Pro Wrestling Chronicle

The King of Trios, Rey de Voladores, and Brian’s erratic sleep schedule have come to an end for the weekend. Plenty of excitement was had.

- Just before the show started, a bunch of the wrestlers (Da Soul Touchaz and Delirious among them) handed out balloons to the crowd, while Helios and a couple others tried to get fans pumped by making the crowd do a wave. The best way to get the crowd excited though? Starting the show. I imagine the balloons would be a pain for the camera crew, but Chuck Taylor certainly didn’t disappoint a little later by snatching some from kids and popping them (including using the ring bell hammer on one).

1. King of Trios Semi-Finals: Team Uppercut defeated The UnStable when Dave Taylor gave Colin Delaney a butterfly suplex and rolled back for the pin. Team Uppercut did some uppercut practice on a balloon before the match. They got the upper hand early using, of course, the European Uppercut, and Vin Gerard found himself in a Bryan Danielson surfboard. Colin tried for a cross-arm breaker on Danielson, who mocked selling pain before pulling a Rampage Jackson. The UnStable get control a little later, ganging up on Danielson and working over his knee. After Claudio Castagnoli got in to run wild, we had several close calls of The UnStable nearly winning, including Gerard getting Danielson in an STF. The victory by Team Uppercut was both exciting and relieving, as The UnStable in the Finals would have lead to their opponents naturally being The Future Is Now, which would have blown up in their faces. Post-match, Colin tries to man up after getting pinned, but was met with a barrage of uppercuts by the entrance. Three for three in good openers this weekend. (15:17)

2. King of Trios Semi-Finals: F.I.S.T. defeated The Future Is Now after Chuck Taylor gave Helios the Awful Waffle. The outcome didn’t surprise me given the results of the first Semi-Final match, but they did a good job getting there. Wisely, Jimmy “Equinox” Olsen, the one Future Is Now member who still has good will with the fans, received the heel beatdown. Lince Dorado was booed early, but the offense he and Helios pulled out late in the match won over some people. Olsen nearly made Taylor tap to the Chikara Special, but Gran Akuma breaks it up after three hard kicks (the first two Olsen sold but manned up after). A tope suicida from Dorado sent him crashing into the guardrail again, though not as bad as last night. Helios hit Icarus with a spectacular 630, but while the ref checked on the screaming-in-pain Icarus, Taylor gave Helios a low blow and hit the Awful Waffle for the victory. “Thank You F.I.S.T.!” goes the crowd. Solid stuff with some great closing minutes. (13:31)

3. Arik Cannon defeated El Generico with the Glimmering Warlock. Generico did a springboard off the ropes to grab the wayward balloon above the ring that Team Uppercut used before, then gave it to a ringside fan sporting his mask. Crowd was split for both guys, with a brief duel between “Ole!” for Generico and “Oh Yeah!” for Cannon (going back to when fans likened him to the Kool-Aid Man in 2006). Cannon would use his strikes, while Generico would fight back with some quickness and strikes of his own. Both exchanged suplexes as well, with Cannon hitting a backdrop driver to set up the finish. Good match, followed by a big ovation for both guys. (9:52)

