Outside the Ropes: ARWPRO, Saturday Jan 12, 2019

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ARWPRO held their first card of the year at 7:00pm Saturday January 12, 2019, at the usual spot of American Legion Post 100 in Lake Station, IN. To report on this show, I’m having my first all-out battle with the new WordPress editing environment, and it’s not going well, so the formatting is going to be a little wonky.

Principal Boom Boom takes charge.

To start the night, Principal Boom Boom called a school assembly to tell us all about the good stuff happening to ARWPRO recently, such as raising about $2000 total for the Daniel Chavez Memorial Fund at the end of 2018, receiving a thank you plaque from an organization for the support of ARWPRO, and superfan Megan Lewter running roughshod over the competition at the Hammond City Middle School Championships.

As his first order of business, ring announcer Greg Hansen introduced a special guest – the President of Southland Championship Wrestling, known as The Sentinel. Our guest came out and let us know he was not impressed with ARW or its fans (I mean, he had a point, the crowd was quiet, but come on, it’s the first show of the year and we’re still digesting all that holiday season overeating). And be brought someone from his roster, Jay Harris, to show us what a real wrestler looks like.

The Sentinel is not impressed.

The owner of ARWPRO, King Bishop, came out to stand up for everyone, and he introduced ARWPRO’s first ever champion, Johnny Showtime, to take on Jay Harris. However, Harris eventually got Showtime to submit to an arm bar submission hold.

The next match featured Moxie Mollie defending her ARWPRO Women’s Championship against Melanie Cruise. Moxie Mollie had a few shining moments, but eventually was overpowered by Cruise. In the picture to the right, she just got clobbered pretty good, and it must have hurt! The final pin came when Cruise had Mollie down near the ropes; the ref was a bit out of position, and Cruise took advantage of that to get both of her feet up on the ropes for extra leverage. Moxie Mollie got robbed! She needs a rematch!

The third match of the night had the most action, as Joey Rancid and Brawn (*) the Lumberjack (representing The Family) took on newcomers The Thieves of Greatness – Theo Storm and Sadon, managed by Damien Saint. Brawn the Lumberjack dresses nothing like a lumberjack! As is normally the case when Charlie Jr and The Family is involved, there was a large amount of shenanigans outside the ring, and the eventual distractions led to The Family getting the pin. But, as you can see, the Thieves of Greatness stick together even in defeat! (*) Thanks to Editor Supreme Aimee Renee who gave me the correct name, I had misunderstood hearing his name as “Rod the Lumberjack”. Fixed!

Maybe next time, dudes.

After intermission, what should have been a nice, long match of fundamentals and skill between Mr. 3% Jon Hudson and The Flawless One Dave Allen got going and out to a medium length, but then was interrupted by a return visit of The Sentinel and Jay Harris. When Harris got involved in this match, Hudson and Allen went from being foes to friends, as they warded off the incursion from SCW.

Get out of our faces, Mr. SCW. And also, where’s my hair?

The semi main event of the evening featured Nick Cutler and Maverick Cage teaming up to go after the Tag Team Titles held by The Mexecutioners (Machine and Santana Starks). Below we see Maverick Cage avoiding the ceiling while about to come down on Santana Starks, and then a move about to end badly for either Cage or Machine. You know, since I took the picture, you think I’d remember whether Cage took Machine down in a head scissors or whether Machine eventually picked up Cage for a powerbomb, but, well, I don’t remember! (The picture on the left should have Cutler standing in the right corner and Machine to the left, but the picture is getting cropped when I display it side by side with the other one.)

The main event of the night had ARWPRO Heavyweight Champion Ivan Manson defending against Max Holiday, who really wants the title back! The ref decided that waaaay too many Family members came out with Manson, and chased a few of them off, but Charlie Jr and OSM Old School Manson got to remain at ringside. Now this match also ended with interference after a ref bump, but not from the direction you’d think. The ref got caught in the corner during a splash by Manson onto Holiday and dropped over. While the Family was still outside the ring wondering how to take advantage of this, Brutus Owen Wesker (BOW) ran out from backstage and clobbered Manson, declaring that he was sick of Manson getting the spotlight. Then Manson pinned Holiday and the ref recovered enough to swim over to the pinfall and count 1-2-3.

Ivan Manson is also a yoga instructor, and shows Max Holiday the proper form for the Cobra position.

The next ARWPRO show is Saturday February 9 at the same place, American Legion 100 in Lake Station, IN. Will Moxie Mollie get a rematch after Melanie Cruise had her foot on the ropes to win and take the Women’s Title? What will Max Holiday have to say to B.O.W. after his interference in the main event?

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If you’ve read this far, you might like wrestling?  So maybe, check out the Northwest Indiana Wrestling Action Program (NWIWRAP) broadcast Sundays at 9:15pm*, right after Mostly Metal, which runs Sundays from 8:00-9:15pm CST, on WVLP 103.1FM in Valparaiso, IN. If you’re not in Valpo, catch it streaming on http://www.wvlp.org and the Tune In Radio app. Rebroadcasts happen Wednesdays 10pm – midnight, and NWIWRAP is archived on YouTube, just search for NWIWRAP. You can find @nwiwrap on Twitter. And you can subscribe to the nwiwrap.wvlp@gmail.com Google calendar, where I try to keep up to date calendar postings of shows in and around the NWI region.

