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.

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 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!

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.

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.

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!