Just heard this morning about Ox Baker's passing. Surreal that I just saw him at an SICW event a few months ago...he was one of the great characters in wrestling.
Attendance has remained solid in East Carondelet despite being a bit down from the packed houses earlier in the year. There were some gravel piles in the parking lot that reduced available parking spaces by a bit, but thankfully I was able to find a relatively decent spot.
The start of the show was slightly delayed as a fan had some sort of medical emergency. He was on the opposite side of the building so I don't know exactly what happened, but I saw the ambulance lights outside the door...hope it was nothing serious.
The sound system had a hiccup when the National Anthem was supposed to be played, so a fan in my section started SINGING the Anthem on his own and everyone just kinda went with it. That's a first for me.
Your ring announcer was Drew Abbenhaus, your referees were Keith Smith & Jay King.
"The Old School Warrior" Chaz Wesson & Farmer Billy Hills vs. Ax Allwardt & "Dead Sexy" Daniel Gunner: This was the only change from the announced lineup; it was originally posted as a singles match between Hills and Ax. Lot of "old school" in the ring with Chaz, Ax, and referee Keith Smith. There was a rough spot or two, but then neither side's wrestlers had teamed up with each other before. Ax and Gunner isolated Hills for a while and it got to the point where Chaz offered Keith a fan's glasses so he could see the tag. The end came when Chaz finally blind-tagged into the match and hit a cross-bodyblock off the top rope to pin Gunner in 9:11.
A promo segment featued Ricky Cruz and Travis Cook(w/ Ken Kasa & Bull Bronson) forming a temporary alliance; their goal was to prove that the masked Red River Jack is actually Ron Powers. Ron lost a loser-leaves-town(-for-the-rest-of-2014) match to Ricky and shouldn't be around...this helped to establish to the attending fans that Ron would be banned for life if he is revealed to be under the mask. (That had only been pushed on the TV show prior to this.) Seeing as how they've only got two months before Ron is cleared to return, they'd better work fast. Big Daddy came out with the masked man to return verbal fire, pushing a few matches that would happen later in the show.
Bobby D vs. Frankie "The Thumper" Wyatt: Don't blink as this one ended quickly; Wyatt missed an avalanche and Bobby D got the pin with a jackknife cradle in 1:03.
Drew interviewed promoter Herb Simmons about upcoming shows. As announced on Friday's Brothers On Whatever Show on 920 AM(that radio station seems oddly familiar to me...), Marty Jannetty is scheduled to be the special guest for the November 15th show. Jannetty competed in the later days of Wrestling At The Chase as Marty Oates and I saw him in a few of the flashback segments on SICW Wrestling Explosion; of course, he's best known as one-half of The Rockers with some guy named Shawn Michaels.
They also talked about the benefit show on November 22nd for John Blackheart & Big Momma Love; their house burned down and the local wrestling community is raising money for them. They were a bit before my time, but Blackheart had a hand in training a lot of local wrestlers during his active career. MMWA Co-Commissioner and retired referee Jim Harris was in the house to help promote the event; it'll be the first time in a few years that MMWA and SICW will be co-promoting a show.
"Night Train/Gorgeous/Great One" Gary Jackson vs. Mohamad Ali Vaez: These two fought to a no-contest last month and Vaez interfered in Gary's match with Ricky Cruz last week in Swansea. It's a Wrestling 101 battle of the evil foreigner against the patriotic American(one with a military background, no less). It didn't take long for this one to get out of hand; they brawled to a double countout in 9:41. Gary did a fired-up promo after the match about defending his country...this feud MUST CONTINUE~!
Herb interviewed The One Man Gang, who was the visiting guest for the month. By all accounts, he was really nice to everyone and I shook his hand later in the evening. Unfortunately his heyday was a bit before my time; he was done with the WWF by the time I was watching, though I did see his brief WCW stint when he held the U.S. Title. He notably wrestled at CHIKARA'S King Of Trios a few years ago as part of "Team WWF" with Ax and Smash of Demolition. That led to an entertaining moment when Larry Sweeney(RIP) challenged him to a strut-off and he donned the Akeem hat to the tune of "Jive Soul Bro". It's a wrestling cliche but it's true: You don't realize how big some of these guys are until you see them in person.
Cue intermission numero uno...
