Jason's Journal

Sep. 22nd, 2006 @ 09:20 am F4W Battle of Los Angeles 2006 Part 1

I

Today got off to a great start as I received a text from my buddy Vince that said:

“10 minutes”

What this meant was that he was going to be late. The plan was to leave my house at 7:00 AM to head to the airport, where we would fly to LA for the BATTLE OF LOS ANGELES pro-wrestling tournament. I received the above-mentioned text at 6:59 AM, so already he’d fucked up.

I replied: “My mom is already here so chop chop.”

But I cannot complain much because right now it is 11:31 IN THE AM and I am sitting here in an Alaska Airlines air plane in row 32 seat B, and I am hammered. Life is great when you get to go on basically a free vacation and you can start drinking at 11:00 in the morning.

This free vacation was actually paid for by a great man named Jubs who is a reader and contributes frequently to our message board. I have no idea what Jubs’ real name is. I think it is James Something. But it doesn’t matter, because this is the pro-wrestling business and I know a lot of people only by their stage names, including my 320-pound one-eyed tattooed Samoan friend Sumito, who may or may not actually be named “Sumito”, but I hope he is because my life would be for the worse if I discovered that his name was, for example, “Henry”.

So this Jubs fellow contacted us several months back and wanted to know if we’d be interested in flying to California for free to attend the September 1-3 Battle of Los Angeles tournament for Pro Wrestling Guerrilla. At the time, all I could wonder was why a man would want to fly Vince and I to Los Angeles for a three-day wrestling show. Truth be told, I haven’t had the opportunity to attend a lot of functions over the past year due to the work required to keep F4Wonline.com active (it is, as I’ve noted elsewhere, like a child; you think about it constantly, you feel the need to feed it and check on it throughout the day, and when you are gone you are filled with great concern about whether it is OK). I told him I’d think about it. He kept pestering me. I asked Vince. He said he’d think about it. The pestering continued. Eventually I was sent a line-up, and as it turns out some of the biggest names not only in indy wrestling but in international wrestling were scheduled to attend, including one of my favorite wrestlers, CIMA of Toryumon and Dragon Gate in Japan. Then one day I sat down and had this thought:

“This man Jubs is offering to fly me to Los Angeles for free to see what may end up being the biggest independent wrestling show in the world in 2006, and I’m sitting here trying to decide whether or not I should take him up on this offer.”

At this point I was ashamed.

So I contacted Jubs and said sure, we’ll go, and I thanked him profusely. He booked our plane tickets and it was determined that we would fly out Friday morning and return home Monday at 9:45 AM.

If you have read any of my previous Road Reports you will probably recall the fact that not a lot of planning or preparation goes into these trips. I did not start packing, in fact, until 6:30 AM Friday morning. And it wasn’t until I was on the plane that I realized that I was flying to Los Angeles courtesy a man I had never spoken verbally to in my entire life (God bless Internet private messages) and hoping that when I arrived, he would be there at the airport to take us to wherever the hell we were going (even this I did not know – all I knew was that we were staying in some dude’s house named Top Gun Somethingorother who was, in fact, in India for six months and wouldn’t even be around, and that Roderick Strong of TNA would also be there). It was also at this point that I realized that arriving home at 9:45 AM meant that with a two-hour flight time and three-hour advanced arrival at the airport we would have to head out Sunday night at about 3:00 AM.

This was when we started drinking.

The man came by and charged us $10 for two Jack and Cokes. He didn’t even give us the Coke cans. It appeared he filled two small plastic cups with one can of Coke and then gave us these little bottles of Jack Daniels (“GOLD MEDALS AT ST. LOUIS EXPOSITION 1904”) to fill them with. These ended up being strong drinks. I have kept the two bottles. I am going to start a collection this weekend, and get hair ties and tie them to my belt as trophies.

The airport stuff was not too bad. A bunch of terrorists recently tried to take down an airplane using some sort of liquid concoction, so all liquids and lotions and such are banned from flights. The woman in front of me at the security checkpoint, who was about 45 years old with lightly dyed hair wearing a blouse and some shorts and rouge and cheap jewelry, was forced to give up her pocket-sized bottle of shampoo. You just never know who might be trying to blow up an airplane.

As I was typing this, the man on the plane came by to collect garbage. We gave him the plastic cups, but I told him I was keeping the Jack bottles.

“Is there anything else you want to get rid of?” the man asked Vince. Then he pointed to me. “Besides him?”

So yeah, that’s the scoop. We’re in the air and soon we shall land, and Jubs alerted me – via private message at the airport – that he would be picking us up in a gray vehicle of some sort, we’d go to Tony Roma’s for Lunch, then it would be on to the show. I actually have no idea what else we could possibly be doing this weekend except drinking and walking around LA in a haze, but I’m fine with that.

II

So we survived the plane flight and Jubs picked us up outside LAX. What happened was, we walked outside and this tall man in a jersey with tight curly black hair and glasses who looked remarkably like a young Mike Lano hurriedly stepped forward and offered his hand.

“Jubs,” he said.

“Hi Jubs.”