* or 9pm, or 9:30pm, or anytime before or after, depending on how much stuff there is to cover! 

Year End Wrestling Recap, 2018

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I probably attended more than three dozen wrestling shows during 2018. It would be hard to go back and get an exact count; I maintained a page of most of the wrestling shows I knew about in the Northwest Indiana region during 2018, but I certainly didn’t attend all of them … and to look back to early 2018 and try to remember which ones I actually saw would be too much for my 52 year old brain. I collect recaps of most shows I attend, either by simply talking about them on the radio or actually bringing equipment and recording delayed radio coverage of the event. For some shows, I write up a recap and post them here on this web page, and below are links to some of those write-ups, too. I plan on continuing this into 2019 and have some pages already prepared – such as this (currently small) list of shows coming up in 2019.

If you want to relive some excitement from 2018, you can find a list of NWIWRAP Episodes (which contain recaps or delayed audio coverage) of many events in the top level NWIWRAP menu item to the left; also, there is a more compressed list at the bottom of this post. Or, you can go look at written recaps through the blog post archives in the left menu here; also, there is an itemized list at the bottom of this post.

So that we can all keep track of what’s going on, here is a list of many regional promotions, their current titleholders that I can remember or could find out about, and their first announced show in 2019. I don’t remember exactly who calls their main title a “World” title or a “Heavyweight” title or a “World Heavyweight Supreme Commander of the Universe” title, so for these purposes, they are all called the Heavyweight Title:

ARWPRO:
Heavyweight: Ivan Manson
Tag Team: The Mexecutioners
Indiana State Championship: X-caliber
Women’s: Moxie Mollie

First show of 2019: January 12, 2019, 7:00pm Central, at American Legion Post 100 in Lake Station, Indiana.

ACW (ACME Championship Wrestling)
Heavyweight: Dave Allen
Intercontinental: Jared Kripke (get well soon!)
Tough Man: Billy the Kid

First show of 2019: Friday February 8, 2019, 7:00pm Central, at DeMotte Boxing Club, DeMotte, IN.

Backbreaker Wrestling:
Heavywight: Trog the Caveman
Tag Team: Top Gunns

First show of 2019: “Hammerlocked”, Saturday February 9, 2019, 6:30pm Central, at St Mary Hildebrandt Hall, Griffith, IN.

Black Label Pro:
Heavyweight: All Ego Ethan Page
Indiana Championship: Kobe Durst

First show of 2019: “BLP Unplugged”, Saturday February 2, 2019, 4:00pm Central, at Rds Gym, Crown Point, IN.

NGW (New Generation Wrestling Indiana):
Heavyweight: Justin Myers
Tag Team: Pinnacle FC
Hoosier State: Brentley Alexander Dawson

First show of 2019: Saturday January 26, 2019, 6:30pm Eastern, at Morgan County Fairgrounds, Crawfordsville, IN.

PWK (Pro Wrestling King):
Prime Heavyweight: Jake Omen
Prime North American: Mitchell Taylor
Prime Tag Team: Rat Pack (Diesl Tracz, Steven Drochner)
Prime Ladies: Moxie Mollie
Heritage: Jayden Quick
Legends Live Women’s: Sadie Vandercamp
Legion Ladies: Shawna Reed

First announced show of 2019 (but may not end up being the first on the calendar): “Wrestling Legends Live”, Saturday March 23, 2019, 7:00pm Eastern, at Century Center, South Bend, IN.

RCW (Revolution Championship Wrestling)
Heavyweight: Russ Jones
United States: Douglas Stout
Tag Team: Brutus Dylan and Kevin Storm
Women’s: Melanie Cruise

First show of 2019 : “Call To War”, Saturday March 23, 2019, 7:00pm Eastern, at Battell Center, Mishawaka, IN.

Recapping 2018: Recaps or delayed audio coverage of several events in 2018 broadcast on WVLP 103.1FM in Valpo:

Recapping 2018: Written recaps of several events in 2018 posted here on metalprofessor.com:

And as always, if you want to try to keep track of regional shows with me, you can pull in the NWIWRAP Google calendar into your own; I try to keep it updated with the events I know about; just go into your own Google calendar and the search for / import the calendar associated with nwiwrap.wvlp@gmail.com.

Outside the Ropes: Black Label Pro November 03 2018 #BLP10

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Black Label Pro held Big Trouble in Little Crown Point on Saturday, November 03 2018 at the On the Square Sports Academy in Crown Point, IN.  This was the last BLP show of the year, before they start gearing up for a couple of early 2019 shows and then their big show on Wrestlemania weekend in New Jersey.

(Stealth edit: You can watch the show on Powerbomb TV: https://powerbomb.tv/promotion/Black-Label-Pro)

  1. The Warhorse Jake Parnell defeated Darby Allin.  Both of these guys are nuts. Darby Allin is soooo smooth with his moves.  (a) Darby Allin leaping over the top onto Parnell; (b) Parnell throwing Allin (he’s the blur) into chairs at ringside.

