Post by cavedweller73 on Jul 10, 2011 10:31:16 GMT -5
Last night was another SLA show in O'Fallon. This one was titled "Circus Maximus" and was being billed as their "biggest show of the year". Here's what happened:
For me, the show got off on a sour note by the fact that they had a live metal band playing before the show. Granted, these guys were no where near as terrible as the ICP-wannabes that opened the last CCW show I attended, however, these guys were still pretty awful. They were playing loud enough to wake the dead and granted, being a musician myself, things like that don't bother me, but what does bother me is when a band is obviously playing that loud just for the sake of playing that loud and the whole thing sounds like a muddy mess. The singer was screaming his balls off and you couldn't hear a word of it. And on top of all of that, the crowd (which was pretty strong....at least 150 or so) didn't even care and just wanted to see wrestling. At least they stopped when it was time for the show to start and it was on to the wrestling...
Marion Fontaine vs. Dorian Victor vs. Aiden Young vs. Christian Rose
This was a match for ACW's You Tube channel. I'd actually seen once Fontaine before at an IPW show. He is like a cross between "Spyder" Nate Webb and Josh "Abacrombie" Raymond. He's a decent worker but every thing he does revolves around the fact that he has a massive mustache. It's an entertaining gimmick, but not that exciting, in my opinion. The match was decent. Victor didn't do much of anything, but Fontaine and Young looked good. However, the real star of the match was Rose. He was in there, throwing all kinds of stiff punches and chops and kicks and even did a big dive to the outside on top of the other three at one point. Young was the first one eliminated (all of ACW/SLA's milti-man/team matches are elimination...which is good) and Victor wasn't far behind. That left Fontaine and Rose. The two of them worked really well together and in the end, Rose got the win.
ACW U-30 title
TLC match
Gerald "Gary Jay" James (w/ his "Parents") (c) vs. ACH
This is one of the matches I was really looking forward to seeing....and it delivered! There were chairs in each corner of the ring and a large ladder set up on one side. Both guys worked the crowd well but when the match got going, it was awesome. At one point, ACH but a chair between the ropes in the corner and shot James head-first into it. When James came up, he was bleeding...a lot. Jay then got a table and threw it into the ring. He then super-plexed ACH through it, but ACH kicked out. There were so many near-falls. They then brawled on the outside and another table was used. This time, ACH laid Jay out on it beside the ring and then did an awesome dive over the top rope and through the table. The match still didn't end there. There were several "This is awesome!" chants. The big ladder was then set up on one side of the ring and ACH laid Jay out on another table and was about to jump onto him from it, but Jay "parents" got involved and grabbed ACH. Jay then jumped up and ran up the ladder and did a Russian leg sweep-like move off the ladder and through the table. Both guys banged their heads hard on some chairs that were set up behind that table too. It was really nasty and both guys looked to be legit hurt. The ref and Jay's "parents" rolled both guys back into the ring and Jay got the pin. Absolutely awesome match! I have to say that ACH is, by far, one of the most exciting workers in the indies right now! Someone please, please, PLEASE book a match between him and AR Fox!!!!! That match has GOT to happen at some point!
KC Karrington & Alexander Rodolph vs. Children of Pain (Darin Childs & Kris Wolfe) vs. The Kentucky Buffet vs. The Hooligans
The first thing that stands out about this match is that Darin Childs has lost a bunch of weight. His build almost reminds me of Sami Callihan. Anyway, KC and Rodolph came out first. KC is still doing his "poor man's Christopher Daniels" gimmick and for some unknown reason, started singing on the mic. Rodolph is the VERY large, hairy guy who beat the crap out of Christian Rose at the last SLA show. The Hooligans were, by far, the most over team in the match and I gotta say, those guys are impressive these days. For two large guys they can really move. The match was all over the place. So much fast-paced action and guys flying around all over the place. Matt Cage did two huge dives to the outside. Alex Castle was his normal, sucky self. At one point, he tried to spear Childs through the ropes and botched it....very badly! Both of The Hooligans did big flippy moves to the outside as well. At one point, they took out KC and double-teamed Rodolph and pinned him. Next, the KY Buffet were eliminated when Childs hit Castle with a low-blow. That left The Hooligans against Childs and Wolfe. The Hooligans doubled-up on Wolfe (who's horrible, by the way). Meanwhile, Childs pulled out an "international object" and hit one of them with it and got the pin for the win. Wow...I'm having a late-1980's USWA flashback! A dumb ending to an otherwise decent match.
