Here is a picture I snagged of on of my regulars walking to the restaurant. No story behind it, just a cool foggy picture.
AWF Sunday Shockwave
The show starts off with highlights from a hardcore match. I don’t know any of the people that were in it but the match looked intense.
Dj Draper starts us off with a new type of look for the AWF show. He says there is tons going on and they advertise for the Championship match in November 7th. Love the advertising of future shows. Except they say you should go to Isanti County this Saturday, even though it was last week….
Last week the show says that Hardcore Holly faced Daivari. OH MY GOD!! ODB was there!!! She has come into my restaurant once or twice, she used to tend bar with my brother at a local bar. A very cool person and always brings a load of fans and fun when she goes to wrestle. Am very excited to see what she does for the AWF! This show has improved leaps and bounds just by doing small video work, promoting future shows, and bringing in local talent with some celebrity attached to it.
ODB is opening an open challenge to anyone in the AWF roster. Randy Raynes accepted the challenge Dj says. They show highlights from the match but tell us not to miss bell time… a little confusing but whatever, I just wanna see these matches!
They will also be in Champlain Minnesota , which is a city I can see from my apartment. Also the city, that as a kid, I met Mr. Perfect in, also the city that is next to Repo Man’s business . Fun times!
Dj says “What an epic battle we just witnessed” We didn’t really witness the match, just highlights. We find out Orin Veidt won the match. Benny Stacks says he knows the gameplan. It seems pretty cheesy but these guys are getting a bit better. I’ve never seen Stacks and Veidt but the whole idea of this promo is good. Orin seems relaxed when he doesn’t have to talk. They should plan how to convey what they need to. Hit your storyline, talk about your character, what your motivations at the moment are. They did pretty well at describing who Orin is and what he and Benny are about.
An advertisement for a school in our area?!? Heck yes!
Now we are treated to a move compilation with some obscure music and montages of famous wrestlers and indie wrestlers. Wait no its a Danny Duggan vignette. This is pretty cool in the sense that we’ve rarely seen this on Shockwave. Makin baby steps!
A Jacob Savage promo. I’ve never seen him before, Draper says he is just a rookie. He says that he might have broken his foot in the match but he still won. Savage keeps looking to the back right of the camera, like he is looking at someone or something, it was distracting. Very monotone, low energy. Like the Jeb Bush of AWF.
Draper is back in the AWF studio with Orin and Benny and now Josh Price. Benny Stacks uses alot of idiom catchphrases, I want so bad for this to be good, but it feels so forced again. Do I have advice on how to make it better? No, I do not, I just know how I feel when I watch it. Benny Stacks is putting himself over as a slimy type character. Josh Price has a good beginning to his promo, talks about how something is 3/4th full but will be full strength or something. These interviews are scattered and lack focus.
We get a hype video for Jeff Jennings, I have never seen him either. I feel like I lack very hard in knowing my local wrestling scene if there are four or five guys now who I have no idea what they are about. I’m kind of excited though.
Sylvestor J Fox introduces himself, he is a manager. He says the AWF says he needs to find a crazy sadistic man. He is at the Fergus Falls State Hospital which Sylvestor calls the Insane Asylum. He is trying to control Luke X, the music in the background is Halloween esque piano music. That is very very interesting. I know there has been no wrestling on this wrestling show yet, but it’s nice to have some insight on who we will be watching over the next few months.
Now a Leonard Literacy promo. First impression.. homeless guy who left a library. He says “little thing about me is easy, reading” He read a whole bunch of wrestling books and now he is a wrestler. “with reading comes great knowledge, with knowledge comes power.” That worked for me for some reason. It was way cheesy, but kind of self aware. It felt like if Adult Swim made a wrestler on a wrestler show.
We get a video about
Tony DeNucci
, he talks about how he was religious but it felt force fed so he went away from Christ. He opened the video with a prayer, so that must have turned around. He gets emotional when talking about how proud he was as a kid. He said he got into body building but then started into wrestling. We see some video of classic AWA footage showing us that Tony DeNucci was pretty talented back in the day.
We see video of a tearful Tony talking about the mistakes he made in life. “The problem is when you live life in the flesh, you fall flat on your face.” He talks alot about ego, says in the first 7 years of marriage his wife should have dumped me. He quit wrestling and started to start working at a car business, he was body building and winning trophies but there was no money in it. He went back to his passion (with his wifes permission). It’s amazing how much religion is a factor in his life and we as viewers had no idea until now. This was very well done, I may not agree with his views, or I may, it doesn’t matter. What matters is that he found what he loves, and he can balance that with family.
And I’m Like… Way surprised, this episode turned AWF on its head. Not one match but I feel like I am more connected to the product than ever before. The story Tony shared hit home a bit with me. I am looking forward to see what AWF has in store for us next week. Onward and Upward!
Paragon Pro Wrestling
Todd and Jeff welcome us to PPW and says its a championship night. The camera was out of focus for most of the intro. Pat Kelly brings out the Amerikan Gunz
They come out to Nas’
Made You Look
. Christian Cole rips on the PPW crowd. He says he invests his time in the Gunz, because time is money. Cole has a good delivery but isn’t saying much.
