Hi, everyone. Mallory Mahling here. My son was lucky enough to be in Chicago for last weekend's wrestling festivities and has shared his thoughts on the shows and the experience.
I began a journey towards wrestling overload with four, yes, FOUR, wrestling shows in three days on an off note. Earlier in the day, Nashville's airport had failures in the computerized equipment at the security checkpoints. Add to that, reduced arrival and departure capacity at O'Hare due to rain and wind. Considering that Chicago is called the Windy City, you might figure they'd have problems with wind knocked out. Alas, that's not the case.
As a result, my flight was two and a half hours late. There goes my chance
to rush into Chicago and get Trish Stratus' autograph at Best Buy. Add on
waits at baggage claim and the car rental counter and a moment to drop my
bags off at the hotel, and there goes the first hour of ROH's first show in
Chicago Ridge that night. After parking (not along Sayre Avenue, but in the
corner of the apartment complex that sits around the Fieldhouse, which had
me thinking in the back of my mind that my car would be in an impound lot by
the time I left the show) and dashing about four blocks to the building, I
arrived in the middle of the Chad Collyer/Ace Steel first blood match to see
Chad (who lost the inexplicable mohawk he had when last I saw him, at Punk:
The Final Chapter eight months ago in favor of a more traditional look)
trying to get one piece of the guardrail into the ring. Several minutes
later, Steel made Collyer bleed and exited to his overture lifted from The
Blues Brothers.
When time came for the next match, I was glad I made it when I did... would
have hated to miss my first chance to see AJ Styles wrestle live. Not
disappointed one bit... a simply tremendous match with Styles and Sydal
going over Austin Aries and Jack Evans. But wait... it only gets better.
After a quick stop at the merchandise table to load up on the latest DVDs
thinking it was time for intermission, the 1100 or so of us got to see
something truly remarkable... the best of Dragon Gate in action in a six-man
tag. I rushed back just in time for the magic to begin. Simply an amazing
match that has to be seen to be believed. The best way to describe it is to
take a TNA X-Division match... and watch it at double speed. CIMA, Naruki
Doi, Masato Yoshino, Dragon Kid, Genki Horiguchi and Ryo Saito put on an
amazing high-flying, high-impact, high-speed show for the assembled crowd.
Add one false finish after another, after another, after another, after
another, and you have the entire crowd whipped into a frenzy, chanting "This
Is Awesome" and "Please Don't Stop". Eventually, they had to come to a
finish... but the longer they worked, the better.
It's intermission. Good thing... NOTHING could have followed that Dragon
Gate match. Coming out of intermission, it's another six-person match, this
one more chaotic... the Shimmer six-woman mayhem. I'm glad I didn't miss out
on this one... I was looking forward to seeing women like Melissa and Rain
wrestle live, wrestle well and look good to boot. This is what I've never
understood... why WWE insists on doing their dumbass diva search with
untrained models and wannabe actresses who don't know the first thing about
wrestling and have them wrestle. How about, instead, take some of the
attractive women from the indies, ones who are already trained to wrestle
like a few of the women they already have in OVW and DSW, and have them do
the diva search? That is, if they insist on doing one. If they didn't, my
heart wouldn't burst. I'd rather see Krissy Vaine wrestling, not trying to
win a hot-dog eating contest, thank you very much.
ROH wrestling school trainee Mitch Franklin was out next. He got some taunts
about his size, considering he looked to be equal in size and weight to a
few of the women that were just in the ring. Homicide's music hit, and the
look on Mitch's face when it did was priceless... that "what did I do to
deserve this?" look. Homicide made short work of Mitch, then out came
Cabana. They brawled for a bit, Homicide got the upper hand and SQUISHED
Colt inside a ladder, literally wrapping said ladder around him. I thought
that there was no way they were using that ladder again.
One brawl begat another, as Chris Hero and Necro Butcher crashed the party
to continue to ROH/CZW feud. Another crazy brawl all over the building, most
of which I missed from my vantage point. Joe is left in the ring, and he
called out Christopher Daniels for their match. But wait, it's a
three-way... and without BJ Whitmer due to his injury, whatever shall they
do? Call in Jimmy Jacobs and his amour Lacey, that's what. Great visual with
a few fans in attendance waving their lighters in the air for Jimmy's music,
and dozens more fans without lighters using their cell phones as de facto
luminaries. I thought the three-way was put together well and didn't make
Jimmy appear to be well below Joe and Daniels' level... even though he did
the job to Joe.