Rachel Summerlyn vs. Athena (w/ Gary Jay's "Parents")
This match was suppose to be a Woman's title match between Summerlyn and Lady Poison, which is one of the matches I was really looking forward to seeing, but Jessica James was nowhere to be found. So, that kinda bummed me out about this match from the start. Still, the match wasn't horrible. Athena is good, but she did botch a few moves, as did Summerlyn. The two of them just didn't seem to fully "click" with each other as if the match was sort of thrown together. In the end, Jay's "mom" got involved in the match and when Summerlyn grabbed "her" and was about to drop "her", Athena did a dive from the top rope and all three of them crashed hard. That move could have turned out REALLY bad too because it was so sloppy. Anyway, Athena got the pin and no one seemed to be hurt too badly.
ACW title match
Davey Vega (c) vs. Johnny Gargano
This was another match I was really forward to seeing. However, I think right off the bat the match was somewhat hurt by the fact that the crowd had absolutely NO clue who Gargano was. When he was announced, maybe 3 people clapped (me being one of them, of course! Ha ha!!). Vega was over HUGE. The match was good, but not as great as it probably should have been because I kind of got the feeling that Gargano was "phoning it in" since no one knew who he was. He was doing tons of headlocks and rest holds and the crowd couldn't have cared less. So, he kept doing them. There were times when they did some exciting, fast-paced moves, but not nearly as many as I had hoped to see. The ending came when Arik Cannon came in through the front door and distracted the ref. Dingo then ran into the ring and attacked Vega and took him out. Then, for some unknown reason, Darin Childs ran into the ring and hit Gargano with his "international object" and laid Vega on top of him for the pin. What a stupid way to end what should have been an awesome match! After it was over, Gargano grabbed the belt and acted as though he was going to leave with it, but then handed it to Vega and shook his hand.
During the intermission, the crappy metal band played again. I bought a DVD and then proceeded to move very quickly out to my car the get away from the noise. When I came back in, I saw Chuck Taylor was at the merch tables. I didn't even know he was suppose to be there.
Last Man Standing match
Dingo vs. Mat Fitchett
I knew this one would be awesome and once again, it delivered. Dingo looks to be in just awesome shape. I swear that if that guy loses anymore weight, his stomach is going to swallow itself. Anyway, he came out first and got on the mic and cut a monster heel promo, cussing out fans and Fitchett's family who were sitting behind me. Fitchett then snuck in from the back and attacked Dingo. The fight was ON! They brawled ALL over the room and basically, Dingo just beat the ever-loving crap out of Fitchett, as usual. I've said it before, if that kid keeps going the way he is, he's going to be crippled before he's 30. Dingo chopped him so hard that Fitchett's chest was bleeding. Fitchett got some super-stiff chops in on Dingo as well, but Fitchett's chest was so beaten up that after a while, you could tell that Dingo was holding back chopping him anymore and hitting him with headbutts to the chest instead. It was nasty! In my opinion, matches like these are more vicious and dangerous then all-out "blood and gut" deathmatches because it seems worse to watch a guy chop the skin off another guy's chest then just get hit with a lighttube and bleed some. In the end, both guys beat the crap out of each other and at one point, they were both down for the 10-count. Arik Cannon then ran out and grabbed Fitchett's foot and held him down while Dingo made it to his feet for the win. Yet another dumb ending to an otherwise great match.
