NWL Special Comment

Now, as promised, a special comment about Sunday's National Wrasslin' League show at the Casa Loma Ballroom in St. Louis, Missouri.

DISCLAIMER:  I'm biased.  Deal with it.

The NWL had varied success in terms of attendance with their Thursday night shows, so the decision was made to shift to Sunday evenings with a scheduled start time of 6 PM.  Unfortunately other factors will come into play on this night as the big screen was having technical issues, delaying the opening of the doors until almost 6:00.  As a result, the actual event didn't begin until about 6:30, but the fans hung in there and the turnout was a notable improvement over the usual Thursday crowd.  Hopefully that's a good sign for the future of the promotion and the audience will continue to grow.  The video screen simply displayed the default NWL logo for the night and no entrance videos or interviews were played.

Your ring announcer was Ben Simon; your referees were Michael Crase & Sean Orleans; your ring girl was Laynie Luck.

"The Raging Bull" Maverick started the show by addressing the fans, complimenting Dez Wellston on their match at the previous event.  However, he had been attacked by Cornell Douglass and Brother Castle after the match and suffered a concussion...as a result, he was not cleared to compete in his scheduled St. Louis Title tournament semifinal.  He reluctantly said he would have to forfeit the match, but NWL President Major Baisden didn't want to reward Douglass for his actions.  Therefore, the semifinal match would be postponed until the next show on April 9th...it would be the first bout of the night and the winner would go on to face the other semifinalist in that show's main event.  That brought out Douglass and Castle to protest, saying Baisden was throwing another bone to the "privileged"...and he asked Major point-blank whose team he was on.  (Without spelling it out, I suspect Baisden reminded Douglass of an uncle of his named Thomas...)  Major told him in no uncertain terms to not question his authority as the boss of the company, booking Castle in a match with Buddy Shepherd later in the night.  Douglass seethed over those words and then actually took a swing at the president, but Maverick blocked the punch and was beaten down by Douglass and Castle.  The Blood Brothers(Davey Gibson & Mathew Grundy) hit the ring to run off the attacking duo.

The Soldiers(Dez Wellston & Neon Iverson) vs. The Anti-Social Network(Tommy Flagg & August Marshall):  This was Iverson's official return to action for the NWL after his previous knee injury...of course, Flagg & Marshall had done their homework and isolated Iverson after clipping his knee.  Wellston got the hot tag and cleaned house, but Flagg caught him in a backslide and got illegal leverage with feet on the ropes to score a cheap pin in 6:50.

"The Hanover Hooligan" Jay Lutz vs. "Greatness" Marcellus Gaines(w/ Drew Gold):  Gaines and Gold are claiming that Gaines is still undefeated since he was "out of his weight class" against Todd Letterman in the tournament quarterfinal.  Lutz was seemingly more inebriated than usual for this bout, which may have been a factor in the outcome.  Gaines outmaneuvered Lutz by backflipping off the top rope, then dropped him with the Southpaw Shooter(knockout punch) for the win in 0:59!  Well, that's how you get a finisher over, especially a KO punch for a boxing character.  (This was a match in which both myself and Ben Simon whiffed on getting the match time on site...I guessed "about a minute" and I was eerily close as I got the time from the YouTube video.)

Skyler Beckett(w/ Buddy Shepherd) vs. Adam Ryan:  Ryan was flying solo this week as Jackie Lee Bosch was not in the house.  Buddy seemed to be taking a few cues from James Brown as he got too worked up, prompting Beckett to comfort him with a gold cape which seemingly energized him.  These two have crossed paths in a past life so they were quite familiar with each other.  The NWL ropes have not been Skyler's friends, sorry to say.  While Beckett was the fan favorite for the bout (and Buddy remains one of the most popular characters in the promotion), they still utilized some subterfuge...Buddy's distraction enabled Skyler to get the rollup pin in 8:22.

Kyle O'Reilly vs. Davey Gibson(w/ Mathew Grundy):  It's very cool to see O'Reilly competing in this area; he faced Mat Fitchett(aka Grundy) at Pro Wrestling Resurgence and took on Barackus at Cape Championship Wrestling.  O'Reilly and Davey (Vega) have crossed paths a few times in St. Louis Anarchy, but both men have evolved their games since those outings.  Kyle's resume speaks for itself as a former Ring Of Honor Heavyweight and Tag Team Champion, as well as an IWGP Jr. Heavyweight Tag Champ...it's hard to believe that I first saw him at Metro East Championship Wrestling in Wood River.  As you might expect, the match was tremendous...Kyle was the more aggressive of the two but wasn't quite a "rulebreaker" in the strictest sense of the term.  I would definitely recommend giving it a look on YouTube if it's in your wheelhouse.  After a lot of close calls, O'Reilly got the tapout victory with the cross-armbreaker in 23:56...outstanding.  Post-match mic work was all Mutual Respect(tm).

Intermission~!  Official Ben Simon Concession Count(tm):  One Coca-Cola.  The beverage prices seem to vary wildly from show to show as it was back to three dollars on this night.