And now, the main event, Bryan Danielson vs. Roderick Strong. Slow build at
the beginning with duelling surfboards... the kind of pace that made some
start to think that it was going to a hour draw. Danielson would work
illegal holds that would garner a five count, break the holds at four and
repeat to the ref "I have 'till FIVE!" Great stuff. Naturally, the action
picked up as time wore on, including a SICK dive by Danielson to the outside
and into the crowd after more than forty-five minutes. The time limit didn't
really come into play until the announcement that there was five minutes
left. Not long after that, Danielson picked up the win to retain the title.
So... I got to the show a little more than a hour in, and I still got to see
four hours' worth of an incredible show. Not bad for the price of admission,
and still three more shows' worth of wrestling left to see.
Part two of the journey took me to Midlothian and the IWA Mid-South "We're
No Joke" card. I've heard of IWA Mid-South, I've seen the results, and I've
seen some of their wrestlers in other promotions... but this is my first
time to see one of their shows.
IWA Mid-South opened right at 2:30 with Team Underground (Chandler McClure &
Eric Priest) vs. Brain Damage & Deranged. Deranged has really changed his
look from when he was in Special K, in addition to putting on some weight
and changing his style. Oh, wait... that's not the same guy. Ha ha ha... how
awkward. Decent match. For some reason, I thought that McClure & Priest can
be the kind of guys that Vince winds up signing... right look, decent
physique, good skills, normal size for a WWE wrestler.
The women were up next, Daizee Haze & Vanessa Kraven vs. Mickie Knuckles &
MsChif in an elimination tag to unify the IWA Mid-South and NWA Midwest
womens' titles. I had never seen MsChif work live before... well, I saw her
work three times in two days, and color me impressed. Great wrestling
ability, and you can't say she has the same kind of look as all the other
girls in the business. Made sense to put this one on early, since Daizee &
MsChif had to make it to Chicago Ridge and Mickie had to go to the
merchandise table later in the afternoon. I had also never seen Mickie
wrestle, but I'd heard many great things. Definitely can't say I was
disappointed. Mickie came out to Gretchen Wilson's Redneck Woman and was
billed as a walking episode of COPS... good stuff. Daizee & MsChif
eliminated one another with a double pin, leaving the woman who wrestles
just about every show for IWA Mid-South and the newcomer. After a couple of
hard-hitting minutes, Vanessa ate MIST from MsChif and fell to Mickie.
Next, a nine-man gauntlet for a title shot, the contract secured above the
ring on a bungee cord. Crazy, crazy match... just impossible to keep up with
it all. By the time everyone was in, there was literally action on the
outside on all four sides of the ring. Scary moment when one competitor
(Marek Brave) tried a shooting star from the top to the floor and wound up
doing the move on the top turnbuckle. He was officially eliminated with that
and stayed on the floor for the rest of the match. Darin Corbin won, with a
little help from the transplanted ROH-heavy crowd's favorite guy Chris Hero.
Next match wound up being a six-man involving Spike Dudley. Not Matt
Hyson... billed as and referred to as Spike Dudley. I can hear Jerry
McDevitt's phone ringing now. During the match, it seemed one of the men on
Spike's team, Eddie Kingston, injured his knee. Spike bled profusely and did
the job. Before that, he cut a prerequisite "f**k WWE for firing me, they
don't know what they're doing" promo. A few minutes into the match,
seemingly out of the blue, Spike tried to get a "f**k ROH chant" going for
some reason and the attempt died on the vine... maybe because most of the
people in attendance were also going to the ROH show that night. Sounds like
someone wanted to get booked and didn't.
Two more unique characters were up next... Josh Abercrombie w/New Kids On
The Block entrance music that somehow works, and Ruckus smoking a cigar and
wearing an "I'm A Hustler" t-shirt to match his music. Very good match,
Abercrombie wins.