Texas Bullrope match
Jordan Lacey (w/Adian Young) vs. Adam Raw
This was suppose to be the ended to the little feud these two guys started at the last show, however, Raw wasn't there. So, Lacey got on the mic and said that instead of a match, he was going to do a dance party. The music played and Lacey did the normal "funny to watch a fat guy dance" dance. Lacey and "Juicy" Jimmy Feltcher should form a tag team....that would be interesting, to say the least! Anyway, when the music stopped, Darin Corbin came out and started cussing Lacey out. They did a sorta of "dance-off" Then, some other guy i a suit came out (he sorta looked like Ted Dibiase (The "Million Dollar Man", not his kid)) and said that he was sent to O'Fallon by Robert Evans to keep Corbin from doing anything offensive. This led to the guy trying to get Corbin to stop cussing and Corbin cussing like a sailor...an entertaining exchange. It would have been more entertaining if Evans himself had been there, but I guess he's living in Philly now and working as Archibald Peck in Chikara and R.D. Evans, The Embassy's lawyer in ROH. When I saw Evans at the first SLA show back in January I knew that guy was going somewhere....not because he's all that great of a wrestler, but just because he was so darn entertaining to watch. Anyway, after all of this, they actually had a bullrope match between Corbin and Lacey. Not a great match, but Corbin did make it fun to watch. Lacey is actually not as horrible a worker as you might expect and even pulled off a second rope super-plex on Corbin at one point. In the end, Lacey got the win by touching all four corners (I'm back in the old USWA again!). After the match, the Dibiase guy and Corbin beatdown Lacey and Young. Corbin hit Lacey with the cowbell and busted him open. They left both guys laying in the middle of the ring. Certainly not a great match, but Corbin is fun to watch.
Arik Connon (w/??) vs. Chuck Taylor
Wow, this was a random match. Cannon came out with the guy in the wheelchair that worked with Taylor at an MECW show here in Evansville last year. For some reason, Taylor was working as a face, which kind of sucked since he's such a great heel. However, Cannon is one of the top heels in SLA, so they had to do it that way. As I said, the match seemed very random, but being so that both guys are about as good as it gets in the indies, they made it work. However, it did kind of suck to not have Taylor screaming like a girl and trying to scare small children. Both guys worked well and seemed to be having fun. At one point, it looked as though they were laughing at each other. There were a lot of near-falls and mat-based submission moves used. In the end, the guy in the wheelchair got up on the ring apron and they basically did the exact same finish as the match Taylor and "wheelchair guy" guy did in MECW last year. Taylor took him out and then Cannon hit Taylor with an AWESOME corkscrew brain buster for the win. It wasn't the most original match I'd ever seen, but for what it was, it was still really good.
Main Event
St. Louis Anarchy title
Submissions Match
Evan Gilestico (c) vs. Dan Walsh
I KNEW this one was going to be good. Walsh came out and Gilestico attacked him from behind right away and the fight was ON!!! The two guys beat the living HELL out of each other! Walsh got busted open early and was bleeding from the front and top of his head and dripping blood all over the place. Gilestico stole a move from Necro Butcher and stacked up a bunch of chairs and was going to slam Walsh into them, but got reversed and back-dropped onto them himself. Walsh them stacked chairs on top of him and hit him with another. They them ended up on the bar and Walsh had Gilestico's arm wrapped around the beer tap. They then went to another corner of the room and were hitting each other with everything from stiff punches to chairs to pieces of broken table. At one point, Gilestico climbed into the ring and pulled down one of the lights from the corner. He then took a running start and slammed it into Walsh's head. They finally did make it back into the ring and continued to beat the crap out of each other. When the action spilled back outside, they were punching each other VERY stiffly and Gilestico got a cut hardway over his eye. That's what I was saying before....these kinds of matches are almost more vicious than all-out deathmatches! When they got back into the ring, Gilestico hit Walsh with a chair and then got him down and used to chair to apply a cross-face and Walsh passed out. The ref stopped the match and Gilestico won. Once Walsh got up, he got on the mic and was screaming about how that was the second time this ref had stopped the match and caused him to lose to Gilestico. He then proceeded to beat the crap out of the ref. While the match was an awesome brawl, I have to admit that the ended did suck because they had been building this feud since January and with this being the "biggest show", the crowd really wanted to see the hometown boy win the belt. But instead, we got the exact same finish as the first match these two had. I don't know who booked this show, but I have to admit that was a terrible way to end your "biggest show of the year".
In the end, this show was good and I enjoyed it. However, I can't say it was my favorite SLA show. Between the strange booking, crappy endings and people who didn't make the show, the whole showed seemed a bit hap-hazardly thrown together. And what sucked about that was the amount of talent on the show....Gargano, Taylor, Cannon, Corbin, Dingo, Summerlyn....with just those people alone, the show could and should have been much better than it was. Still, I did enjoy it and I have to admit that right now, SLA is putting on some of the best shows in the "somewhat local" area.