He rapidly shook our hands and pointed to his car, which was sitting there next to a curb with the back door open. Holding the door open was a young man we later learned was M-Dogg 20, who for some strange reason was acting as a chauffer. This car was a five-seater and Vince is about a two-seat man, so we crammed into the back and were on our way.

In the front seat was Roderick Strong, who thankfully didn’t appear to know that I had, at times, written that he’s the most generic wrestler I’ve ever seen. Within five minutes, I felt bad about this statement and instead came to the conclusion that TNA is actually the dumbest wrestling promotion in existence. Roderick Strong, in fact, is a very funny guy with a dry sense of humor. I sat there in the back seat thinking, you know, if I were a wrestling promoter I could probably do something with this man. It would involve him making fun of Vince repeatedly and probably chopping the shit out of him, but regardless that would be more than TNA has ever done to bring out his personality.

Jubs took us to Tony Roma’s, which is a restaurant that serves awesome ribs. He explained that this restaurant was right down the street from “the venue”. The venue in question was the place where Battle of Los Angeles was being held. For some reason, Jubs repeatedly referred to is as “the venue”. It wasn’t “the arena” or “the building”. It was “the venue”. Apparently this is a SoCal thing. I explained to Jubs that in Washington, we always called it “the building”. The promoter would say, “Be at the building at 4:00.”

“Yeah, but a ‘building’ could be anything,” Jubs said. “It could be a school or someone’s house.”

“Well, a ‘venue’ could be anything,” I argued. “It could be a cave.”

“Yeah, but why would I say ‘the building’ and not ‘the venue’ if an event is being held there?”

“Why does it matter?”

“In all the time I wrestled,” Vince said, “no one ever couldn’t find a place because it was called ‘the building’ and not ‘the venue’.”

“Why not ‘the arena’?” I asked.

“Actually,” Jubs said, “I think legally you can only call something an ‘arena’ if it seats a certain amount of people.”

As he was arguing, Jubs tried to park about a mile away from Tony Roma’s. Roderick set him straight.

“Why the hell are you parking so far away, Jubs?” he asked.

Jubs explained that he was looking for somewhere that he could back into, and there were too many cars close to the building. If he parked there, he’d have to go in straight and back out.

“Don’t make me walk,” Roderick pleaded.

So Jubs parked closer to the building, against his better judgment. “Wait until you see me try to back out,” he said.

At Tony Roma’s I got a chance to learn a little bit more about M-Dogg 20. He had a best-of video on his iPod that a fan had made for him. It consisted of him doing a whole bunch of cool moves and almost dying. Seriously, he almost died once. He was doing an Asai moonsault in a building with no pretty black mats, and the middle rope fucking broke and he flipped over and plunged upside-down onto his head on the concrete. We all screamed in terror upon seeing this, right there in the eating venue. M-Dogg 20 also did this one spot where his opponent was on all fours and he did a pommel horse circle on his back.

“You were a gymnast!” I said.

“Yup. Twelve years.”

“Wow, I was too. What level did you get to?”

“One.”

“You were much better than I was.”

We discussed what it was like being a pro-wrestler who was a former gymnast.

“You notice how when you do spots, you can’t help but do them with good form?” I asked. “I used to do moonsaults and I’d watch the tape back and notice that my legs were straight and my toes were pointed, and I didn’t even mean to.”

“Oh yeah,” he said. “I used to hate it. I used to watch it and think that it looked weird. So I consciously tried to bend my legs and not look like such a gymnast. But nowadays, I’m back to having good form again because I figured out it was good to do stuff that looks different from everyone else.”

Jubs got to talking about this Battle of Los Angeles preview that some fan had created. It had bios of every single wrestler, photos, predictions, the whole shebang.

“So did you read it on the plane like you said you were going to?” Jubs asked Vince.

“I was going to,” Vince said. “But I went to print it out and it was 40 pages long.”

This was no exaggeration. The preview was 40 pages long.

“I like how on the preview it has everyone’s win loss record,” I said. “Like, it would have M-Dogg 20 listed as 40-18-4 or something. Who the fuck keeps track of stuff like that?”

“Actually, did you read your stats?” Jubs asked M-Dogg. “Did you know you have never won a tournament match ever in PWG?” he asked.

“Thanks Jubs,” said M-Dogg 20.

“And did you see your odds? You’re 50:1 to win this tournament.”

“How the hell do they come up with odds?”

“I presume it has to do with everyone’s record,” I said.

“Disco Machine is 100:1,” Jubs noted.

“Well at least I’m not in last place,” said M-Dogg.

“What are my odds, Jubs?” asked Roderick.

III

We got to THE VENUE at 4:00 and had a good four hours to sit around and watch the proceedings. A few of the wrestlers were already in the building, including CIMA, Genki Horiguchi, and an unmasked Dragon Kid. Seeing Dragon Kid without his mask took me back to the early 2000s when, on a trip backstage to the WWE Raw and Smackdown tapings in Kelowna, BC, I saw an unmasked Ultimo Dragon.

“Wow,” I thought to myself. “A young Japanese man.”

At about 4:30 the Toryumon guys got in the ring and started goofing around. They were running the ropes in a wacky manner, doing goofy holds, and pretending like they were going to do lame dives through the middle and bottom rope and such. I thought, wow, they’re every indy geek I’ve ever seen, just really fucking good indy geeks.