American Gunz vs. Whirlwind Gentlemen
The Gentlemen hit the ring and attack the Gunz right away. The tag champs show up and the whole locker room shows up to just start fighting.
This guy comes out and tries to talk and present some sort of idea. He says “hey hey hey! I can either fine you all, or it’s an eight man tag for the Number One contendership for the Tag Titles.” He says they have to choose but then just says “eight man tag” as he walks away…. what the hell?
We are told that the winning team gets a number one contender position, it doesn’t make sense at all, the announcers are trying to save it but this poop has been flushed.
Amerikan Gunz vs. Whirlwind Gentlemen
Amerikan Gunz and Hammerstone and Chamberlain vs. Gangrel and Mikey O’Shea and The Whirlwind Gentlemen
This match is just brawling and cool moves, confusion too. The announcers spend the first few minutes trying to figure out what this match means and what the rules are. That’s bad. The match breaks down and the Gentlemen got the pin over the tag champs.
And I’m Like… What The Hell? Why is that even a thing that happened, I mean, I didn’t like Matt Striker as interim GM, but he was way better than this douche commissioner.
Tuesday November 3rd in Vegas is the next PPW tapings.
Caleb Konley video package
He talks about how there is a conspiracy, that he is the measuring stick, and he kinda is acting crazy like Kevin Kross.
Caleb Konley vs. Eric Right
With Kevin and Caleb, I’m wondering what’s with all the “I’m going crazy” characters? PPW is pretty diverse in actual characters, but their bad guys are mainly, I’m tough and CRAY!
I do think both of these guys are the brightest spots on the PPW show, this should be a fun match. The announcers say they are top competitors and top strikers.
We start with a headlock that leads into some chain wrestling. Todd and Jeff talk about what the competitors finishers are and why the wrestlers are dangerous. They put over the fact that Eric can’t strike with Caleb so Right is trying to out wrestle him. That was a nice observation and made it easier to follow the story of the match.
I think being on TV sometimes hurts the quality of matches on PPW. These two have been going at it for maybe five minutes, not too many big moves or momentum shifting moments, yet they are moving around like we are halfway through an ironman match. Maybe if the matches were wrestled at a faster pace? I don’t know.
Right went for his Grandma’s tonic, he gets the drink in and gets all fired up. When are we getting the storyline of that tonic being labeled a Foreign Object? Eric Right hit the Airplane Spin into the Sleeper, Konley escapes and turns it into the Cradleshock for the win.
And I’m Like… The story was there, the announcing was good, the characters were there, it just needed more time to get emotional.
Kevin Kross vs. Mercurio
Speaking of guys who think they are krazy, Kevin Kross. He dismantles Mercurio. Not like he has five moves of doom, or that the doom moves exist in PPW, but Kross hits his moves of doom. He goes to the outside and scares a fan into a handshake attempt, Mercurio takes advantage of the distraction. Mercurio goes for a asai moonsault, Kross doesn’t get hit. Mercurio just bounces off Kevin Kross, Mercurio does a ddt on the hardwood floor, Kross doesn’t sell it outside of laying on the floor. Mercurio hurt his shoulder, goes to the inside of the ring. Mercurio goes for a top rope hurricanrana, Kross reverses that to a Death Valley Driver. Sits down and acts crazy by sitting as Todd says “criss cross apple sauce” and smiling at Mercurio. Kevin then puts Mercurio in the ropes and beats him until a DQ,
And I’m Like… More building of Kevin Kross, I’m still not sold on the character but his light is shining a bit brighter everytime I see him.
Jessy Sorenson says Joey Ryan weaseled and sleazes his way into a championship match. “Joey Ryan bring your A-Game because I’m the King of the Comeback”
Paragon Pro Wrestling Heavyweight Championship-
Jessy Sorensen (c) vs. Joey Ryan
lol at Jessy wearing a PPW hat with just his belt and trunks! We hear that Joey was called
The Technical Wizard
in the early 2000’s. Now he is trying to bring sleaze back but he never lost that technical ability.
We see headlocks and side headlocks, leg scissors and kip-ups. This feeling out process is taking a bit, we only got about 10 minutes left in the show, this is a problem that plagues PPW, they shove so much in the show that nothing has room to breathe, except the matches, they are slow and plodding. It’s old school like WCCW but where WCCW would have two storylines dominate television for a month and the cast supplement those stories. PPW tells a story in a week or two and then everyone just wrestles until something happens for one or two weeks. I mean I am watching WCCW and one match between Kerry Von Erich and Ric Flair has been talked about for three weeks. We got interviews with both men involved in the match, with both referees and the gatekeeper. There is also a story where one guy left his manager, and that has been explained for about four weeks. On PPW, a casket match will be introduced and happen in two weeks, then never talked about again.
The match is so-so, until Joey hits Jessy with some brass knuckles for the dusty win. Joey gets the three count, but another ref runs out there and reverses the decision. The match ends in a poop DQ.
And I’m Like.. not too happy with Jessy Sorensen’s title run, he is just not interesting to me. He might have ‘the look’ but that’s about as far as it goes for me. Jessy should have lost, but whatever, until next week.
You all have a good one
-Jake