After an intermission and a stop at the merch table to buy an IWA tape from
Mickie's part of the table, it was time for Kevin Steen vs. Ian Rotten. Fun
match, with plenty of Steen playing to the crowd. In his pre-match promo,
Steen drew a parallel between his match here and the Shawn Michaels/Vince
McMahon match set for tomorrow night on the big show... after a shameless
t-shirt plug, 'cause he needs the money... funny. Steen borrowed some HBK
mannerisms during the match, but went on to lose.
Delirious and El Generico were next and had a good match, thick with comic
stylings. Funniest bit came when Delirious tried to explain and negotiate a
leapfrog spot with Generico, only to sucker him when it was finally
attempted.
Mr. Insanity Toby Klein beat a LARGE bald dude named Tank who friggin'
looked like a tank. This wasn't my cup of tea as far as match styles go, but
it was good.
Low Ki vs. Necro Butcher in a wild kick-ass brawl was next. Necro came out
first, then Ki ran out and surprised Necro with a sneak attack as dozens of
streamers were being thrown for him, leading to a great visual with Ki and
Butcher brawling amidst the streamers... good stuff.
Main event, Chris Hero w/F**k You Hero chants vs. Milano Collection A.T.
w/imaginary dog on a leash. Solid match, even if I wasn't buying the Vintage
Fit Finlay Fake Knee Injury Spot. Hero submitted Milano to bring the show to
a close and send most of the people scurrying for the exits.
Moments after Milano tapped, I hopped in the car and headed a few miles
northwest to Chicago Ridge for a second night of ROH and show number three
of the trip. Parking was even more scarce than it was the previous night...
and for good reason. Once inside, the basketball court of Frontier
Fieldhouse was quite literally teeming with chairs, pushed tightly together
and set up in rows with as much legroom as your average coach-class seat.
However, all that was only temporary.
I arrived just in time to see the last few minutes of the main pre-show
match, the Shimmer six-woman tag. The 7:30 bell time was pushed back about
twenty minutes to allow the people who couldn't even park at the warehouses
on Virginia Avenue time to reach the building. In the meantime, Jim Cornette
manned the autograph table for a while.
The show began with Jack Evans leaving for his Dragon Gate tour on a winning
note, scoring the pin in a six-man mayhem that was, well, mayhem. The
highlight... three men in electric chair position, essentially
chicken-fighting with one another.
Jim Cornette was out next to make several points, one of which was
appointing Adam Pearce as the "bouncer", responsible for covering the front
door, side door and bathroom to prevent Hero & Butcher from crashing the
show. Why do I think that plan won't quite work out as intended? Colt Cabana
came out to ask for and receive clearance to take on Homicide in a Chicago
Street Fight. Next up, Delirious. Cornette complimented Delirious'
performance that I missed on the show prior, but issued an ultimatum... pick
your opponent in a singles match tonight and beat him or else lose your
place in ROH. Delirious jabbered as he is wont to do, then picked Ricky
Reyes. Didn't make sense to me... but then again, I didn't see what happened
the previous night. Better use of Delirious here, I thought, in a more
serious role. Sure, Delirious' schtick is over with everyone, but it's not
the kind of schtick that can convey itself to anything but the first match
or two. Anyway, Delirious won, so his spot is safe for a while.
More Dragon Gate goodness on tap... Masato Yoshino teaming with Alex Shelley
& Jimmy Rave to face the entire Do Fixer group of Dragon Kid, Genki
"H-A-G-E" Horiguchi & Ryo Saito. The Embassy hit the ring and were showered
with enough TP to cool Cornholio's jets and turn him back into Beavis. The
toilet paper factored in at a few points during the match itself... might as
well use it since there was enough throw for a small town to keep itself
clean for several weeks. Another great match.
Loaded four-way next... Samoa Joe, AJ Styles, Jimmy Yang and Christopher
Daniels w/X Division title hidden under his vestiments. Joe pinned Styles,
then laid the groundwork for the next money matchup... Joe vs. Danielson for
the ROH title. Solid back and forth mic work between Joe & Danielson soon
gave way to another wild brawl around the building when Hero & Butcher
breached the perimeter. During the brawl, a young woman in the front row
took an errant chair to the head, but took it well. Gabe & Cary emerged to
talk things over with the woman, who received a "She's Hardcore" chant and
hopefully some of the free stuff the crowd suggested she get as
compensation.