 

2. Allie Kat defeated Kylie Ray with a piledriver.  This started as a fun romp with both ladies being happy and sportsmanlike (sportswomanlike?), but you know how that goes after a while.  Kylie Ray is the happiest person I’ve ever seen wrestle. (a) Kat about to elbow Ray; (b) Ray getting out of a twisting armbar.

 

3. PCO defeated Dasher Hatfield.  PCO is amazingly acrobatic for a big stocky dude like him; he’s a brick house.  (a) Wrestling! ; (b) PCO is upside down.

 

4. Kevin Ku defeated Gary Jay by using Ring Announcer Sara’s stepladder which he hates so much.  I think he used the stepladder before locking in a submission, but this was over 12 hours ago and I’m old, so I might be misremembering.  I’ve never seen someone with such hatred for an inanimate object.  Kevin, how did those steps hurt you?  Sorry for the crappy out of focus shot.

 

5. #NoNewFriends defeated Space Pirates, the Riegel Twins, and Five Foot Pack Hunters in an 8-man / 4 tag-team battle that had a lot of non-stop action, much of it going from in to out of the ring, as seen below.

 

6. Bryan Alvarez defeated Marko Stunt.  Alvarez plays a great arrogant SOB (is it playing?), and Marko Stunt has been one of my favorites on the card both times I’ve seen him now.   (a) Alvarez gives Stunt a chance at an uncontested armbar; (b) Stunt slaps the hell out of Alvarez.  These guys both chopped the hell out of each other.  Actually, lots of people chopped the hell out of each other.  If I used a stopwatch to time the percentage of the ring time dedicated to chopping and slapping in all the matches so far, it would probably be about 10-15% or more.  Not that that’s a bad thing.  I’ll include a bonus picture at the end of Alvarez’s red and bleeding chest.

 

7. Puma King defeated Gringo Loco.  You know, “You Give Love A Bad Name” is a strange entrance song for a cat from Mexico City. This was a fun, high flying match. Gringo Loco doesn’t look like he should be able to pull off the moves he does, but he is amazingly agile. (a) Puma King about to deliver a flying hurricanrana; (b) the yellow blur is Puma King coming off the top ropes onto Gringo Loco.

 

8. Jeremy Wyatt defeated Marcus Crane.  Jeremy, as long as you use Rainbow in the Dark as your entrance music, you will be my favorite in any match no matter what I’m supposed to think about your dastardly shenanigans.  Both of the blurs below are Marcus Crane – this tells you either how fast he is, or how bad at photography I am with my cellphone.

 

9.  Kobe Durst retained his BLP Indiana State Championship against Rory Gulak.  This match was “AMAZING!”  (a) Durst about to clobber Gulak.  (b) Durst suplexing Gulak over the top rope and onto the outside; this move ended with Gulak going over but also then carrying Durst over the top rope with him.  Props to these guys for not only doing a move usually just teased at, but building it into a double whammy.   Random fact: Kobe Durst has his own personalized entrance music.

 

10. Ethan Page defeated Jordynne Grace in a falls-count-anywhere match to become the BLP World Champion.  This match involved chairs, bleachers, tables, cement walls, and several splintered wooden planks that were not tables, but looked like really big dining room table extenders.  (a) Jordynne suggesting a test of strength; (b) Jordynne putting Page through one of the mystery planks.

 

After going around the perimeter of the venue at least one and a half times, the match finally ended on the entrance stage when Page put Grace through another mystery plank.  Then Page was joined by his car crew Kobe Durst and the Space Pirates to suggest that (i) Page and Durst enter the upcoming (early 2019) BLP tag team tournament together, and since that will also involve the Space Pirates, there’s a good chance the 4 of them will hold every BLP title going in to Wrestlemania weekend, and (ii) at the Wrestlemania weekend show, Page wants Durst to get a shot at the BLP World Title.  Page also put over Grace big time, and made it a point to shame (with the crowd’s agreement) whatever dope yelled “Wrestling is for men!” during the falls count anywhere match.

Misc Ramblings:

Overall, every single match was good and had something memorable in it.  The workers definitely put it all on the line in each match.

The show ran almost 3.5 hours long, which at my age is starting to get a bit lengthy; I’ve noticed that no matter where I am or what fed I’m watching, the 2h45min hour mark is about where I start to switch from thinking about what matches are still coming up to counting down how many matches must be left before I can get out of those uncomfortable seats.

For all the emphasis on family friendliness and asking patrons to be careful with language, boy are some of the entrance themes seriously uncensored!  I mean, I don’t really care about that, but the crowd almost turned it into a game, by saying “Oooooh” every time a very clear “fucking” or “mother fucker” got heard during an entrance song.  That was funny.

Not directly related to this show, but I was listening to Jeff Hawkins on the Shake Them Ropes podcast (part of the Voices of Wrestling network) when he was discussing how Evolve was not as unique an entity as it used to be, with the rise of “super indies” … and he specifically mentioned Black Label Pro as one of the “super indies”, which was cool.