For me, the show got off on a sour note by the fact that they had a live metal band playing before the show. Granted, these guys were no where near as terrible as the ICP-wannabes that opened the last CCW show I attended, however, these guys were still pretty awful. They were playing loud enough to wake the dead and granted, being a musician myself, things like that don't bother me, but what does bother me is when a band is obviously playing that loud just for the sake of playing that loud and the whole thing sounds like a muddy mess. The singer was screaming his balls off and you couldn't hear a word of it. And on top of all of that, the crowd (which was pretty strong....at least 150 or so) didn't even care and just wanted to see wrestling. At least they stopped when it was time for the show to start and it was on to the wrestling...
Marion Fontaine vs. Dorian Victor vs. Aiden Young vs. Christian Rose
This was a match for ACW's You Tube channel. I'd actually seen once Fontaine before at an IPW show. He is like a cross between "Spyder" Nate Webb and Josh "Abacrombie" Raymond. He's a decent worker but every thing he does revolves around the fact that he has a massive mustache. It's an entertaining gimmick, but not that exciting, in my opinion. The match was decent. Victor didn't do much of anything, but Fontaine and Young looked good. However, the real star of the match was Rose. He was in there, throwing all kinds of stiff punches and chops and kicks and even did a big dive to the outside on top of the other three at one point. Young was the first one eliminated (all of ACW/SLA's milti-man/team matches are elimination...which is good) and Victor wasn't far behind. That left Fontaine and Rose. The two of them worked really well together and in the end, Rose got the win.
ACW U-30 title
TLC match
Gerald "Gary Jay" James (w/ his "Parents") (c) vs. ACH
This is one of the matches I was really looking forward to seeing....and it delivered! There were chairs in each corner of the ring and a large ladder set up on one side. Both guys worked the crowd well but when the match got going, it was awesome. At one point, ACH but a chair between the ropes in the corner and shot James head-first into it. When James came up, he was bleeding...a lot. Jay then got a table and threw it into the ring. He then super-plexed ACH through it, but ACH kicked out. There were so many near-falls. They then brawled on the outside and another table was used. This time, ACH laid Jay out on it beside the ring and then did an awesome dive over the top rope and through the table. The match still didn't end there. There were several "This is awesome!" chants. The big ladder was then set up on one side of the ring and ACH laid Jay out on another table and was about to jump onto him from it, but Jay "parents" got involved and grabbed ACH. Jay then jumped up and ran up the ladder and did a Russian leg sweep-like move off the ladder and through the table. Both guys banged their heads hard on some chairs that were set up behind that table too. It was really nasty and both guys looked to be legit hurt. The ref and Jay's "parents" rolled both guys back into the ring and Jay got the pin. Absolutely awesome match! I have to say that ACH is, by far, one of the most exciting workers in the indies right now! Someone please, please, PLEASE book a match between him and AR Fox!!!!! That match has GOT to happen at some point!
KC Karrington & Alexander Rodolph vs. Children of Pain (Darin Childs & Kris Wolfe) vs. The Kentucky Buffet vs. The Hooligans
The first thing that stands out about this match is that Darin Childs has lost a bunch of weight. His build almost reminds me of Sami Callihan. Anyway, KC and Rodolph came out first. KC is still doing his "poor man's Christopher Daniels" gimmick and for some unknown reason, started singing on the mic. Rodolph is the VERY large, hairy guy who beat the crap out of Christian Rose at the last SLA show. The Hooligans were, by far, the most over team in the match and I gotta say, those guys are impressive these days. For two large guys they can really move. The match was all over the place. So much fast-paced action and guys flying around all over the place. Matt Cage did two huge dives to the outside. Alex Castle was his normal, sucky self. At one point, he tried to spear Childs through the ropes and botched it....very badly! Both of The Hooligans did big flippy moves to the outside as well. At one point, they took out KC and double-teamed Rodolph and pinned him. Next, the KY Buffet were eliminated when Childs hit Castle with a low-blow. That left The Hooligans against Childs and Wolfe. The Hooligans doubled-up on Wolfe (who's horrible, by the way). Meanwhile, Childs pulled out an "international object" and hit one of them with it and got the pin for the win. Wow...I'm having a late-1980's USWA flashback! A dumb ending to an otherwise decent match.