The Dragon Gate guys went out on a high note, as CIMA & Naruki Doi turned in
one more phenomenal match with Austin Aries & Roderick Strong for the tag
titles.
Lance Storm received a well-deserved hero's welcome for his title match with
Danielson. For a second, I had to question putting Cabana/Homicide on last.
Crowd chanted "You've Still Got It" at Storm. Did he ever really lose it?
Danielson put Storm away in a lot less time than it took him to get past
Strong last night. Excellent match.
My questions were quickly answered by the quality and sheer brutality of
Cabana/Homicide as the main event. Great stuff... thrills, chills,
bone-crunching spills and no need for even the edge of your seat once the
call went out for chairs to rain into the ring. Remember the bent ladder
from last night's show that I didn't think would ever be used again. Well,
it was used again... but only as a weapon for Colt to return the favor to
Homicide. Great blow-off to the feud, with Homicide coming to a truce of
sorts to wrap the show up after nearly five hours.
The journey concludes with the self-proclaimed granddaddy of them all,
Wrestlemania 22. I got into Allstate Arena just in time for the "bonus
match" after waiting nearly thirty minutes on a line that extended all the
way from the two open doors and active turnstiles at the north entrance to
the corner of Mannheim & Lunt. Trust me, it's a long way... and all the
lines for all the other entrances were just about as long, stretching down
the other side of Lunt for the other half of the north entrance and through
the parking lots for the others. I would have been really disappointed if I
had missed that bonus match, really. Would have loved to have been a fly on
the wall when that one was being booked.
"How can we use MNM at Mania?"
"Well, they could defend the tag titles."
"Now, now, now... that's crazy talk. Let's put them in generic blue shirts
in a battle royal and have them be sodomized by Viscera."
Yeesh. Enough of the flowery language. It's not a bonus match, it's an
excuse to get a bunch of midcarders on the bill. And who's bright idea was
it to have Viscera win? No London & Kendrick, which disappointed me.
However, several rows down in the lower bowl, there were two guys with a
two-part sign... I Flew 4000 Miles To See London & Kendrick. Surely that was
money well-spent.
After that, out came the announcers. First, Tazz & Cole, then the Spanish
team, then Jim Ross to a thunderous ovation. After Lawler came out to
complete the Raw side of the team, the silence was pierced with a loud We
Want Joey chant.
Michelle Williams sang America The Beautiful. This was the Michelle Williams
from Destiny's Child, not the Michelle Williams from Dawson's Creek and
Brokeback Mountain. I would have preferred the latter, really. I don't
know... can she even sing? No matter.
Big Show and Kane retained the tag titles over Carlito & Masters. Yawn. Not
a thing to write home about here.
Money in the bank ladder match... now here's the one to write home about.
Everyone looked good here, plenty of amazing spots. Shelton Benjamin is
amazing. Why he doesn't get more opportunities to show it, I don't know. RVD
has the knack for the big spots as well... then again, you already knew
that. RVD wins the future title shot, and all seems a little righter with
the world.
A Josh Matthews interview with Gene Okerlund somehow turned into a Randy
Orton/Batista staredown. It's amazing how over Batista still is. I just
wonder what he's going to look like when he comes back.
Howard Finkel has appeared out of nowhere. Bad news... Bret Hart "didn't
feel comfortable" with participating here tonight. Can you really blame him?
Some people in attendance did, but their boos might just have been the
reaction to wanting to see Bret appear live and missing out. Good news...
the other Hall of Fame inductees are present and accounted for. Eddie
Guerrero's induction was mentioned last, with Chavo walking Vickie out.
Genuinely emotional moment, and the only time the Eddie chant seemed called
for.
JBL won the US title from Chris Benoit in a screwy finish that fell flat in
the building. There has to be a better use of Benoit than this.
Edge won the hardcore match by spearing Mick Foley through a flaming table.