I needed some caffeine, so we went out to Jubs’ car. Outside the building I ran into AcidHelmNUN from the F4Wonline.com message board. Acid had posted a deal asking if he could meet up with us and say hi. He had promised to bring cookies.

“I have cookies,” he said moments after introducing himself.

He did indeed, Mrs. Field’s cookies. AcidHelmNUN, a man of his word, and a great man.

“Where’s Vince?” he asked. “I have one for him too.”

“Have you see Vince lately? He doesn’t need any cookies. I can eat that one.”

Vinny was inside the building hanging out in our unofficial press area, the back south wall. We were joined by James Caldwell of the Pro Wrestling Torch newsletter and website, a former PWG regular who moved back to Houston recently and hadn’t been to a show in six months.

“I set up a press table by the back,” he told me. “You can come sit with me if you want.”

COLLUSION.

At about six o’clock, most all of the wrestlers were there. I think the one thing that struck me most was how small a lot of these guys were. Five years ago I would go to wrestling shows and see guys and think, my God so-and-so is huge in real life. At this show, I was blown away with how small everyone was. I used to go to indy shows and be far and away the smallest guy there, but at this show I would have been within 10 pounds of probably 25% of the crew. Chris Sabin looked maybe 160 pounds. CIMA was maybe 180, max. Dragon Kid, obviously, was diminutive.

By 6:30, there were, no joke, fifteen guys in the ring all going over spots. Guys were bonking into each other and goofing around, and again I thought, Jesus, this is every indy show I’ve ever been to, just with impossibly better talent.

In the front row, the Toryumon guys, who had been goofing off earlier, were now staring slack-jawed at the fifteen guys in the ring.

I love this business.

IV

There was a bar there back by the curtain, so I made sure to grab a vodka and cran about five minutes before showtime (that’s carny for twenty minutes before showtime). At the bar I just happened to run into another wrestling mainstay, the great Dr. Lucha himself, Steve Sims. Steve is a longtime fan that has helped provide information on Mexican pro-wrestling to Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer and I for a long, long time. He was here for one day of wrestling, then it was straight baseball all day Saturday and Sunday. One must have their priorities straight.

“There’s no way this show is starting on time,” James said as I sat down at the press table.

At least the place filled up fast. At 7:40 I was sitting here thinking this show was a total bust. There were about 20 people in this here American Legion Post #308 (basically every Elk’s Lodge/Eagles Hall you’ve ever been in). Turns out the reason no one was here was because they hadn’t even opened the doors yet. Keep in mind that when we arrived at 4:00 there were already about two dozen people sitting outside the front door, baking in the hot Reseda sun. People make jokes about certain places being “Mexico North”. This part of Reseda was in fact Mexico North.

The doors opened about 20 minutes before eight. Apparently there was a major deal between PWG and the building regarding what time the doors would open. I guess the building wanted the doors open two hours before bell time so they could start selling liquor. PWG wanted a half hour. Finally they compromised to one hour. Suffice to say, you probably won’t be seeing a lot of future PWG shows in the American Legion Post #308.

The building could seat “400” (everyone who said this put “400” in quotation marks) and they’d pre-sold 300 tickets.

James called it.

The ring announcer came out at 8:08 and everyone cheered. He then announced that we would be starting in 10 minutes. Welcome to indy hell. In the meantime they set up all the lights and cameras and such. Did I mention they were filming this in HD? Oh yes. These cameras are like $80,000. Jubs said he figured they were renting them for the three days at the cost of a bit over $1,000. He asked if I’d seen the first Battle of Los Angeles DVD, which also was done in HD and thus looked really, really good.

“But were the matches any good?” I asked.

At 8:18 PM the ring announcer introduced Dino Woodward, the PWG Commissioner. Apparently we’d be rooming with Dino later. He said this show had been exhausting to put together as some guys had missed their flights and one guy had gotten hurt (ROH Champion Bryan Danielson), but still they’d put together the best show possible. “You guys are going to shit your pants!” he promised. Suddenly, the Briscoe Brothers hit the ring and beat the piss out of Dino. They cut a promo that involved copious usage of the word “fuck”, which I don’t approve of. They said they didn’t give a fuck about the people and didn’t give a fuck about the promotion. “FUCK YOU BRISCOES!” the fans screamed. They have each put on about 40 to 50 pounds of solid muscle since the last time I saw them. Amazing how that works.

The ring bell, which I swear to God was actually a cow bell, rang to signal that THE PRO WRESTLING GUERRILLA BATTLE OF LOS ANGELES TOURNAMENT WAS BEGINNING. This was the biggest reaction to the ringing of a cow bell in the history of the Earth. Crowd was hardcore and super hot.

