Kurt Adonis vs Jeff Starr
Adonis looks like a knock-off Chris Chetti, if you can
imagine such a thing. They work the crowd to start with, establishing Starr as
the face. I dug Starr hitting an early pescado that looked decent. Adonis takes
over with a weak looking superkick, but I liked his interactions with the crowd
whilst working a chinlock (and he actually WORKED the chinlock, rather than
just sitting in it. Fair play). Adonis takes too long climbing the ropes and
gets superplexed off. Starr hits a better superkick and an out-of-control
looking swanton for the win. Brief match, nothing offensive.
Terrible Todd Stone vs Short Sleeve Sampson
The DVD box bills this as “Midget Madness”. Great. Sampson
looks remarkably like a midget Martin Stone. He also raps. Stone attacks from behind
to start, but Sampson soon gains control. He springboards off the ropes nicely,
then hits a sweet looking suicide dive, so I’m already happy with Short Sleeve.
Stone isn’t quite so enjoyable on offence, not moving quite so fluidly as
Sampson. Stone gets an RKO but fails a second attempt, and Sampson hits a Worm
for the win. This was ok
Chris Sabin vs Damian Adams
Sabin’s arrival earns a “TNA” chant, which really makes the
show feel old. Sabin looks really good early on, hitting a nice springboard
dropkick and a pescado to the floor. Adams impresses early with a big bump,
hurling himself over the top rope to the floor. Sabin works the crowd by
chopping Adams outside the ring on all four sides. Adams hits a nice overhead
belly-to-belly to take over, but his spell in control is pretty bland, working
a chinlock and a weakly applied abdominal stretch to little reaction. Shame, as
he looks able to keep up with Sabin during the closing run before falling to
the Cradle Shock for the Sabin victory.
Al Snow vs Chris Candido
Candido isn’t accompanied by Tammy Sytch here, but another
wrestler called Thunderbolt (think a terrifying lovechild of Droz and BJ Whitmer).
Luckily, they’ve got quite good chemistry and Thunderbolt happily stooges for
Candido. This is basically a competitive comedy match, and it’s fun, if a bit
overlong. We kick off with basic comedy spots like Snow riding Candido like a
pony, and Thunderbolt missing interference spots and nailing Candido instead.
Candido gets a brief run of offence after Thunderbolt nails Snow with a spear
(earning himself an ejection), but Snow regains control after pulling Candido’s
trunks down on a sunset flip. Candido, like a pro, wrestles with his trunks
below his arse for a few minutes. We suddenly hit a run of finisher spamming,
with Snow getting two counts from Sweet Chin Music, a pedigree and the People’s
Elbow. Candido also gets two after hulking up and hitting a big boot/legdrop.
Candido hits an appalling stunner before the ref bumps, and Tammy Sytch runs in
dressed like a ref. Snow manages to beat her fast counts, and Candido
accidentally nails her with a foreign object. Snow nails him with Head and the
recovering ref counts three. Decent enough.
Jerry Lawler vs Slyk Wagner Brown
Brown is accompanied by a fat lad in a t-shirt called Big
Daddy. Mick Foley is the guest ref for this bout, and he’s bloody awful at it. This
match is pretty poor, and that’s in no way the fault of Lawler, who tries his
best to make it watchable. Lawler hits some beautiful looking fistdrops and a
really nice high dropkick. Brown is pretty bland, and is really shown up by
Lawler. 90% of Lawler’s offence is punches, which all look great and are
interspersed perfectly. Brown’s offence is 90% punches and kicks, and at no
point do you think they’ll put Lawler away. Big Daddy gets ejected after
getting caught interfering after hitting numerous cheapshots behind Foley’s
back. This leads to the finish, where Lawler nails two piledrivers but only
gets two, albeit with a VERY slow Foley count. Big Daddy comes back, nails
Lawler from behind and hides under a table, only for Foley to stop counting on
two and instead leave the ring and hunt down Big Daddy (who he doesn’t know for
sure is out there). This melee ends with Lawler rolling up Brown for the win. A
bit of a clusterfuck.
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