The Tornado vs. Attila Khan: I knew very little about Khan before this show and I don't know much more now; I couldn't tell you if he's competed in other parts of the country or if he's a totally new wrestler. I fear some level of evil foreigner overlap with him and Vaez under the same roof. This was a glorified squash, as it should have been; Khan won with some sort of straitjacket hold(I was on the other side of the ring and didn't see the hold too clearly) in 4:55...but he refused to release the hold and the referee reversed the decision. Your winner(?): The Tornado.
Red River Jack(w/ "The Famous" Big Daddy) vs. Bull Bronson(w/ Travis Cook): Travis made it very clear that winning was secondary to unmasking on this night. As a result, this one didn't last long before Kasa and then Cruz stormed the ring for the DQ in 4:08. Big Jim Hoffarth made the save, nicely seguing into the next match(though all parties involved felt the need to return to the backstage area and then come back out)...
Big Jim Hoffarth vs. "The King Of Chaos" Ricky Cruz: These two fought several times when Hoffarth was still under the Big Texan mask, but this was their first encounter since the unmasking. However, Kasa and Bronson(w/ Travis) were quick to exact vengeance for Hoffarth's involvement in their business...that led to another DQ in 5:05. Red River Jack(w/ Big Daddy) arrived to back up Hoffarth...an interesting pairing of the currently masked and the formerly masked. I smell a tag match in the making.
Cue intermission number two...there were a surprising number of indecisive finishes on this show(four in a row, in fact), but they did have purpose and will hopefully lead to management putting its collective foot down in the future about all the interference.
Classic Champion Heath Hatton & "The Man Of Tomorrow" Daniel Eads vs. "Ironman" Ken Kasa & Flash Flanagan(w/ Travis Cook): Current champion Hatton and protege Eads were going up against former champion Kasa and current contender Flanagan...Flanagan had targeted Eads at the September show to draw Hatton's attention, leading to their first title match in Fairmont City. That bout saw Flash initially win after using his kendo stick, but the decision was reversed...leaving Flash in a worse mood than usual. This was a standard solid tag bout...I was admittedly a bit distracted during the later parts of the show and didn't catch everything that happened. Referee Jay King had trouble maintaining order, including a few moments where a guy was thrown into the corner and indirectly went over the top rope as a result. (For reference, deliberately throwing an opponent over the top rope is a DQ in SICW.)
Things broke down near the end of the match and Flash's kendo stick came into play. Hatton got a hold of the weapon and Flash manhandled referee King, using him as a human shield. Jay finally got fed up with Flanagan's actions and deliberately turned his back as Heath laid out Flash with two shots from the kendo stick (earning some retribution for the kendo stick attack in Fairmont City...CONTINUITY~!). Of course, Jay turned around to count the pin when Hatton covered Flanagan...that ended it at 13:33. Flash blew his top and laid out both Hatton and Eads with the weapon after the bell...so Hatton-Flanagan II will take place at the November 15th show.
It's funny how this blog started out as more of a self-reference thing than anything else...over time, I heard from people on the local wrestling scene who said that they read it. I often wonder about my place in the grand scheme of things(both wrestling and otherwise)...I sit here as a 37-year-old guy who has far more life concerns than wrestling nowadays. I appreciate people like Brian Kelley at Missouri Wrestling Revival as well as Ben Simon and Drew Abbenhaus who take some of the load off my shoulders...I wish I could contribute more than I do to MWR, but I don't want my semi-jaded attitude to reflect on my writeups. The people around here deserve a bit better than that. I've said a few times lately that I'm one fan with one seat at the shows and one opinion...if a promotion is drawing good crowds who enjoy the shows, then that's what counts. At any rate: If you're reading this, thanks for your support.
The rest of the year looks like this:
-Saturday 10/25: PWCS in Granite City, IL
-Saturday 11/1: Dynamo in Fenton, MO
-Saturday 11/8: MMWA in St. Louis, MO
-Saturday 11/15: SICW in East Carondelet, IL (Marty Jannetty); WLW in Troy, MO
-Saturday 11/22: MMWA-SICW in Cahokia, IL (John Blackheart/Big Momma Love benefit)
-Friday 12/5: SLA in Alton, IL (Yuletide Terror); PWE in Pontoon Beach, IL
-Saturday 12/6: Dynamo in Fenton, MO
-Saturday 12/13: SICW in East Carondelet, IL; MMWA in St. Louis, MO
-Sunday 12/28: HRW in Belleville, IL
Good night, good luck, and #yaywrestling.
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