Pro Wrestling Chronicle

Here are some more details to fill in what happened yesterday…

Louden Noxious was the ring announcer throughout the night. As already listed on ChikaraPro.com, he plugged the next Chikara shows being in Reading, PA on Aug. 9th and Philadelphia on Aug. 10th. Also announced were the dates for Chikara’s big Midwest debut: Sept 20th in the Chicago area and Sept. 21st in Belfontaine, OH in the greater Columbus area. No other details given. Also, I had the chance to meet the well-traveled Steven Ho, a fine young man.

Eddie Kingston defeated Lince Dorado: Very heated indeed, which I guess would stem back to King of Trios. There were lot of grudge matches on the card, and they all appropriately started very hot and heavy with one guy immediately going after the other. Some hard-hitting offense from Kingston most of the time, but Dorado stayed strong up until the Backfist to the Future. Post-match, as Kingston walked to the back, Dorado shouted out to him that he wasn’t dead yet (insert Monty Python joke here) and dared him to come back and finish things. Eddie acknowledged this but just kept walking.

Ultimo Breakfast defeated Jimmy Olsen: Though not as funny as Moscow, this year’s CAW contest-winning gimmick does allow for the wrestler to have a lot more mobility (he’s in a singlet and not a restrictive cow costume), plus I like how his mask resembles a toaster (plus I think it’s metal, as he used a lot of headbutts). Olsen was very aggressive on him, leading to his unmasking of Breakfast and the DQ under Chikara rules. Not much too it, as it only went four minutes.

Sweeney Promo: Sweeney didn’t like being called a loser by Mitch Ryder at the last show, acknowledged himself being a 21-time ICW/ICWA Tex-Arkana Television Champ (”I may have lost it 20 times, but I won it back each and every time.”), and challenged Ryder to a match in the future. Ryder walked out with Shayne Hawke, said they would be winning the tag titles later tonight, and that Sweeney would need to get a tag team partner if he wanted a piece of him. Sweeney had no problem with this. Return of the Sharecropper?! Who knows?

Icarus & Gran Akuma & The Osirian Portal defeated Soldier Ant & Worker Ant & The Super Smash Brothers: Started out with a pretty slick exchange of moves between Akuma and Stupified and Icarus being made the fool by some miscommunicated irish whips. Player Uno had his NES controller pants removed (he was pantsed, revealing Spongebob Squarepants boxers) and Amasis put them on. Naturally, this lead to Amasis getting paused, which happened as he was climbing the ropes. He stayed paused until a few seconds after the match; I was thinking he would be involved in the finish, unpaused and accidentally splashing on one of his partners. Uno was beat down quite a bit before the hot tag, leading into a hot finishing sequence of moves. Uno and Stupified had some more miscommunication (as evident in recent matches) in which Uno accidentally splashed into Stupified in the corner. Uno was then pinned by Icarus following a swinging pedigree (think a swinging DDT with a Pedigree in its place. Stupified was very upset after the match and may have broken ties with the 8-Bit Luchador.

Incognito defeated Chuck Taylor: Decent match. Started with some nice exchanges leading into submission attempts on Taylor, followed by some dives from both, but slowed down considerably towards the end. Whole lot of clapping to pick up the energy. People just don’t seem to be catching on to Incognito on his own. Taylor could have stood to get some more heat on him. The Spanish Fly finish got a good pop.

Mike Quackenbush defeated Shane Storm, only for Storm to win by Reverse Decision DQ: This was fantastic, especially with the crowd really into the whole thing. Maybe because the fans here were flat on Storm to begin with, but there were many boos and shouts of “Judas!” towards him. I’m dubbing this The Jimmy Rave Syndrome, in which a flat babyface ends up succeeding more with a heel turn. Quack went right after Storm, and we got some chop/forearm exchanges on the floor accompanied by Yays and Boos for Quack and Storm respectively. Storm got the upperhand and attempted a shining wizard with a running charge, but he was backdropped onto the ringside steps. An exchange of attempted moves on the edge of the apron lead to Quack getting DDT’d on it. Soon after, Quack was clotheslined while kneeling and sold a knee injury the rest of the match. Storm also gave some shots to Quack’s noggin. He was heeling it up pretty good; a change of mask could help him with that even more down the line. Quack fought back, gave him a bunch of smacks to the face (harkening back to Storm’s busted nose), hit the knees off the top while still selling the previous injury, and locked on the Chikara Special for the initial submission victory. Quack wouldn’t let go, and the fans were chanting heavily not to let go, so ref Derk Sabato reversed the decision and gave it to Storm. Fans wanted Quack to kill Sabato, but he decided not to. Vin Gerard lurked onto the entrance way after Quack left and slowly applauded Storm, but Storm just shoved him aside as he passed him. Quite a bit of irony (or something or other) in how Storm’s treachery allowed Hero to reverse the Chikara Special on Equinox, causing Equinox to lose his mask and become Vin Gerard.