4. Mike Quackenbush & Jigsaw won a 12-team Elimination Gauntlet. The yearly tradition continued. The match began with Hallowicked & Frightmare facing Tony Kozina & Ryan Drago, which ended after several minutes with EPIC WAR team advancing after a release German suplex and a German suplex pin on Frightmare. Team #3 was Tim Donst & Hydra, who advanced after Donst made Drago submit after what looked like a Tazmission. Team #4, running right out, was UltraMantis Black & Crossbones, taking it to the Sea Donsters hard. Mantis was able to avoid being placed in the Hydra-Lock and turned it into a sit-out tombstone to advance. Team #5 was Beef Wellington & Steve “The Turtle” Weiner, coming out to a big ovation and calling themselves “Animal House.” They were put away shortly after a brief hot streak when Crossbones gave Beef the Flippin’ Sweet Driver, allowing the Order of the Neo-Solar Temple to advance and achieve two points in the process. Then came Team #6 of Player Uno & Create-A-Wrestler, calling themselves “The Saturday Night Slam Masters” and quickly eliminating the Order after a small package on Crossbones. Both points lost. Team #7 was another oddball unit in Pinkie Sanchez & Mitch Ryder. This lasted a while, with fans cheering for both Uno and Pinkie, ending with Pinkie rolling up Uno with some help from Ryder (who was sporting some lackluster new gear). The Gauntlet picked up steam seriously and stayed that way after Team #8, Marshe Rockett & Willie Richardson of Da Soul Touchaz, came in like a house of fire. Da Soul Touchaz advanced after Willie dropped Da Bomb on Pinkie. Then came The Young Bucks, getting work done quickly in spectacular fashion and advancing after a 450 immediately followed by a moonsault. The tenth team of Cheech Hernandez & “Cloudy” Day had a very good stretch with the Jacksons. Lots of big moves culminating with Cloudy scoring with a rollup. Brodie Lee & Grizzly Redwood were the penultimate team and started brawling with Cheech & Cloudy. Cloudy received some big hits, making some fans think that he might puke in the ring again as he did against Gran Akuma two years ago. Cheech foolishly tries to get Brodie up in the powerbomb position for a doubleteam, but can’t keep him up there and gets a lariat and a big boot for both his troubles and his team’s elimination. Quackenbush & Jigsaw entered in the final spot, though I’m thinking everyone has lost count of teams by this point. They have a good stretch against the two Roughnecks. The heels set up their own end after Brodie accidentally booted Grizzly when aiming for Quack (who was holding Grizzly above him and simply dropped down to his knees) and was taken to the outside by Jigsaw. Quack got the pin on Grizzly with the QuackenDriver II (sit-out tombstone with the legs locked in a cross position), giving his team the match and a third point to earn themselves a title shot. Lot of fun, with the second half of teams delivering the goods as noted. Brodie shoved Louden Noxious to the ground after the loss. (40:15)

-Intermission

5. Amasis & Ophidian & Michael Nakazawa & KUDO defeated Fire Ant & Soldier Ant & Darin Corbin & Ryan Cruz after KUDO pinned Corbin after the double knees from the top. The last great piece of comedy of the weekend. A lot of slick exchanges throughout, with and without Nakazawa’s baby oil. Nakazawa applied it liberally to himself, shared some with Amasis towards the end, and squirted some all over Fire Ant in humiliating fashion (shades of Dragon Gate’s Gamma, who I’ve only recently seen for the first time, by drooling the oil onto Fire Ant from the top rope. The oil backfired on Nakazawa and company when he got too oily to do a German suplex, allowing Fire Ant to grab it and grease up his leg when his opponents tried to grab it and drag him back. Lots of dives commenced, including a massive Ant Hill to the floor using the North Star Express’ assistance. KUDO and Ophidian hit their flying double knee attacks in unison at one point, and KUDO connected with the double knees in the tree of woe position to set up the finish. Coup de Grace was Nakazawa squirting a circle of baby oil around Corbin’s body, preventing his partners from pulling him to safety. This was great. (17:57)

6. Eddie Kingston defeated Austin Aries with the Sliding D lariat. Aries was still his heel character. The fans seemed split again, but the chants for Kingston were louder, and Aries situated into the heel role of the match. One early spot had Aries constantly ducking Kingston as he ran the ropes, resulting in Kingston slowing down and Aries running the ropes himself to mock his cardio. Kingston admitted that it was because he smokes. The two dished out some strikes, Aries hit the heat-seeking missile dive and again took too long to do the power-drive elbow, and Kingston gave him some monstrous suplexes (one of which spiked Aries on his head). The finish was set up by an F-5 of all things by Kingston off the top rope. Another damn fine match. (9:21)