Here are a couple of extra pictures.  (a) shows the chest of Bryan Alvarez after his match with Marko Stunt.  (b) Shows that there’s good news and bad news about falls count anywhere matches:  the good news is that the action can go anywhere, such as close to you; the bad news is that the action can go anywhere, such as where you can’t see it!

 

Edit: Whoops, I totally forgot the pre-show match in which Steve Manders defeated Graham (someone help with the last name? Evers?) who comes to the ring with his trusty flamethrower.  Since I feel bad about not knowing his last name, I’ll make sure his picture is BIG!!

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Outside the Ropes: XSE / PWK A Night of Havoc, Friday Oct 19, 2018

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XSE and PWK held “A Night of Havoc” at the Lifeplex Center in Plymouth, IN at 7:00pm Friday Oct 19.

This was one of those tough decision nights for me because ACW was also running a show, and I also love going to see the folks in ACW as much as possible. But, XSE had this date nailed down for a long time, so they had dibs on my schedule. Plus, as you might tell from the title of the event, they had a special guest … Matt Cross! I’m sure the ACW guys killed in on their show, too.

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The opening match was for the PWK Heritage Championship, and featured current champion Jayden Michael Quick against challenger Jake Omen (above). I certainly don’t know all the matches JMQ has had during his career, but I’m sure facing Jake Omen was one of the toughest. The larger, more powerful Omen controlled a lot of the match, but Jayden Michael Quick retained his title after catching Omen with a second frog splash, and getting the pin.  Below left: JMQ in a predicament.  Below right: JMQ about to miss his first frog splash.

 

Next, Jordan Silver (who used to be Jordan Quick, and so Quick … Silver is a pretty clever name change!) took on Matt Starr. After several minutes of competition, the match was interrupted by Psycho coming out slowly to the ring, looking spooky in his dark blue asylum-style coveralls and black eye shadow, and distracting Matt Star – allowing Jordan Silver to get the pin. This follows a similar event at the last PWK show Halloween Mania V a couple of weekends ago, so there is clearly something brewing between Star and Psycho.  Psycho drew a fork out of his boot and threatened Star with it, but did not follow through. Below left, Jordan Silver is about to get planted.

 

Current PWK North American Champion Mitchell Taylor defended his title against Tony Thunder, representing the Rat Pack. Like at the last PWK show, maestro Eric King played an old commercial Burger King jingle, much to Taylor’s chagrin (above right). The match ended in a disqualification when Taylor’s ring pal Duchess got involved. She tried to distract the ref while slipping Taylor a chain (with proof in a picture, below right!), then coming in the ring, then getting accidentally clobbered by Taylor in the corner. Ultimately Taylor got the DQ, and retains his title.  Below left, you can’t see Taylor’s left arm, but from Tony Thunder’s expression, you know where it just hit.

 

KO Kendra took on Travis Trendbender (introduced only as “Travis”, so maybe he’s losing the adjective) in a match to determine the #1 contender for Moxie Mollie’s PWK Women’s Championship, with that match to take place at the next show. Travis played a lot of mind games during the match, ducking out of action a lot. KO Kendra came out on top, so she will face Moxie Mollie soon.  Travis was a sore loser; the poor guy on the floor (below right) just came out to help Travis get to the back after his match, and was repaid with a kick to the face.

 

After intermission, Nick Cutler took on Keith Creme – the latter became known as Krispy Kreme after he made it clear what he thought of the audience. I had not seen Creme before; he was bald and with absolutely no body hair, but Cutler had enough for both of them. Although Cutler was on the receiving end of some brutality here and there, he was clearly having a good time managing Creme for most of the match, and ended up getting the win.  Below left, Creme tries to get some protection; below right, Creme had Cutler in a submission hold, but Cutler escaped by deadlifting Creme from off the mat.

 

Just A Mazing defeated Russ Jones in a match that pitted the high flying A Mazing against the brick wall of Jones.  After the match, Just A Mazing told the crowd his story of coming back after a serious car accident, and thanked Jones because having a match against Jones was one of his bucket list items upon his return.

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The main event was a fatal four way in a match for the Key to the Kingdom – the holder of which can get a title match at any time.  The entrants were Steven Drochner, Scotty Young, Jared Kripke, and special guest Matt Cross.  Why Matt Cross would want a Key to the PWK Kingdom was not explained.  The match ended when Matt Cross did his shoulder-springboard back off  the ropes into a stunner on Jared Kripke, but Steven Drochner quickly rolled Cross out of the ring and got the pin on Kripke himself.  And so Steven Drochner now holds the Key to the Kingdom.  After the match, Kripke and Cross had a short moment of mutual beard appreciation.

Picture 1: Cross taking care of business on the outside.  Picture 2:  Kripke taking a breather while Cross takes care of business on the inside.  Picture 3: Cross doing a tower of doom and slamming all three other contestants off the corner turnbuckle.  Kripke is the one totally upside down. Picture 4: Cross jumping onto Drochner.

 

 

 

Bell Ringer Greg Garrett posted results from this show on his Facebook page (linked), so give it a like!

The next XSE / PWK event is on November 24, 2018 in Knox, IN.  Follow the XSE Facebook page for more information!