Vin Gerard defeated Fire Ant to win the Young Lions Cup: The outcome I expected last month comes this month in quite the tricky finish. Bulk of it was Gerard on offense, working over Fire Ant’s knee, going so far as to bite it. Said finish came after Gerard was unable to make Fire Ant tap to the STF, so he got a chair from ringside. Referee Bryce Remsburg was not afraid to disqualify him as Gerard prepared to curb stomp Ant on the chair (a little game of Chicken here), so Gerard tossed the chair aside. As Bryce took care of the chair, Gerard snatched the Cup, tossed it into Ant’s hands, and then fell to the ground and pretended to be knocked out by the Cup. Bryce nearly disqualified Fire Ant, but the other Ants ran out to argue with him. Gerard popped back up, conked Fire Ant with the Cup, behind Bryce’s back, and a very dramatic three count made Gerard the new Young Lions Cup Champion. And here I am with the YLC shows in my possession. There’ll be Ant Hill to pay.

Tim Donst defeated UltraMantis Black (with Hydra & Crossbones): The other half of that whole Chikara Special controversy storyline results in a five minute match and a fun post-match angle. Donst had one eye on Mantis and one on Crossbones in the beginning, allowing Mantis to get the advantage. Hydra was very conflicted when he came out with the rest of the Order of the Neo Solar Temple, not acting like his jovial, juiced-up self. Crossbones beat down Donst behind the ref’s back, but eventually Donst came back and hit a dive onto everybody. Finish saw Mantis, while in control, ordering Hydra to hit Donst with Mantis’ staff while Crossbones had the ref’s attention. Hydra hesitated forever, then hit Mantis by mistake, leading Donst to get the win with the Donstitution as it’s called (an Olympic Slam into a bridging pinfall). Now the long story long. After the match, Mantis ordered Hydra into the ring and harshly brow-beat him (and he didn’t even use a mic, shouting for everyone to hear). Fans chanted for Hydra to stand up to himself, Mantis slapped him, and Hydra slapped back. Mantis and Crossbones beat him down before Donst ran back to make the save, which got a very big pop and “USA!” chants even. Donst and Hydra buddied up and posed together, and they also made the belt motion with their hands, seeing how they accumulated three points in tag action together while a part of the Order. This was fun; happy to see Hydra babyface.

Brodie Lee defeated Claudio Castagnoli: As announced ahead of time, this was a No DQ Match with two refs (in this case, Sabato and the regular ring announcer). Claudio and Brodie dueled with chairs very briefly before using what their mothers gave them, and soon Claudio nailed a dive over the top after running off a chair set up mid-ring. One of the biggest pops of the night. Fighting at ringside saw Brodie hit the guardrails and Claudio get choked by the timekeeper’s tablecloth. Sabato was knocked out after an inadvertant bicycle kick from Claudio, so the other ref took over. Claudio gave Brodie a giant swing and slingshot him into an exposed turnbuckle. Then Shayne Hawke ran out to interfere, but was subsequently tossed out the ring, followed by Mitch Ryder’s fireball (well done, with good selling by everyone) and a big boot by Brodie for the pinfall. Good stuff, with Lee now aligned with the two flashier heels.

Incoherence defeated The Fabulous Two to retain the Campeones de Parejas: Shayne Hawke has now been rechristened Buck Hawke for some reason, but I can dig it. Match began with BUCK Hawke getting chased around the ring by Delirious, and both Delirious and Hallowicked taking turns hitting moves in the corner (helped by each guy leaving and rentering the ring, constituting a tag). First fall as mentioned was Brodie Lee coming out for a distraction, which allowed Ryder to give Delirious a low blow and roll him up. Delirious was worked over forever after this, with the heels’ distractions preventing Hallowicked’s tags to be seen, but soon Hallowicked got that hot tag, ran wild, and scored the second fall on Hawke with the Rydeen Bomb (or Sky High) on Hawke. Third fall took everyone by surprise, as Hallowicked scored a flash schoolboy on Ryder to retain the titles. Good match with a bit of old school mixed in, ending on a high note with the crazy masked babyfaces retaining the titles once again. If I recall recent results correctly, future teams eligible to challenge Incoherence are the united Tim Donst & Hydra and the feuding Quackenbush & Storm.

Mighty good show overall.