When several wrestling promotions run shows in one general area, event overlap can be unavoidable. Such was the case on Saturday when there were three indy shows in the greater St. Louis area...if you went a bit further east, you could also add the one-shot(?) Pro Wrestling Collision event in Nashville, Illinois. It didn't help that the Cardinals were playing Game 1 of the National League Championship Series at Busch Stadium II AND there was a Blues game at Scottrade Center. As a result, wrestling show turnouts were a bit lower...though the Dynamo show actually seemed to have a few more people than usual.
Several wrestlers worked multiple shows in the same night, resulting in some unusual match placement on the shows. Gary Jackson worked the opener at SICW in Swansea, then went to MMWA in St. Louis for a match there. Espinosa worked the opener at Dynamo before going to South Broadway for a 60-Minute Ironman Match with Da'Marius Jones. Ken Kasa worked both SICW and Dynamo. Oddly, Ricky Cruz only had a match at SICW and wasn't on the card for Dynamo despite being Heavyweight Champion; I think I heard that he was injured but don't hold me to that.
Your ring announcer was Chris Roedel(with Luke Roberts handling extra announcements); your referees were Eric Allen(!) and Patrick Hook. Hadn't seen Allen at a wrestling show in an official capacity in quite a while...sounds like he's easing back into things.
"Dirdey" Jake Dirden & Jackal vs. Brandon Espinosa & Elvis Aliaga(w/ Lucy Mendez) for the Tag Team Titles: Very interesting...Ricky wasn't around and Lucy was in Espinosa's corner. That may create a conflict of interest when those three all cross paths again. I'll freely admit that it's hard to hate Lucy...the STL tattoo helps. (Go Cards!) Would like to see more of her in the ring, but it's tough to get fresh matchups with the handful of female wrestlers in the general area. Good stuff here; Lucy got involved on a few occasions, including an early tripup of Jackal that turned the momentum in her team's favor. Hot tag Dirden, casa en fuego, bonzo gonzo...Jackal and Espy took each other out of the game and Dirden went for the kill against recent rival Aliaga. However, Elvis' trip to Chokeslam City was diverted by a blatant low blow from Lucy on Dirden...right in front of the ref, so that was a DQ at 9:32. The good guys rebounded to clear the ring and this feud...MUST CONTINUE~!
Sir Isaac vs. "The Alternative" Brandon Gallagher: Isaac is one of the newest Dynamo trainees; before this, I had only seen him in a battle royal and a one-on-one match with fellow rookie Mike Outlaw. This was his first traditional face-vs.-heel outing and I thought he looked really good. He pulled off a nice flying rana off the apron before Gallagher cut him off and took control. Gallagher's hit the skids as of late, so the possibility of an upset was pretty good. Isaac nailed a beautiful 450 Splash late in the match, but wasn't able to cover right away and Gallagher reached the ropes to escape defeat. Isaac went to the well once too often and Gallagher tripped him up, causing an uncomfortable landing on the turnbuckle...and the internal observation on my part that Sir Isaac had just discovered gravity. (I apologize, ladies and gentlemen.) Gallagher got the pinfall after that(with a handful of tights for good measure) in 8:48.
Brandon Aarons vs. "The" Evan Morris: Morris' introduction now includes "intergalactic thumb wrestling champion" as well as "former prom king"; coming out to "Beat It" by Michael Jackson is a nice touch as well. Aarons' hair status remains pristine and, yes, he did tell me to say that. Solid action here; Aarons won with a modified Burning Hammer in 8:15.
"Unbreakable" Michael Elgin vs. "The Rebel/Belt Collector" Jeremy Wyatt: Elgin's story has been a significant one in the national wrestling scene; until a month ago, he was Ring Of Honor Heavyweight champion with no sign of his reign coming to an end any time soon. However, Jay Briscoe continued his trend of unexpected title victories...I didn't see his win over Kevin Steen coming, either. The bigger story was Elgin's visa status, something that kept him from returning to the U.S. until fairly recently(he was at St. Louis Anarchy last week). ROH advertised Elgin's return for Saturday's show, but Elgin responded to them on Twitter saying that he WOULDN'T be there and seemingly quit the promotion. He had already been booked for High Risk Wrestling on Sunday, but he was a late addition to the Dynamo card on this night against Midwest standout Wyatt.
Elgin's presence on the card probably helped the attendance; the turnout was noticably better than usual for Glen Carbon. These guys had a really good match, I thought; to the best of my knowledge, it was the first time they had faced each other. The matchup could have realistically gone either way as Wyatt made a thing out of defeating indy wrestling standouts for a while(in Metro Pro). The ending saw Wyatt escape a turnbuckle powerbomb attempt and pull the referee between himself and Elgin. The momentary ref distraction allowed Wyatt to get in an undetected low blow, then score the upset(albeit a tainted one) with the Lightning Spiral in 13:58. I suspect these two will meet again down the line...
CUE INTERMISSION~!