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If you’ve read this far, you might like wrestling?  So maybe, check out the Northwest Indiana Wrestling Action Program (NWIWRAP) broadcast Sundays at 9:15pm*, right after Mostly Metal, which runs Sundays from 8:00-9:15pm CST, on WVLP 103.1FM in Valparaiso, IN. If you’re not in Valpo, catch it streaming on http://www.wvlp.org and the Tune In Radio app. Rebroadcasts happen Wednesdays 10pm – midnight, and NWIWRAP is archived on YouTube, just search for NWIWRAP. You can find @nwiwrap on Twitter. And you can subscribe to the nwiwrap.wvlp@gmail.com Google calendar, where I try to keep up to date calendar postings of shows in and around the NWI region.

* or 9pm, or 9:30pm, or anytime before or after, depending on how much stuff there is to cover! 

Outside the Ropes: RCW Revolution Rumble, Sat Sept 15, 2018, South Bend, IN

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Revolution Championship Wrestling (RCW) held the Revolution Rumble at 7:00pm Saturday September 15 at the Century Center in South Bend, IN.

This event is called Revolution Rumble, but it also contains a match called the Revolution Rumble.  If I was like WWE,  I would be sure to say either “Revolution Rumble Event” or “Revolution Rumble Match” every time the phrase comes up, but since I like to think we’re all smart enough to tell the difference by context … credit that WWE apparently does not give to its audience.

The Century Center is a really good place to see a wrestling show … mostly.  I like the auditorium style seating.  I don’t like the absence of hot dogs.  The arena has a good capacity, and so crowds can look pretty thin, but I think if this event was back at the usual Battell Center, it would have looked quite full.  The crowd was quite vocal, regardless.

The first match was a Five Man Mayhem Match, featuring Scotty Young, Anthony Lee, Jeremy Hadley, Mojo the Voodoo King (I like the name “Mojo McQueen” better), and Tank.  The idea here was the winner of the match would get the final spot (#25) in the Revolution Rumble, and the loser (the person getting pinned) would get spot #1 in the Revolution Rumble.  (See, now I just talked about the Rumble, and I did not specify I was talking about the Revolution Rumble MATCH rather than EVENT, and yet I’ll get it made total sense to you anyway.  See?  We can do it!  Take note, WWE.)  At some points in this match, all five were slugging it out in the ring, and other times a couple of people would be laid out outside the ring, leaving only two or three in the ring, so the pacing stayed sharp and something interesting was always happening.  Below, left, Hadley and Young team up on Tank, while and Lee takes on Mojo.  Below right, Tank topples a tower of doom, slamming three other people at once (Jeremy Hadley was smart enough to stay out of the ring for that one).  Mojo the Voodoo King won this match by pinning Anthony Lee.

Next, Melanie Cruz defended her RCW Women’s Championship against Samantha Heights.  Normally I’d cheer for Cruz, but Samantha Heights is from Cincinnati, and so I have to go with my hometown girl.  But, much like the Bengals and the Indiana University Hoosiers, my support is a curse, and although Heights overcame some brutality from the much larger Cruz and mounted a comeback, she was met with a big boot to the face and got pinned.  Below left, we see Cruz dragging Heights back out from under the ring; I think Heights lost a contact lens down there, and was going under the ring to look for it, but Cruz didn’t let her; if Heights’ vision was impaired, that gave Cruz an unfair advantage!  Below right, Heights launches an aerial attack onto Cruz.  Cruz may or may not have just caught her in mid air and thrown her down.  That’s not the point, look at the high flying style of Heights!  (See, I’m trying really hard here for my homework hero!)

Match 3 was Douglas Stout vs Kevin Storm for Storm’s RCW United States Championship.  Kevin Storm was still remembering what Stout did to him at the last event, and attacked Stout immediately by coming to the ring and launching a suicide dive onto Stout, who had cleared the ring for Storm’s entrance.  Soon after, Storm got the referee to turn towards the audience, and landed a low blow on Stout, repaying him for that very action.  The match ended when Stout’s valet Nicole distracted the ref and slipped her purse to Stout; the purse must have been loaded with all their loose change, because one whack with purse KO’d Storm.   And so Douglas Stout is now your RCW United States Champion.  Below right, he admires his new prize.  Below left, Storm lands a dropkick earlier in the match.

Next, Brian Pillman Jr (also from Cincinnati!) took on Noah Walker.  Walker put up a good fight, but Pillman got the pin.  Below left, Pillman leaps over the top rope on his way to kick Walker in the face; below right, Pillman admires the work of Walker.   Being from Cincinnati, Pillman displays good sportsmanship.

After intermission, the second special guest appeared, and we had Brutus Dylan taking on Madman Fulton (most recently AKA Sawyer Fulton).

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Dylan and Sawyer were evenly matched; below left, they both pause for a breather after a long sequence of matching each other move for move.  Sawyer also got his heart-rate up by trying a few power moves on Dylan; gravity in South Bend must be stronger than he’s used to, and he had trouble getting Dylan up on the air a couple of times.  On the other hand, he was able to jump pretty high; below right, he’s coming off the ropes to kick Dylan).  Dylan eventually got the pin.