1. Chris Sabin vs. Colt Cabana in a tournament match. Sabin was billed at 207. Lots of great chain wrestling and wacky comedy early. Colt got the heat for awhile, then went for an Asai moonsault and got dropkicked right in the gut. That was scary as he almost landed headfirst. Sabin made his comeback and they traded nearfalls. Sabin finally hit a reverse rolling cradle into a bridge for the pin. Good opener, but too short. (**3/4)

2. El Generico vs. Delirious in a tournament match. The masked El Generico is, according to Jubs, the best wrestler in the whole entire world. El Generico, he says, has never had a bad match, and in fact has never had anything but the best match on any show he’s ever been on. “I had a match with Generico and it was not the best match on the show,” Roderick stated earlier in the day when Jubs was ranting. This did not deter Jubs. He told me to call Dave Meltzer and tell him to start working on a bio of El Generico for when he is inducted into the Wrestling Observer Hall of Fame. I told him I would get to work on that. OK, after one minute I can tell you that El Generico is not the best wrestler in the entire world because the best wrestler in the entire world is Delirious. I believe his gimmick is that he’s a masked athletic Ultimate Warrior. He also hit young Generico with a historically hard chop. I mean, I’ve seen – and delivered – some hard chops in my life, but this was Chris Benoit vs. David Flair chopworthy. Delirious is a total comedy wrestler, but when he needs to go he goes. Generico made his comeback and hit the Fosbury flop dive to the outside, thankfully not killing any fans. Generico finally hit him with two brutal Yakuza kicks in the corner, then dropped him on his head with a half-Nelson German suplex for the pin. Awesome finish. Turned into a pretty damn good little match. (***1/2)

During the break between matches I ran into ERIC~! and BLIZZARD BEAST~!~!~! from the board. Blizzard Beast looks exactly like what you would expect a man named Blizzard Beast to look like, just more clean-shaven.

“I had to shave for a job interview,” he noted with a tinge of sadness in his voice. These were fine gentleman. Eric offered to buy me a drink.

“Let me finish this one,” I said, “and if I’m not stumbling you can buy me another.”

3. M-Dogg 20~!~!~! vs. CIMA~!!~~! in a tournament match. M-Dogg said in the car that he wanted a great showing to hopefully open some doors with Dragon Gate. It was funny, because the Japanese guy came out and suddenly we had a Japanese crowd. They sat quietly and studiously and applauded the technical matwork. CIMA is another guy that looks so much bigger in his gear than in his street clothes. It’s also weird to see him in clothes without fringe. They did a quick highspot early, then had a very methodical, slow-paced match. M-Dogg finally made a comeback and it was highspots galore. He hit a twisting space flying tiger drop to the outside to a huge pop. His toes were pointed. Lots of close nearfalls. CIMA finally caught him on a huracanrana attempt and turned it into a kryptonite krunch for the pin. Very good stuff. Go M-Dogg~! Crowd gave them a big standing ovation afterwards. (***1/2)

The bad news is that M-Dogg’s streak of never winning a PWG tourney match continues.

4. Matt Sydal vs. Kevin Steen in a tournament match. Sydal apparently waited until the last minute to go tanning. Steen, a tubbier man, scissored Sydal’s head and was laying on the mat. He rolled to his belly and did some push-ups, then rolled to his back and did some crunches. Everyone laughed. That’s one awesome thing about indy wrestling. Guys come up with funny ideas and they can do them. Shit like this would never fly in WWE, probably even at house shows, and that’s sad. I’m sure he’s a great guy – and maybe he also has a dry sense of humor – but Sydal looks like every dude you’d see serving burgers at Red Robin. White guy with short brown hair who went tanning for too long the day before the show, wearing plain blue trunks and plain boots. His in-ring was fine, but your average fan would completely forget about him 24 hours later. I mean, he’s 100 times the worker of our buddy Paul from the latest Bryan vs. Vinny video, but Paul you’d remember a week later because he’s wacky and has a giant Unibomber beard. These guys chopped the piss out of each other. “IN THE FACE!” some fan screamed after every chop. Steen held him for five seconds on a vertical superplex. Tons of nearfalls, then Steen KILLED HIM with a middle rope powerbomb for the pin. This show is on a roll. (***3/4)

If you wanted to argue that any of the previous three matches was the best on the show so far, I wouldn’t argue with you.

5. Quicksilver vs. Dragon Kid in a tournament match. After intermission, the final four matches started at 10:04. In other words, this show has been almost two hours long so far. The funny thing is that unlike most indy shows, this two hours FLEW by. I guess there is something to be said for quality wrestling. The Dragon Gate guys are like four steps ahead of everyone else. That is not a knock, just a matter of fact. They’re so smooth, and sometimes you can see them having to slow down briefly just to let the other guys catch up. Quicksilver got the heat. This was a rough match to have to follow everything else. Of course, you could say that about every match, really. Crowd wasn’t much into it. Kid made a comeback and did an Asai into the crowd, wiping out a woman in the process. A security dude raised a fist to indicate that the woman was fine and the fans chanted “SHE’S HARDCORE!” Other than that, this got way less of a reaction than you’d think. I did like how Quicksilver had to sell this more than the middle-aged woman who got wiped out. Quicksilver made a comeback and dropped Dragon on his head with like five straight moves, including basically a tombstone Diamond cutter. Crowd finally started getting into it. Dragon finally hit the springboard huracanrana for the pin. He SMASHED his head into the canvas going over and looked messed up. Tons of great moves, but missing everything else. (**3/4)