Rachel Summerlyn vs. Athena (w/ Gary Jay's "Parents")
This match was suppose to be a Woman's title match between Summerlyn and Lady Poison, which is one of the matches I was really looking forward to seeing, but Jessica James was nowhere to be found. So, that kinda bummed me out about this match from the start. Still, the match wasn't horrible. Athena is good, but she did botch a few moves, as did Summerlyn. The two of them just didn't seem to fully "click" with each other as if the match was sort of thrown together. In the end, Jay's "mom" got involved in the match and when Summerlyn grabbed "her" and was about to drop "her", Athena did a dive from the top rope and all three of them crashed hard. That move could have turned out REALLY bad too because it was so sloppy. Anyway, Athena got the pin and no one seemed to be hurt too badly.
ACW title match
Davey Vega (c) vs. Johnny Gargano
This was another match I was really forward to seeing. However, I think right off the bat the match was somewhat hurt by the fact that the crowd had absolutely NO clue who Gargano was. When he was announced, maybe 3 people clapped (me being one of them, of course! Ha ha!!). Vega was over HUGE. The match was good, but not as great as it probably should have been because I kind of got the feeling that Gargano was "phoning it in" since no one knew who he was. He was doing tons of headlocks and rest holds and the crowd couldn't have cared less. So, he kept doing them. There were times when they did some exciting, fast-paced moves, but not nearly as many as I had hoped to see. The ending came when Arik Cannon came in through the front door and distracted the ref. Dingo then ran into the ring and attacked Vega and took him out. Then, for some unknown reason, Darin Childs ran into the ring and hit Gargano with his "international object" and laid Vega on top of him for the pin. What a stupid way to end what should have been an awesome match! After it was over, Gargano grabbed the belt and acted as though he was going to leave with it, but then handed it to Vega and shook his hand.
During the intermission, the crappy metal band played again. I bought a DVD and then proceeded to move very quickly out to my car the get away from the noise. When I came back in, I saw Chuck Taylor was at the merch tables. I didn't even know he was suppose to be there.
Last Man Standing match
Dingo vs. Mat Fitchett
I knew this one would be awesome and once again, it delivered. Dingo looks to be in just awesome shape. I swear that if that guy loses anymore weight, his stomach is going to swallow itself. Anyway, he came out first and got on the mic and cut a monster heel promo, cussing out fans and Fitchett's family who were sitting behind me. Fitchett then snuck in from the back and attacked Dingo. The fight was ON! They brawled ALL over the room and basically, Dingo just beat the ever-loving crap out of Fitchett, as usual. I've said it before, if that kid keeps going the way he is, he's going to be crippled before he's 30. Dingo chopped him so hard that Fitchett's chest was bleeding. Fitchett got some super-stiff chops in on Dingo as well, but Fitchett's chest was so beaten up that after a while, you could tell that Dingo was holding back chopping him anymore and hitting him with headbutts to the chest instead. It was nasty! In my opinion, matches like these are more vicious and dangerous then all-out "blood and gut" deathmatches because it seems worse to watch a guy chop the skin off another guy's chest then just get hit with a lighttube and bleed some. In the end, both guys beat the crap out of each other and at one point, they were both down for the 10-count. Arik Cannon then ran out and grabbed Fitchett's foot and held him down while Dingo made it to his feet for the win. Yet another dumb ending to an otherwise great match.