Next, it was time for the Revolution Rumble!  (And I’ll bet you know that I’m talking about the actual rumble match, and you’re not confused that the actual event is just now starting … suck it, WWE!)  This was a 25-man over the top battle royal with entrants coming to the ring in one minute intervals.  I tried to keep track of the order of entrants and elimination; when a lot of people got eliminated close together, I may have gotten a couple of pairs out of order, but I think overall the list is OK.  The names are in order of entrance, with the order of elimination in parentheses.  The winner of the match would face Nick Cutler afterwards for the RCW Heavyweight Championship.

  1. Anthony Lee – having lost the mayhem match, he got the #1 spot.   (5)
  2. Roger Lanier (2)
  3. Chase Wilder (I think) (1)
  4. Samantha Heights (8)
  5. Noah Walker (6)
  6. Shady Chris Xion (9)
  7. Fireball (3)
  8. Cletus Farmer (4)
  9. Brandon Smooth (7)
  10. Brutus Dylan (15)
  11. The Polish Heartthrob (10)
  12. Chris Rains (11)
  13. Jimmy W (12)
  14. Dusty Bottoms (14)
  15. Super Diva (15)
  16. Kevin Storm (17)
  17. Douglas Stout (13)
  18. Tank (20)
  19. Madman Fulton (16)
  20. Brian Pillman Jr (18)
  21. Jeremy Hadley (19)
  22. Anthony Toatele (23?  24?)
  23. Scotty Young (23?)
  24. Russ Jones (22? 24)
  25. Mojo the Voodoo King (21)

Note that Nick Cutler was in the timekeeper’s area for the match, offering commentary as he saw fit.  He was particularly obsessed with stressing that since the match is no-DQ, there should be lots of crotch shots.  He encouraged many of them.

Brutus Dylan eliminated everyone left in the ring when he entered, so that he was alone when The Polish Heartthrob came out.

The end of the match got a bit confusing.  The final three participants were Anthony Toatele, Scotty Young, and Russ Jones.  After their eliminations, Tank and Mojo kept going at it outside the ring, causing a distraction.  It looked like Toatele had eliminated Jones on the far side of the ring during the distraction; but either both feet never hit the ground, or he just took advantage of the refs not seeing it, because he re-entered shortly after.  Once Toatele and Jones were the final two left in the match, they got into a spot outside the ropes, on the apron on the near side of the ring.  Nick Cutler snuck into the ring and knocked them both off the apron and onto the floor.  His theory was that since neither of them won the match, he would not have to face either of them.   RCW GM Jon Blackwell disagreed, and his ruling was that now Cutler would have to face both Toatele and Jones, in a triple threat match for the championship.  Here, four participants survey the scene, and Tank might be getting eliminated.

During the main event, Nick Cutler tried to defend his RCW Heavyweight Championship from both Anthony Toatele and Russ Jones.  Each of Toatele and Jones got to take turns giving retribution to Cutler for interfering in the Rumble (Jones is getting his turn below left).  Cutler kept up his fascination with groins, yelling “Crotch!” a few times.  I see new t-shirt options in his future.  Eventually, Cutler was able to pin Toatele by using the second rope for leverage with his feet.

The next RCW show is Friday October 12 at the O’Brien Center in South Bend, IN.

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If you’ve read this far, you might like wrestling?  So maybe, check out the Northwest Indiana Wrestling Action Program (NWIWRAP) broadcast Sundays at 9:15pm*, right after Mostly Metal, which runs Sundays from 8:00-9:15pm CST, on WVLP 103.1FM in Valparaiso, IN. If you’re not in Valpo, catch it streaming on http://www.wvlp.org and the Tune In Radio app. Rebroadcasts happen Wednesdays 10pm – midnight, and NWIWRAP is archived on YouTube, just search for NWIWRAP. You can find @nwiwrap on Twitter. And you can subscribe to the nwiwrap.wvlp@gmail.com Google calendar, where I try to keep up to date calendar postings of shows in and around the NWI region.

* or 9pm, or 9:30pm, or anytime before or after, depending on how much stuff there is to cover! 

Outside the Ropes: ACW at the Rust Belt Rebellion, Sat Aug 18, 6:00pm

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ACME Championship Wrestling (ACW) took part in Shelby, Indiana’s Rust Belt Rebellion auto show event by putting on a wrestling card on site at 6:00pm Saturday August 18.

I had no idea what to expect from a “Rust Belt Rebellion” auto show in Shelby, IN, especially since I had never been to Shelby, and the address on the flyer for the show was not something like the Lake County Fairgrounds or other municipal location, but looked just like the address where Amazon would deliver new socks to some dude’s house.  Google was no help whatsoever, as it kept wanting to redirect me to the Indianapolis area.   Luckily, on the approach to Shelby, there was good signage to the Rust Belt Rebellion; the signs directed me to a residential street and …. holy shit, this thing is at some dude’s house!  Cars of attendees were parked up and down the street.  Some neighbors had “no parking” signs near their curbs.  But wait, it got really interesting.  The property behind the house opened up into a large partially cleared forested area that was set up with a lot of permanent structures to host this event, or other events like it.  It was like a mini Renaissance Fair lot, but for tattooed men with cars instead of for nerds with plastic swords.  There was a playground for kids with the features built from car parts and with an auto theme; there was a replica gas station front (pictured below), there were a couple of open structures for food sales.  And, at the heart of it all, there were a couple of open areas where people had lined up their old cars and popped the hoods for others to gawk at.  And finally, towards the back, was the wrestling ring!