Buddy Shepherd(w/ Skyler Beckett) vs. Brother Castle(w/ "The Bull City Boss" Cornell Douglass):  Local talk radio host Tony Colombo was the special guest ring announcer.  Buddy sent Beckett to the backstage area and told him NOT to come back out under any circumstances...this would come back to bite him, as you might expect.  It was my first opportunity to see Castle/Adrian Armour in action, though it seemed to be more of an angle-driven bout.  Douglass interfered a few times, but finally hit Shepherd with his cane in full view of the referee for the DQ in 7:30.  Douglass and Castle double-teamed Buddy afterwards with no sign of Skyler(since he was told to stay backstage)...after the duo took their leave, Skyler finally ran to the ring to check on Buddy.

"Takedown" Javy Torres vs. Christian Adonis:  With Carolina Grizelda Esmeralda Rodriguez in his past, Adonis was looking to get back on the winning track.  Torres hadn't appeared in a few weeks and was hoping to score his first NWL win.  Torres used his amateur wrestling background to gain an edge against the arrogant Adonis.  However, underhanded tactics made the difference as Adonis got the rollup pin with a handful of tights in 6:21.

Jack Foster vs. Jet Royal(w/ Jax Royal):  "Super Soul" Coco Rumble was rumored to be the St. Louis representative in the I-70 Series, but "The Billion-Dollar Brother" Emmett DuBois and Clayton Fox are taking credit for putting him on the shelf.  The Royals might have been better off with Coco as Foster finally made his NWL debut to a huge reaction from the STL audience!  The Royals were completely unprepared and dominated by Foster; Jax interfered on several occasions but was fended off with ease.  The Royals were bounced around the ring like the proverbial pinballs and Jet did a full backwards somersault after Foster connected with IT'S THE BIG FOOT...that ended it at 2:36 and gave St. Louis a win in the series, improving the score to 4-3 in favor of Kansas City.  Jax took a massive chokeslam afterwards to add, er, injury to injury.

Mathew Grundy(w/ Davey Gibson) vs. "The Five-Star Phenom" Todd Letterman, St. Louis Title Tournament Semifinal:  The "David vs. Goliath" dichotomy happens a lot in wrestling and this was a great example of that contrast.  Would Grundy find a way to take down his much larger opponent?  Would Letterman's sheer power be too much for Grundy's speed and experience to overcome?  Grundy got near-falls after a flying Stone Cold Stunner off the second rope and another after a crucifix bomb, but Letterman cut him off with his signature spinebuster to score his own two-count.  Letterman press-slammed Grundy out of the ring onto the entrance stage but Grundy somehow came back with a springboard Frankensteiner for another close near-fall.  Grundy delivered a reverse Frankensteiner and somehow picked up his massive opponent for a Death Valley Driver!  That wasn't quite enough to finish off Letterman...Grundy went to the well one more time, but Letterman caught his attempted springboard move and finished with the Endzone Spike(pumphandle Michinoku Driver) in 20:26!  With that win, Letterman moves on to the finals on April 8th where he'll face the winner of the Maverick vs. Cornell Douglass semifinal!

After the show, I made my way to The B-Side bar about a block away with Brian Kelley, Drew Abbenhaus, Gary Weiss, Ben Simon, Michael Crase, and Photo Joe.  It's a nice place and it may become a regular stop after NWL events...I had a cheeseburger and sour cream and onion potato chips, with water to drink.  (The diet has been in its planning stage for about, what, two decades now?)

At any rate, I had to work on Saturday night and didn't attend either of the local wrestling shows...I will post the results from the Mid-Missouri Wrestling Alliance(Lemay, MO) and World League Wrestling(Troy, MO) once I have them.  Over at NWL Kansas City, "The Mile-High Magnum" Dak(ota) Draper defeated Blaine Meeks to become the first NWL K.C. Champion and Jeremy Wyatt defeated Kyle O'Reilly to put Kansas City in a 5-3 lead over St. Louis in the I-70 Series.  The independent wrestling scene was VERY busy in the Orlando, Florida area for WrestleMania XXXIII weekend...it's a journey I hope to take at some point in my life, but not in my current state.

The rest of April looks like this:
-Saturday 4/8: Pro Wrestling Resurgence in Swansea, IL; Mid-Missouri Wrestling Alliance in St. Louis, MO; World Powerhouse Wrestling in Jerseyville, IL
-Sunday 4/9: National Wrasslin' League in St. Louis, MO
-Saturday 4/15: Southern Illinois Championship Wrestling in East Carondelet, IL
-Friday 4/21: Cape Championship Wrestling in Cape Girardeau, MO
-Sunday 4/23: National Wrasslin' League in St. Louis, MO
-Saturday 4/29: Southern Illinois Championship Wrestling in Millstadt, IL

That's my special comment for this, the thirteenth wrestling show I've attended in the year 2017.  Good night, good luck, and #yaywrestling.

-PB, Watching Wrestling Wrong Since 1991

P.S. We are all marks.