor acted on his own, that McChesney was trying to stand on his own for the match and Conners is going to disassociate himself from Team Big League, leaving Justin LaBar as the evil manager, possibly with Taylor joinging up.
Overall, an excellent night. Tickets were cheap and attendance was a bit sparse, but the people who were there were enthusiastic. It was announced that October's match is having its name changed from No Excuses 2013 to Retro Reunion, apparently welcoming back some former stars including some fellow named Egotistical? *shrug* Before my time, I suppose (not difficult to do since I only started attending last year). We also had Cody Knotts arriving to promote his film, Pro Wrestlers Vs Zombies
including showing off a new trailer / music video
which includes shots of IWC's own Facade and Ashton Amherst as well as footage of Hacksaw Jim Duggan, Roddy Piper, and Kurt Angle. They had a "biggest fan" competition during the event to win free tickets for the debut United States (first showings will apparently be in England and Germany) in Uniontown, PA. My wife won one, so we will be attending. There were a lot of kids at the match tonight. It was a bit disruptive having them running up and down the bleachers throughout the matches, and at least one of them slapped McChesney on the back as he came in, something that would get most of the adults thrown out. It played well when Shulo did his "benediction" pre-ring bit with all of the kids huddled around the ringside fence and him evidently saying something very earnest to them although I couldn't catch what. Still, they were enthusiastic, and that's half the fun at wrestling.
Unfortunately, my wife and I will be missing the next event. She scheduled our Halloween party for that day. Ah well, so much for dressing up as Jason Gory...
Edit: And Plummer has posted his video insult to LaBar
.
edited 28th Sep '13 10:58:09 AM by FuzzyBoots
Wait, by Delaney do you mean Colin Delaney? Because I've been wondering what happened to that guy.
Well in 1941 a happy father had a son . . .One and the same. He looks older nowadays, sporting a beard, but he wrestles pretty much every month with the IWC, and also does shows for a number of other promotions. Looking at his Cage Match profile
, he keeps pretty busy, doing 4-6 shows every month. In my opinion, he's pretty good at what he does. I never saw him back in his "Olsen Twins" phase, but these days, he certainly delivers. If I were to sum up his persona when wrestling with the IWC, he comes off as someone who's ecstatic just to be there and wrestle for the fans, and maybe someone who enjoys the pain just a little too much (a frequent gimmick is for him to take a hit from a wrestler, obviously be knocked back by it, then grin widely and invite the opponent to try again).
That's actually a pretty good gimmick; so I went to his Wikipedia page and it says he comes out to Tik Tok. Please tell me that's not true.
Well in 1941 a happy father had a son . . .It's not a wrestler, it's the Ke$ha song. And it is mentioned on the page.
Well in 1941 a happy father had a son . . .Ah. In the IWC, he comes out to Hot, Hot, Hot
, but that's because he's in a tag team with Keith Haught.
^_^ And he dances to it... frankly, he came off as a bit flamboyant in the early bits I saw him in, but after a few matches, I get more the impression that he's playing a guy who simply doesn't care what anyone thinks of him, you know the kind of guy in high school who'd show up wearing a pink shirt with a unicorn on it because they think unicorns are cool and just don't get why anyone would see it as anything but manly.
I think I'm going to have to start watching IWC just for him, he sounds great.
Well in 1941 a happy father had a son . . .Unfortunately, the next IWC event will not have Haught and Delaney (although I suspect that they're both booked in other events in the area this month). However, it does have some other interesting matches.
International Wrestling Cartel Retro Reunion
Saturday October 19th, 2013 Belltime: 7:30 PM Court Time Sports Center 95 Enterprise St. - Suite 100 Elizabeth, PA 15037Ringside Reserved: $20.00
General Admission: $15.00
Kids Under 10 General Admission: $10.00
Official Website link
- John McChesney and Dalton Castle will be choosing each other's opponents, non-title match for McChesney
- Facade vs. Egotistico Fantastico - IWC Super Indy match
- Team Big League vs. Aeroform (Flip Kendrick and Louis Lyndon) - IWC Tag Championship match
- Jimmy Vega$ vs. HD Cannon
- Ashton Amherst vs. Bobby Shields
- Bobby Fish vs. Andrew Palace
- W.A.R. vs. Pete Dunne and Mark Andrews
I'm really bummed about missing Aeroform. They're another one of those acrobatic high-flying teams, had a sweet match against Flippin' Ain't Easy
, the former team-up of Facade and Gory. And, of course, they're running a costume contest, asking people to dress up as their favorite IWC wrestler, past or present. Ah well, guess I'll just have to get the DVD.
So, any thoughts on how Impact ended last night? If you hadn't heard: Hogan's contract expired on Oct. 1 in real life and (as far as we know) an extension was not signed. The most recent episode had been taped last week, before it expired.
Here's how they wrote his exit. They had the newly heel Dixie Carter trying to convince him to stay, (this was in the main event slot, btw), and putting him over as the greatest thing to ever happen to the wrestling business. Hogan's eventual answer was a no, telling Dixie he quit, and walking away. Dixie freaked out and ran after him, getting in his way and frantically trying to talk him out of it, with Hogan staying adamant about quitting. He got around Dixie and started to walk away again, which led Dixie to—and how I wish I were joking—fall down on her knees and wrap her arms around Hogan's leg to stop him from leaving. An embarrassed Hogan kept telling her to let go and finally got his leg free, walking away. Dixie picked herself up, and then shouted that he couldn't quit because he was fired and she didn't want him anyway.
Even if Hogan had creative control, my understanding is that a clause like that just allows him to say "No, I'm not doing that," and he doesn't have to do it. If, OTOH, they just kept him off TV until his contract expired and did their best to reduce him to an afterthought while shifting the focus to the younger talent (like the people involved in the main event of their upcoming PPV, for instance, crazy as that sounds), his clause wouldn't allow him to demand TV time; it just lets him dictate how he's used, not whether he's used, right?
I don't know about his contract's requirements, but I'm glad he's gone; might even start watching again. I have a feeling that he had some say on how he left though.
Well in 1941 a happy father had a son . . .:-P It's a labor of love. Frankly, I largely write the reviews for the wrestlers (they get cross-posted to the Facebook group and I've had a few thank me for providing feedback), but this is a convenient place to share them so that I feel like someone else might see them.
If it ever gets to the level that you feel like I'm just trying to use the board as advertising, let me know, by PM if you don't want to do so publicly. Astroturfing is far too common these days.
It's fine; with what little is posted on this board, any business is good business, and you are still on topic.
Well in 1941 a happy father had a son . . .Come to think of it, this
may be why. I am not a big fan of scaffolds.
Scaffold matches never made sense to me; "let's put the wrestlers where no one can see them and they'll be more likely to get hurt! Genius!"
Oh my. I'm guessing that the dangling precariously from the top of the scaffold was less than planned, but that Chicky Starr was trying to avoid breaking kayfabe by not helping Invader #3? If that happened to me, I wouldn't be going back to the scaffold... to hell with my job.
Edit: Ah, and watching a bit further forward with the ending, I guess it was likely all intentional. *shudder* Could not pay me to do that...
edited 8th Oct '13 5:37:31 AM by FuzzyBoots

Anybody here seen HHH's new dvd? Looks pretty good, from the stuff I've seen so far of it.