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The first match was X-Calibur vs Thomas Keith.  Apparently Thomas Keith does not like being in Shelby, and he made that clear to the crowd.  During the match, Ref Zoran got clobbered and fell down. Keith grabbed a water spray bottle and sprayed the ref to help revive him; during the confusion, X-Calibur got the upper hand on Keith and got the win.  (Below left, Keith suplexes X-Calibur off the turnbuckles.)

The second match was started at the insistence of Billy the Kid, who is still pissed at Phantasmo for events at the last show which closed out ACW’s “school year” earlier this summer, School’s Out.  GM Michael Allen agreed that Billy the Kid deserved a match; Phantasmo came out and they got started.  Below right. Phantasmo finds himself in a precarious position.  But. eventually Phantasmo won; this did not make Billy the Kid happy, and the two went at it again, resulting in a pull-apart brawl that required the ACW security guards and wrestler Arun to separate (this picture is a couple of paragraphs below, left).  I think we can expect more from Phantasmo and Billy the Kid.

There was a little girl in front of me who saw the guy at ringside recording video, and asked her mom, “Are they recording for TV?”  I’m glad kids still know about TV and not just YouTube.

Kujo came out for his match against Cliff Caviar for Caviar’s Tough Man Championship.  As Caviar came out, he had his “Insurance Policy” TK Zero with him, as always.  As they circled the ring, Kujo jumped out and knocked TK Zero into the guardrail, neutralizing him at least for a while.  Smart!  But, this only paid off temporarily.  Below right, Kujo was not impressed by Caviar’s right hook, and so shows Caviar where he could hit him a second time.  Later on, Kujo had Caviar knocked loopy; TK Zero entered the ring, hit Kujo from behind, and dragged Caviar onto the prone Kujo so that Caviar got the three count.  All this happened in full view of the ref,  but the Tough Man rules have a no DQ stipulation, so the ref can do nothing but count.

After this match cleared out, TK Zero remained in the ring for his scheduled match against Jesus, er, rather, Dakota Prodigy – who is nicely rocking the long hair and beard now.  Below left, TK Zero tries to squeeze Dakota through the guardrail early in the match.  Dakota didn’t get in a lot of offense, and was pinned pretty quickly after he tried to get the upper hand with a jump off the top rope shown below, right.

Next up, hometown hero from Shelby, Crimson Dynamo, took on Kyle Cross.  Not only did Cross have to defend against Dynamo, but also from a kid who’s mom came up with a megaphone for the kid to shout with.  (I don’t think the boy had or used it up until this point.)  Dynamo won the match when he caught Cross with a right cross out of the blue.  Below left, the ring lights give Cross a spooky glow; right, Cross gives Dynamo a neckbreaker across the top turnbuckle.

The Top Gunns made their ACW debut against Kyle Kaylor and Venom.  Venom was a masked wrestler whose mask looked exactly as you’d imagine it would for a wrestler named Venom.  The Top Gunns coordinated well together for some fun offense on their way to victory, and developed a new number one fan in the front row who basically demonstrated he was having a religious experience from the match! Below left, Highball dropkicks Kaylor.  Below right, Ace is carrying and is about to backdrop both opponents at the same time!

The second to last match had Dave Allen taking on Arun.  I think Dave Allen’s Grandmother was in attendance; I mean, he kept calling one woman in the crowd “Grandma”, and if she wasn’t really his Grandmother, that would have been totally disrespectful.  A small boy kept getting more and more upset with Allen’s words and antics to the point of tears.  Poor kid.  Below left, the action is outside of the ring.  This match had a nice intensity to it; somehow Arun got a cut on the top of his head and had blood on his face, which gave a really good extra look to the match.  (Per Facebook posts, it seems he needed stitches … hope you heal up nicely, Arun!)  Arun did get the win with a surprise roll up.  Below right, you can see the true face of disappointment.

The main event was Rockstar Jonny Nigh defending his ACW Heavyweight Championship against Xavier Black.  Below left, Nigh is escaping from a headlock, and below right is celebrating with his fans after his successful title defense.

The next ACW show is coming in late September, be sure to give a Like to the Facebook page “ACME Championship Wrestling – ACW” for updates.

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If you’ve read this far, you might like wrestling?  So maybe, check out the Northwest Indiana Wrestling Action Program (NWIWRAP) broadcast Sundays at 9:15pm*, right after Mostly Metal, which runs Sundays from 8:00-9:15pm CST, on WVLP 103.1FM in Valparaiso, IN. If you’re not in Valpo, catch it streaming on http://www.wvlp.org and the Tune In Radio app. Rebroadcasts happen Wednesdays 10pm – midnight, and NWIWRAP is archived on YouTube, just search for NWIWRAP. You can find @nwiwrap on Twitter. And you can subscribe to the nwiwrap.wvlp@gmail.com Google calendar, where I try to keep up to date calendar postings of shows in and around the NWI region.