6. Rocky Romero vs. Roderick Strong in a tournament match. Steve Sims made a good point to me during intermission, that being that every match so far was basically the same. And he’s right. At least they’re all basically very good. If they all basically sucked I’d be one unhappy man. Rocky went to shake hands, but then spit right in Roderick’s face. Crowd was APPALLED. Strong then bulled him in the corner, hit him with some rib shots and delivered a CHOP OF FUCK. People screamed in terror. That’s two historic chops on one show. Strong got the heat giving him a backdrop onto the apron. Looked way more terrifying than it actually was, but the place went nuts. OK, Roderick is among the hardest choppers I have ever seen. He just beat the piss out of Young Rocky and it was great. They had a battle of chops and kicks, then Romero wiped him out with a tope to the outside. Roderick broke his back with two backbreakers. There were a few moments of hesitation and this may have went on a bit too long. Regardless, Strong finally had enough, powerbombed the motherfuck out of him and put him in a crab for the submission. Big standing ovation and loud “THAT WAS AWESOME!” chants. And it was. Best match on the show. Afterwards, Strong went to shake his hand, and as Rocky was about to accept Strong spit on him. BWAHAHAHA!!! (****)

So anyway, El Generico didn’t have the best match on the show.

7. PWG Champion Joey Ryan & PWG World Tag Team Champions Chris Bosh and Scott Lost & Petey Williams vs. B-Boy & Excalibur & Human Tornado & Homicide. Petey and Homicide were surprise unbilled mystery partners. Tornado, a fantastic man, is billed as “The Only Black Man in Nacho Libre”. That got one of the biggest pops of the night. Lost and Bosh and Ryan are known as The Embassy and they are the top heel group. Their Embassy does not feature a tanning bed, I can tell you that. Fans were screaming that Joey was a paper champion. Apparently he’s part owner (well, one of like six) and hasn’t won a match clean in a year. It’s all countouts, DQ’s, outside interference etc. He does get a ton of heat. TNA guys got a big pop as mystery partners, including a standing ovation for Homicide. Tornado — whose gimmick is that his penis is made of steel, and whose signature spot is the BITCH SLAP — is one of those guys who is about nine feet tall and constantly looks like he’s going to kill himself or his opponent, but he’s still frikkin great and the place goes nuts for everything he does. The biggest pop early was for a goofy spot that ended with the ref punching Ryan. Bad guys finally got the heat on Tornado and went to work. At about 11:23 PM it hit me that this show was officially going on too long. The chicks – Jade Chung with the heels and some other blonde with the babyfaces – got into a fight out on the floor, really for no good reason. Tornado finally hit a big move and got the hot tag. You know, they used to have shows run long to kill the town for the competition. I don’t know why you’d run almost five straight hours when you’ve got two more shows in the same building the same weekend. Homicide did a big dive to the outside. They teased a stacked-up eight-man superplex spot, but Petey broke it up. Hey, I would have as well. So anyway, five seconds after writing that they did it anyway and it was a total mess. Hopefully no one was killed. Everyone hit a big move to progressively less heat. “OH MY GOSH!” a fan screamed. “WHY DON’T YOU JUST PIN SOMEBODY!” Petey finally got mad about something and hit Joey with the CANADIAN DESTROYER~! Excalibur mercifully climbed on top for the pin. People were immediately walking rapidly to the door. Probably not the best sign. If we forget the eight-hour main event, a hell of a first night. (**1/4)

V

It’s 11:30 in the morning and I just woke up. We were out until 4:30 AM last night, engaged in a long battle to get the worst food I may have ever eaten in my life. Right now I am sitting outside of Tank Talwar’s house at a little glass table under an umbrella, already baking in the 80-degree Southern California sun.

Vinny just came out. I’ve mentioned many times that I could never live with Vince, and this is why. He’s one of the most grotesque people you’ve ever seen in the morning. He looks 40 pounds fatter, his clothes all look smaller and tighter, his hair looks like it was built by birds, he’s unshaven and hairy, and the first thing he has to do is eat something. Mama Talwar had left some donuts on this glass table during the night, so that was the first thing he went for. The back yard is very large. There’s some old junk out by one of the walls, a barbecue that looks like it hasn’t been used since 1978, a metal pole of some sort that has a string tied to it and the other end tied to a bush (don’t ask, I have no idea), some nicely mown grass, and a big tree with a little brick wall built around it. So anyway, with all of this area available Vince of course had to sit with me at the little glass table and loudly chomp on his donut. There is nothing in this world worse than listening to Vince eat, with the possible exception of listening to my buddy Brent Kremen eat. As I type I am stricken with amazement that we have not killed each other yet.

Vince finished the donut and grabbed another one. Then he said: “I’m going to go for a walk.” Sweeter words have never been spoken.

On the way out he ran into Mama Talwar. She is a short little Mexican woman with graying hair and the sweetest smile. Last night in the car when Jubs was telling us about Mrs. Talwar, and how we were going to stay in the basement of her house in Pasadena, Vince suddenly said, “Hold on, so we’re staying with the little old lady from Pasadena?” And, in fact, we were. I don’t know if this woman drove a hot rod, but she was goddamn cool enough to write a song about. Besides the donuts (and the fact that she didn’t care that four wrestlers barged into her home at 4:00 in the morning), she’d also stocked the fridge with pop and beer, and left a note on the table saying, “I got a pizza, help yourself!”