Cringe-inducing bumps throughout, including Edge hitting the thumbtacks and
both Edge and Lita taking the mandible claw... with Mr. Socko wrapped in
barbed wire. Lita bled from the mouth. [Feel free to insert your own Lita
STD joke here, if you want.]
Booker & Sharmell walked the parade of freaks in the back. Highlight, Ted
Dibiase playing OLD SCHOOL Million Dollar Man. Lowlight, Snitsky turning his
foot lust towards Mae Young. In between, Goldust.
Booker & Sharmell vs. Boogeyman... bad. Guess why. Who said that in order to
get a job in a wrestling company, you had to know how to wrestle a match?
Hey, I want to be the starting center fielder for the San Francisco Giants!
Well, what are you waiting for, Felipe Alou? Put me in the lineup! What do
you mean it doesn't work that way?
Mickie James picked up the womens' title from Trish Stratus. For some
reason, the crowd got together and decided to be cute, cheering Mickie and
booing Trish for no good reason. What the hell was wrong with you people? I
wasn't part of the meeting, not that I would have been a joiner for that bit
anyway. Know why? I have no reason to boo Trish. She works hard, has
wrestling skills and is a VERY attractive female playing babyface... so let's
boo her. Why... because the other woman forced a kiss or three on her and
she didn't reciprocate? *sigh* Sometimes, I just don't understand wrestling
fans.
You know what this show was missing? McMahons. All of them. All on the same
screen. Good thing someone saw that oversight and plugged in this segment.
Vince's first line ("all right, God, I don't like you and you don't like
me") was a real laugh-inducer. No, really.
Undertaker ran his Wrestlemania record to 14-0 by stuffing a hefty no-talent
in a casket and closing the lid... as if the outcome was in doubt. I would
hate to think that WWE would set something like Undertaker's Wrestlemania
streak aside so that Mark Henry could have his 35th attempt to try to get
over and fail miserably. Highlight for me, besides Undertaker's plancha over
the casket, was Henry hitting the World's Strongest Slam... and going for
the pinfall.
Shawn Michaels finally got some heat back on the McMahons by dropping an
elbow on Vince from an absurdly tall ladder while Vince was stuffed in a
trash can. Hope there weren't any midgets beating off in there earlier.
Shawn followed with the superkick and got the win. I was starting to worry
about this one, with Shawn seemingly never able to keep any heat against the
McFamily for three whole months.
Finally, WWE has come back to their senses in one regard... Wrestlemania 23
is in a stadium, Ford Field in Detroit.
P.O.D. played Rey Mysterio to the ring, and Rey shockingly won the title.
Shocking to me, anyway... didn't think it would ever happen. Great moment,
and I think Rey is very deserving. Short match, though.
Torrie Wilson won the "Playboy pillow fight" without a single pillow being
swung. How is that possible? More importantly, who's call was it to bill it
a pillow fight and book it as a wrestling match? They could have taken time
from this fiasco and put it in the World title match. Surprised they didn't
put Candice over, not that it would have mattered one bit. You know
something went wrong when a predominantly male audience is chanting "boring"
while two moderately attractive women are rolling around in their underwear
in the ring.
Enough of that... main event time. HHH w/bad-ass new entrance vs. Cena
w/elaborate one-time-only entrance that didn't matter one bit when it came
to being cheered or booed. Crowd was split about 50/50, give or take a few,
and each side tried their damndest to shout down the other. Surprisingly,
Cena got the tap-out win (and kept his Wrestlemania record perfect at 3-0)
and Wrestlemania ended with a feel-good moment that half the people felt
good about.
Wrestlemania exceeded my modest expectations. The first two hours or so were
pretty damn good in my book, then the last part dragged things down some.
IWA Mid-South put on a good show, and ROH put on two phenomenal must-see
shows. I have yet to attend a ROH show that was anything less than great.
Amazingly, after four shows and 33 live matches (not counting watching Raw
Monday night, since I wasn't in the arena live), I'm not sick of wrestling.
On the contrary... I'm looking forward to all four shows appearing soon on
DVD, so that I might buy them and occasionally re-live this weekend. Oh,
yeah, and see for myself what I missed in the first hour of ROH Friday
night... and maybe watch that Dragon Gate six-man in half-speed so it doesn't
seem like a blur.