Texas Bullrope match
Jordan Lacey (w/Adian Young) vs. Adam Raw
This was suppose to be the ended to the little feud these two guys started at the last show, however, Raw wasn't there. So, Lacey got on the mic and said that instead of a match, he was going to do a dance party. The music played and Lacey did the normal "funny to watch a fat guy dance" dance. Lacey and "Juicy" Jimmy Feltcher should form a tag team....that would be interesting, to say the least! Anyway, when the music stopped, Darin Corbin came out and started cussing Lacey out. They did a sorta of "dance-off" Then, some other guy i a suit came out (he sorta looked like Ted Dibiase (The "Million Dollar Man", not his kid)) and said that he was sent to O'Fallon by Robert Evans to keep Corbin from doing anything offensive. This led to the guy trying to get Corbin to stop cussing and Corbin cussing like a sailor...an entertaining exchange. It would have been more entertaining if Evans himself had been there, but I guess he's living in Philly now and working as Archibald Peck in Chikara and R.D. Evans, The Embassy's lawyer in ROH. When I saw Evans at the first SLA show back in January I knew that guy was going somewhere....not because he's all that great of a wrestler, but just because he was so darn entertaining to watch. Anyway, after all of this, they actually had a bullrope match between Corbin and Lacey. Not a great match, but Corbin did make it fun to watch. Lacey is actually not as horrible a worker as you might expect and even pulled off a second rope super-plex on Corbin at one point. In the end, Lacey got the win by touching all four corners (I'm back in the old USWA again!). After the match, the Dibiase guy and Corbin beatdown Lacey and Young. Corbin hit Lacey with the cowbell and busted him open. They left both guys laying in the middle of the ring. Certainly not a great match, but Corbin is fun to watch.
Arik Connon (w/??) vs. Chuck Taylor
Wow, this was a random match. Cannon came out with the guy in the wheelchair that worked with Taylor at an MECW show here in Evansville last year. For some reason, Taylor was working as a face, which kind of sucked since he's such a great heel. However, Cannon is one of the top heels in SLA, so they had to do it that way. As I said, the match seemed very random, but being so that both guys are about as good as it gets in the indies, they made it work. However, it did kind of suck to not have Taylor screaming like a girl and trying to scare small children. Both guys worked well and seemed to be having fun. At one point, it looked as though they were laughing at each other. There were a lot of near-falls and mat-based submission moves used. In the end, the guy in the wheelchair got up on the ring apron and they basically did the exact same finish as the match Taylor and "wheelchair guy" guy did in MECW last year. Taylor took him out and then Cannon hit Taylor with an AWESOME corkscrew brain buster for the win. It wasn't the most original match I'd ever seen, but for what it was, it was still really good.
Main Event
St. Louis Anarchy title
Submissions Match
Evan Gilestico (c) vs. Dan Walsh
I KNEW this one was going to be good. Walsh came out and Gilestico attacked him from behind right away and the fight was ON!!! The two guys beat the living HELL out of each other! Walsh got busted open early and was bleeding from the front and top of his head and dripping blood all over the place. Gilestico stole a move from Necro Butcher and stacked up a bunch of chairs and was going to slam Walsh into them, but got reversed and back-dropped onto them himself. Walsh them stacked chairs on top of him and hit him with another. They them ended up on the bar and Walsh had Gilestico's arm wrapped around the beer tap. They then went to another corner of the room and were hitting each other with everything from stiff punches to chairs to pieces of broken table. At one point, Gilestico climbed into the ring and pulled down one of the lights from the corner. He then took a running start and slammed it into Walsh's head. They finally did make it back into the ring and continued to beat the crap out of each other. When the action spilled back outside, they were punching each other VERY stiffly and Gilestico got a cut hardway over his eye. That's what I was saying before....these kinds of matches are almost more vicious than all-out deathmatches! When they got back into the ring, Gilestico hit Walsh with a chair and then got him down and used to chair to apply a cross-face and Walsh passed out. The ref stopped the match and Gilestico won. Once Walsh got up, he got on the mic and was screaming about how that was the second time this ref had stopped the match and caused him to lose to Gilestico. He then proceeded to beat the crap out of the ref. While the match was an awesome brawl, I have to admit that the ended did suck because they had been building this feud since January and with this being the "biggest show", the crowd really wanted to see the hometown boy win the belt. But instead, we got the exact same finish as the first match these two had. I don't know who booked this show, but I have to admit that was a terrible way to end your "biggest show of the year".
In the end, this show was good and I enjoyed it. However, I can't say it was my favorite SLA show. Between the strange booking, crappy endings and people who didn't make the show, the whole showed seemed a bit hap-hazardly thrown together. And what sucked about that was the amount of talent on the show....Gargano, Taylor, Cannon, Corbin, Dingo, Summerlyn....with just those people alone, the show could and should have been much better than it was. Still, I did enjoy it and I have to admit that right now, SLA is putting on some of the best shows in the "somewhat local" area.