7. Rey de Voladores Finals: Kota Ibushi defeated Player Dos with the Golden Star Press to win the tournament. Big chants for Ibushi, but Dos was shown some love as well. Nakazawa and KUDO were at ringside cornering Ibushi and also providing a bit of safety net for the dives to the outside, of which there were a few. Plenty of close nearfalls, moreso from Ibushi, putting his kicks to good use and pulling out the nip-up-to-German sequence he’s used on El Generico. One funny spot involved Ibushi turning the missed top rope moonsault into the standing moonsault; Dos moved well ahead of time and put his arms out to celebrate the dodge that ultimately failed him. A terrific encounter, again ending with both men getting a big ovation afterward, plus much love shown for DDT. Leonard F. Chikarason presented the tournament plaque to Ibushi, who seemed like he was on Cloud Nine. In general, a smart move to have Rey de Voladores occur during King of Trios this year, as it resulted in the mini-tournament’s strongest field of talent yet by taking advantage of some of the visitors. (11:26)

8. King of Trios Finals: F.I.S.T. defeated Team Uppercut to win the tournament when Chuck Taylor made Danielson submit to a half-crab. No official in-ring introduction by the finalists, as F.I.S.T. jumped Team Uppercut from behind as they entered. Even worse, they did this as Team Uppercut, previously coming out to Claudio’s music, were coming out to “The Final Countdown.” Rudos to the bone. Danielson had a limp from his earlier match, and Taylor went straight to work on it by ramming it on the floor. Danielson got worked over by all three early, including a surfboard by Akuma and a few of Taylor’s own elbows. Dave Taylor and Claudio eventually both got in to run wild, with Squire Dave connecting with the butterfly suplex that got his team into the Finals, but that only got a two-count. Claudio took Sole Food into an Akuma Yoshi Tonic at one point, but later hit the Ricola Bomb on Akuma for a visible pinfall, only for ref Bryce Remsburg to get pulled out of the ring before he counted to three. Claudio wiped out Akuma and Icarus on the outside with a big twisting dive, leaving Danielson and Chuck in the ring alone together. Danielson gave Chuck the back body drop off the top and hits a good number of his elbows, but Chuck kicks out at two after looking the worse for wear. Danielson then locked in the Cattle Mutilation while keeping his injured knee elevated, but Icarus slid in and broke it up with a Knee-DT. Danielson was put in the tree of woe after attempting another super back body drop on Icarus, and received an Awful Waffle from the position. That got a two-and-three-quarters count (massive pop, a kick-out from this move has happened extremely rarely if ever, at least in Chikara), but Chuck quickly followed up by locking in the half-crab, his knee pressed against the top of Danielson’s back. His partners preoccupied/restrained at ringside and himself pulled back into the middle of the ring, Danielson was forced to tap out. F.I.S.T. get made as they won the 2009 tournament and received the tournament medals from Chikarason. A fantastic close to the tournament that told a great story. I could have gone for either team winning, but this result is far more beneficial: heels of the home promotion once again reach prominence. Chuck Taylor in particular gets elevated quite a bit from his victory, though nothing gets taken away by Danielson. (11:09)

Overall: Should have known this night would be high point of the weekend, as the final night encapsulated everything that went one during the tournament. The level of talent, the layout of the whole weekend, and the booking of the tournament (even with people bitching about The Future Is Now beating teams they probably shouldn’t have), made this the best King of Trios yet. Tremendous Finals for both King of Trios and Rey de Voladores, a more-than-pleasant surprise to get Danielson AND Aries AND Generico AND Ibushi on all three nights, Young Bucks and Soul Touchaz shine, Nakazawa made a new friend in Amasis, etc. If you have the money, get the entire weekend on DVD, or at least the last two nights, but Night 3 is a must.

Anyway, after all of this, the next Chikara shows are April 25th in Easton, PA and April 26th back in Philadelphia. Among the talent advertised on the poster for the 4/26 show were Glacier and Shark Girl. Make of that what you will. Thanks for reading if you did so.