"The New Hotness" Danny Adams vs. Steven Kennedy vs. Keon Option vs. Mike Outlaw: Option is a Dynamo trainee who was making his in-ring debut; he substituted for Barackus in the announced show lineup. It can be difficult to judge a person's skill when there are multiple people in the matchup, but he looked fine from what I saw of him. The match was relatively short compared to some of the other bouts on the card; a dive sequence saw Outlaw take out Option and Adams with a somersault plancha, then Kennedy followed up with an Asai moonsaul to the floor. Kennedy hit Option with the Splash Mountain(sitout Razor's Edge-style powerbomb), but Adams dropkicked Kennedy to break up the pin attempt and stole the fall on Option in 5:23.
"The Maniac" Paco Gonzalez vs. "Showtime" Bradley Charles: It looked like Paco had a lot of friends in attendance as a particular section of the crowd was really into him. This was a solid bout; SBC has mostly been a heel in Dynamo but, depending on the opposition, he can play the face role. Charles won with the TKO in 10:21...unfortunately, the Paco fan club left shortly after the matchup.
I saw something similar at another recent show when a group was clearly there to see one particular person and left after his match. Maybe people have other stuff going on, but it seems like a slight against the other wrestlers when you don't stick around the whole show. I see it at comedy shows as well; sometimes those people in the audience go one further by making a point to ONLY make noise for their friend (even if other comics are deserving of a reaction). Bit of a sidetrack on my part, but just something I had seen a few times recently and felt a need to address.
Team Dynamo(Billy McNeil, "The Don Mega" Shorty Biggs, Outtkast, Jack Gamble, & Jon Webb) vs. The Travis Cook Organization("Ironman" Ken Kasa, Michael Magnuson, Dave DeLorean, Shawn Santel, & Mauler McDarby), elimination tag match: Travis Cook was not in attendance for Dynamo OR SICW on this night; Executive Director Mark Bland announced at the Fenton show that Travis would be barred from the building for this one. (Notably, Bland wasn't at the show either.) I've always been a fan of the Survivor Series format so I'll admit some bias when it comes to this style of matchup. Billy was a random addition to this one as everyone else in the matchup had some degree of history with each other. Thanks to Chris Roedel for passing along the elimination times...
The good guys hit a series of dives, including Billy going Ridiculously Dangerous(tm) with a somersault plancha off the top rope. However, the heels took the initial lead when Magnuson pinned Gamble after a Death Valley Driver in 4:43; Gamble kept going after Magnuson until the ref finally convinced him to leave the ring. The feud between High Level Enterprise and the Black Hand Warriors continued as Webb and Magnuson took the fight to the floor; that exchange was highlighted by Webb hitting Magnuson with a moonsault off the guardrail. However, that led to both men fighting to the backstage area and being counted out at 8:07. (Both men were legal, but the eliminations came off awkwardly as Eric Allen continued officating with the guys in the ring; Patrick Hook came out to tell Chris that Webb and Magnuson were eliminated via countout.)
The "Travis Cook guys" maintained a 4-on-3 advantage, but Team Dynamo evented it up when Shorty hit Paydirt on McDarby to eliminate him at 10:44. McDarby lurked at ringside and got in a cheapshot with his shillelagh, allowing Santel to pin Shorty in 11:26. McNeil took out Santel with a modified Codebreaker in 12:15, evening things up with two on each side. Kasa and DeLorean worked together well for a while but things broke down between the four remaining competitors; that led to DeLorean powerbombing McNeil onto Outtkast, leading to Kasa pinning McNeil at 19:46 and putting Outtkast in a two-on-one situation.
Unfortunately for the heel side, their teamwork backfired at a key moment as Kasa superkicked DeLorean by mistake, allowing Outtkast to roll up Kasa for a flash pin in 23:05. That left Outtkast and DeLorean to battle it out; Outtkast has had surprising luck with his corkscrew moonsault senton off the top rope after going YEARS without hitting it. That move sealed the deal in 26:05, giving Team Dynamo the victory.
Switching gears to the other area shows: It sounded like SICW got a good turnout for their Swansea fundraiser, but the baseball playoffs affected the attendance a little bit. Heath Hatton retained the SICW Classic Title against Bull Bronson in the main event while the feud between Gary Jackson and Mohamad Ali Vaez continued. Two newcomers from Ohio Valley Wrestling debuted: Jade Dawson and Robbie Walker(not the WCW guy).
On the MMWA side, Brandon Espinosa retained the Heavyweight Title against Da'Marius Jones in a 60-Minute Ironman Match. The regulation time expired with a 4-4 tie, but sudden death was ordered; shenanigans with a chair and the involvement of A.J. Williams led to Espinosa retaining and more trouble brewing between Tag Champs Williams & Jones. Elsewhere on the card, Moondog Rover retained the T.V. Title in a no-DQ match against Kevin Lee Davidson and Dave Osborne won a gauntlet match to earn the next shot at Espinosa.
I haven't seen anything about the Pro Wrestling Collision show yet; I will post if/when I get the info. All I knew about the show was Bull Bronson defending the Heavyweight Title against Ax Allwardt.
As for shows in other parts of the country...who would have thought that Madman Pondo would work a Ring Of Honor show(albeit only in an interference spot)?
The weekend wasn't quite done...but more on that next time.
Good night, good luck, and #yaywrestling.
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