* or 9pm, or 9:30pm, or anytime before or after, depending on how much stuff there is to cover! 

 

Outside the Ropes: ARWPRO’s Headlock on Hunger, Sat Aug 11, 2018

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ARWPRO held Headlock on Hunger at noon on Saturday August 11, 2018.  This show was a fundraiser for the Portage Food Pantry, held at the Texas Roudhouse on Rt 6 in Portage, IN. 
When I say the show was at the Texas Roadhouse, that means “at, but not quite inside”, and we all got to sit on the blacktop parking lot on a nice 85 degree sunny day (pictured left, below the next paragraph).  I guess Mother Nature isn’t a wrestling fan.  But there were ice cold drinks at the concession stand, along with hot dogs and burgers cooked inside the restaurant, which were delicious.  I think I’ll go back to Texas Roadhouse soon, order a burger from the menu, and ask if I can pay $3 for it like at this event! 
The show opened with Angel Armani coming out to spray good scent on the stinky audience and introduce his new protege, Johnny Swashbuckle.  His opponent was the “Prince of Lucha” Juan Hernandez.  The match was full of shenanigans from Angel Armani on behalf of Swashbuckle (pictured right below, he tries to push Hernandez off the turnbuckle), but Juan Hernandez eventually got the pin. 
 

The second match featured Indiana State Championship Dave Allen vs. Johnny Showtime.  Dave Allen had a cheering section of one, a young boy who had a “Dave Allen Fan Club” sign; his parents should be ashamed.  The end of the match was eventful; Johnny Showtime pinned Allen near the ropes, and the ref counted three and called for the bell – but at the same time, he noticed Allen’s foot had been on the ropes, so he ordered the match resumed … and this time, Allen won, to retain his title. (Below left, Showtime kicks Allen in the midsection.)

 

Match three was a fatal four-way.  Breaking with the first two matches, there was no one named Johnny in this one.  We had Sadon vs. Theo Storm vs. Maverick Cage vs. X-Calibur.  ARWPRO owner King Bishop came out and announced that the winner of this match would receive the ARWPRO Golden Ticket, allowing him to challenge for any ARWPRO title.  After a lot of attempted teaming up against each other, and action in and out of the ring, X-Calibur is taking home the Golden Ticket.  Below right, Maverick Cage drops the tower of doom, throwing down all three opponents off the ropes. 
 

The ARWPRO Women’s Championship was up for grabs next, with champ Moxie Mollie defending against Melanie Cruz.  The confusion at the end of the Indiana State Championship match was just a warm up for this one. At one point in the match, Melanie Cruz got frustrated and clotheslined the ref.  A second ref came out, and he must not have noticed the transgression, because he allowed the match to continue, and counted to three when Cruz  had Mollie pinned quickly afterwards.  As he announced the winner and new champion, the original ref came back into the ring, asserting that Cruz was disqualified because she had clotheslined him.  The refs started shoving each other!  Moxie Mollie, recovering from a kick to the mush from Cruz, was demanding the match be restarted!  King Bishop was quickly out to restore order; he announced that the title was being held up, with the rematch to take place at the next ARWPRO show on Sept 8 in Lake Station, IN.   (I did not get a picture of this match; I’ll blame my wife, who arrived at the show right at the start of this match, so I was being a good husband and talking to her …. a bit.  Love ya sweetie!).

After intermission, WWF star Eugene came out to entertain the crowd and beat up Nick Cutler.  My wife was impressed with Cutler’s chest hair (in a “wow, is that real?” kind of way, not in a “hubba hubba” kind of way).  Eugene was not, and he got the win.  Below left, Eugene helps a boy in the front celebrate his 5th birthday by having him count the 5 punches he was giving to Cutler.

The next match started out as a battle between ARWPRO Heavyweight Champion Max Holiday defending against Drex Odell, representing The Family.  But it quickly degenerated into a DQ as other members of The Family came out and interfered.  Drex Odell was the only one out there not wearing a black shirt, and I had to remind myself a few times that he was actually part of The Family.  Below right, Odell dodges out of the way at the last second.  Farther below, left, Holiday raises his title.

 

B.O.W. and The Machine sweated and talked smack at each other through a match that ended with Machine victorious.  The theme of the match was, “It’s hot, count faster, ref!”  Below right, B.O.W. is about to plant Machine into the mat.

 

The main event of the show started out as Tommy Dreamer vs. Ivan Manson in a Chicago Street Fight.  But as they are known to do, The Family carried on their grudge against Manson by running out and ruining this match, too!  This pissed off Tommy Dreamer, who says he didn’t come all this way for nothing, and the match was turned into a hardcore tag team match between Dreamer & Manson vs. The Family (it was actually 4 on 2, but who’s counting).  Dreamer and Manson came away with the win.  Below left, Dreamer waits for his moment against Odell.

After the match, Tommy Dreamer did a really nice thing and called all kids under 12 into the ring for a big group picture.  It’s all, he says, about making memories for them.

 

The next ARWPRO show is on Saturday September 8, 7:00pm, at the American Legion Post 100 in Lake Station, IN.