After last night I don’t feel like pizza, or really anything else. About fifteen or twenty of us went to IHOP at about midnight or 1:00 or 2:00 AM. I think it was midnight, but given we got back at 4:30 AM I want to think that we actually got there at two. Before I quit wrestling, I used to love hanging out with the guys and dread the actual in-ring wrestling. I wasn’t worried about having to work this show and had a good old time talking to people beforehand, but at midnight, having been there since 4:00 in the afternoon, all I wanted to do was get the fuck out of the building and go get some food. Enter Jubs, our chauffer, of whose mercy we were at. Jubs is all about the meet-and-greet, the networking, the socializing, the what-have-you. Jubs sat on a goddamn box and explained to us that we were going to hang around until the American Legion Post #308 bar did the Last Call, then when all the wrestlers were sufficiently drunk, we could all go to IHOP together.

“Jubs, I just want to go eat now,” I said.

Jubs would have none of this.

To tell you how exciting this two hours or so was, we ended up getting into a long discussion about whether you could really do the Canadian destroyer on a person. I remarked that the move was absurd and Jubs was appalled and made this statement, that if he put my head between his legs and jumped (actually, the exact word he used was “leapt”) over me, I would be FORCED to flip over and be piledriven.

“Jubs, I wrestled for six years and I can tell you that the Canadian destroyer violates the laws of physics and would never work.”

Jubs would not hear of this and continued his argument. “Well, what if you outweighed the person by, say, 100 pounds? If you were 100 pounds heavier than the person, could you do it to them in real life?”

“OK, let’s say you WERE 100 pounds heavier than the person. What the fuck does that have to do with anything? Name the last person that Petey Williams wrestled who he outweighed by 100 pounds. In fact, have you seen Petey Williams? He’s even shorter than I am, and if he hadn’t bulked up recently he’d be about 140 pounds. I’m not sure he’s ever wrestled anyone that he’s outweighed at all.”

Roderick, who had been drinking heavily, wandered by.

“Roderick,” I said, “Jubs here says that you could really do the Canadian destroyer on a man in a real fight.”

“WHAT!?” He nearly spilled his beer.

“I never said that,” Jubs said.

“Yes you did,” I said. “You said someone could really do it to a person, and that means in a real fight you could do a Canadian destroyer.”

Jubs was stammering and Roderick had been set off. He announced that he was going to try it and grabbed some random man. The man, who had no idea what was going on, ran off in fear as his head got near Roderick’s crotch.

“Jubs, let’s go eat,” I said.

“Why haven’t you gone to eat yet?” Roderick asked Jubs. “You’re not drinking anything.”

“Jubs says we’re socializing,” I noted.

“SOCIALIZING? YOU’RE SITTING ON A BOX HERE TALKING ABOUT THE CANADIAN DESTROYER!”

“I fully agree,” I said. “Jubs, let’s go.”

But he would not be deterred. Meanwhile, the guy at the bar was apparently trying to get rid of his entire stock of beer. At this point he was offering large beers for a dollar. I couldn’t see this man, but he would make these announcement over the bar loudspeaker, and I strongly suspect that he was actually “Mean” Gene Okerlund.

“FOR THE NEXT THIRTY SECONDS WE’RE GIVING AWAY FREE BEER!” he finally announced. Everyone jumped up, the Briscoes faster than anyone, but then Okerlund made a buzzing noise and revealed that he’d WORKED THE WRESTLERS. They were appalled, but also gained a strange sort of respect for this man.

“THIS IS THE LAST CALL,” he later said. “COME HERE AND GET SOME DAMN BEER.”

“Jubs,” I said, “please go round everyone up and let’s go eat.”

“Will you admit that the Canadian destroyer would work on an infant at least?” he asked. “If you took a child, could you not hit the child with the Canadian destroyer?”

“Yes, Jubs, and in fact I will state on the record in the newsletter that the Canadian destroyer would work in a real fight with a full-grown man if we can just PLEASE go!”

“Fine,” he said, and went to tell the remaining people where we were going to eat.

Seeing as to how I arose at 6:00 AM, I have few memories of that first night at IHOP except that it took us forever to get our food. We were all spread out at different tables in the same general area, and across from Vince, Jubs, Blizzard Beast and I were Colt Cabana, M-Dogg 20, and two girls. I ordered chocolate milk and Colt joked that I was old school, all the while looking at the chocolate milk like he REALLY wanted a sip. They got their food first, after a good hour or so, and I must have looked extraordinarily sad and hungry because Colt threw a French fry at me in pity. When I got my food I threw one back, and a small food fight erupted. Thankfully the situation was quelled. Women of the Night wandered in and out. My food arrived after about two hours, a Philly cheesesteak sandwich, and it was the grossest thing I’ve ever eaten. Jubs repeatedly reminded me that he’d warned me against getting a Philly cheesesteak at a place known for breakfast food.

“How was I supposed to know it would be bad?” I asked.

“Well, it’s IHOP,” he said. “Why would you order a Philly cheesesteak at IHOP?”

“Why not?”

“Because you know it’s going to be bad.”

“Why would I know that?”

“Because IHOP is all about breakfast food.”

“So what? The Philly cheesesteak is on the menu, so that indicates that they fucking know how to cook a Philly cheesesteak. If they didn’t, why would they put it on the menu?”

“Would you go to a meat-packing place and order a salad?”

“The meat-packing place wouldn’t have a menu with salad on it,” I said. “And if it did, then it probably should be a good salad.”

“Yeah, but salad wouldn’t be their specialty.”

This argument went on well into the night.

VI

Although we were stranded at Mama Talwar’s house until 5:30 in the afternoon, today ended up being a pretty great day all things considered. As noted, I slept until 11:30 and then did some work on the website. Later, Vince and I walked down the street to Albertson’s. It was almost but not quite insufferably hot. The sun beat down. We went into Albertson’s and I bought a toothbrush and some fruity Jack Daniel’s drink. I sat outside barefooted in the shade, in the valley of the Sierra Madres, against the wall of an Albertson’s that hadn’t changed since probably 1970, drinking my Jack. This was the closest I may have ever been to my homeland south of the border. There was no hurry.

Later we walked back. Still no Jubs. The story was that his dog needed to be groomed, and he couldn’t leave until the work was done. The grooming folks were supposed to be there at 1:00 PM. It was 3:00 and still no groomers. There was no end in sight. The other two dudes we were staying with could wait no longer, so they left to go to the venue. We called Jubs several times for an update. Finally we called and no one answered, and his voicemail was full. We were stranded at Mama Talwar’s. She came down with sliced watermelon and water. She talked to Vince about football while I read, first in the air-conditioned adjoining room, and then, realizing that it wasn’t every day I’d be able to sit outside with nothing to do but read in the 95-degree Southern California air, I went into the backyard. There was a part of me that was restless, and another part of me that could have sat there for the rest of my life. I read, fittingly, A Hobo Autobiography by Jim Tully.

Jubs, wearing a WrestleMania baseball jersey, picked us up late, around 5:00 PM. The wrestlers had long since left. Jubs lived near THE VENUE, so he had to drive 25 minutes or so to Mama Talwar’s, pick us up, then drive us back to the venue. He was stuck in traffic, so the 25 minutes became 60 minutes, and the fact that he left late in the afternoon didn’t help. What did help was that on the way, we stopped at the legendary IN & OUT BURGER. Everyone we talked to that lived in Southern California made it clear that there were much better restaurants in the area, but none of that mattered — we HAD to eat at IN & OUT BURGER.

In & Out Burger, for those unaware, is a franchise most well-known to me due to its appearance in the classic film The Big Lebowski. They serve greasy burgers and fries. Jubs explained to us that there was a SECRET MENU that you could read about on the website. One of the Secret Menu items was the 4x4 — four beef patties and four slices of cheese. We all got 4x4s and fries and extra large Cokes. Technically, after weeks of dieting and healthy eating, this could have resulted in my suffering a massive heart attack, but instead I felt fantastic afterwards, and probably could have eaten another 4x4. Jubs insisted we both get In & Out Burger hats. The guy behind the counter was more than happy to oblige. We ate outside in the warm air. Jubs, a fountain of useless trivia — much like Vince, in fact — explained to us that In & Out Burger employees often started as teens and moved up the ladder, ultimately working there all their lives. Great benefits, he explained, including medical. Jubs is always thinking. He reminds me of Dave Meltzer in that way. You hang out with Dave and you can tell that he’s ALWAYS thinking about wrestling, non-stop. Jubs isn’t always thinking about wrestling, but he’s always thinking about something, 24/7. Usually, it’s an argument to whatever you’re talking about. He talks really fast. I think he’s constantly trying to keep up with his brain. He starts every sentence almost without fail with either the words “but” or “well” or “actually” (all of which are used in the same way you would use the word “but”). To him, this is not constant arguing, but rather AN ATTEMPT TO UNDERSTAND. Jubs likes to look at every side of any given issue.

I should note that Jubs does not see himself this way. “Actually, I don’t think enough,” he says. I explained to him that my saying he thinks all the time is actually a compliment, and that I think he’s smart. “No,” he says. “I’m actually not very smart.”

Jubs is so intent on arguing every statement ever made by another living being that he will insist he’s dumb in order to win.

Jubs also showed us that on virtually everything produced at In & Out Burger there is a passage from the Bible. Mine, for example, was John 3:16. Jubs’, coincidentally, was from Revelations, the book of the Doom of the Earth. Vince’s was a verse from a book that I have never heard of before, and keep in mind that I’m an ordained reverend. I was so flabbergasted that when I got home I went out of my way to look through the Bible to confirm or disconfirm the existence of this book. Unfortunately, by the time I got home I could not remember what this book was called, and was therefore unable to determine whether it was just some strange abbreviation for a more well-known book. I did, however, see that the Book of Titans is abbreviated in my King James Bible to “TIT”.

VII

Before Night Two began, we met more great people from the website, including Todd Martin (who was doing reports for WrestlingObserver.com), ERIC~! (the two of us spent the weekend buying drinks for each other), AcidHelm (he was BACK, just without the cookies), Blizzard Beast (you cannot hold a good beast down), and FRANK P~!, a man from the UK whose first name is, in fact, Frank (you never know with the board monikers), and who was in the US earlier this year for WrestleMania. Caldwell was also back, sitting up on the stage at the PRESS TABLE. Unfortunately, PWG had hung banners on the stage this evening, obscuring the press table. James went out of his way to move things around so that there would be a place for me to sit.

Anyone who has read the Torch is aware that James is a very polarizing figure. Some people love his stuff and some people abhor it. To me, James is a guy in his early 20s that is doing what I was doing eleven years ago. I guess I just have a soft spot in my heart for anyone who is getting started in the weird business of wrestling reporting, and while I do disagree with some of the thing he’s written, I would be lying if I said that James Caldwell has written worse stuff than the shit I wrote in 1995. We all have to start somewhere, and there wasn’t one point during the weekend where he came across like he knew it all and had nothing more to learn. That’s the only attitude that anyone can have in this business that to me is worthy of scorn.

1. Disco Machine vs. Austin Aries in a tournament match. Disco’s mask looks like something you’d pick up at Burger King, a plastic dealy with an elastic band. It may be, since he only wears it for ring intros. Loud “AUSTIN ARIES!” chants. Clearly no one ever heard him on Figure Four Daily. Aries ended up outside early and Disco hit him with a tope through the corner. Aries had the taped ribs gimmick, not sure why. I love when folks “tape their ribs” and the tape is around their midsection. Personally, my ribs don’t go down to my pelvis, but maybe that’s just me. This match looked choreographed from bell-to-bell. Disco hit a top rope powerslam for a scary nearfall. Aries finally hit a brainbuster and tapped him out. (**1/4)

2. Ronin vs. Davey Richards in a tournament match. Crowd chanted “WE WANT TJ! FUCK YOU RONIN!” This was supposed to be Davey vs. TJ Perkins, for those of you confused. Apparently, TJ decided he was going to show up at the building at 7:45 for an 8:00 bell time. Keep in mind they wanted everyone there at 4:00. He showed up all nonchalant, and when people told him the show started at 8:00 and it was 7:45, he said, “I always show up late.” Then he went to the board and saw his name had been scratched off the line-up and replaced with Ronin. He hung his head and left the building. Ronin was thrown into this match with about an hour to prepare. Sucks to be him. Davey wanted a handshake early and Ronin spit on him. Davey was SO MAD that he immediately applied a HEAD LOCK. Someone chanted “RODERICK STRONG!” at Davey. Well, I have determined this weekend that personalities aside, Davey, Roderick, Matt Sydal and Austin Aries all look exactly the same. Can’t someone grow a mullet or something? Crowd did not want to see what these guys were doing. A light “WE WANT ARMBARS!” chant started, totally in jest. The crowd didn’t want Ronin, they wanted TJ, and since there was no TJ Davey probably should have just beaten the fuck out of this guy and ended it. Crowd finally started to get into it as Davey started his comeback. They traded nearfalls. To this crowd, Ronin’s odds of winning were 1000:1. Davey finally hit an underhook spike DDT for the pin. Brutal finish to, well, kind of a brutal match. (*3/4)

I later learned that we’d roomed with Ronin the night before. He had an effective mask, apparently.

3. Jack Evans vs. Claudio Castagnoli in a tournament match. If you never saw Claudio in your life, you would see his ring entrance, with “Sledgehammer” by Peter Gabriel playing and the Haliburton and the glittering silver jacket, and determine that he was the greatest wrestler there has ever been. He also appears to be eight feet tall. Jack, I should note, HAS GEAR. This is headline-worthy. They did a highspot early. I think part of Jack’s charm is that he works like an indy guy who made it big. Sort of like why I figure people identified with the Hardys. They were backyard goofs just like the fans who happened to make it to WWE. I mean, to this day Jack still takes like 40 steps running the ropes, but with that said he’s improved dramatically since starting his Japan tours. Match was highspotrrific early, kind of like a Sabu match in that you’re sort of guaranteed a fuck-up or two amongst the wild stuff. They did a teased dive spot that ended with Claudio dropping him onto the apron and getting the heat. Claudio did a long delayed suplex and the folks counted to 21. Rapidly, I might add. Claudio ended up outside and Jack hit a springboard flip dive. Jack hit a standing Arabian 450 and went up top, but Claudio caught him and backdropped him into a forearm shot for a hot nearfall. Jack turned a top rope powerbomb attempt into a super huracanrana, then hit a 540 off the top for the pin. Crowd went insane for the finish and were on their feet clapping. A mix of the best and worst of Jack Evans. (**3/4)

4. Chris Hero vs. Genki Horiguchi in a tournament match. I was trying to figure out if Hero was 7-4 or if Horiguchi was 5-4. Dueling “H-A-G-E” and “H-E-R-O” chants. Genki went to work on his legs. Hero got the heat and did lots of whacky spots. Jubs, I should note, stated that Hero was a hell of a shooter and would do just fine in MMA. He and Roderick got into a huge argument about this in the car on the way from the airport. Roderick said that just because Hero choked out fans and wrestlers who allowed themselves to be choked out at Denny’s didn’t mean he would be any good in a real shoot. Somehow, in the end, Jubs – and he will deny this, but I have never lied – was stating that Hero would beat UFC Light Heavyweight Champion Chuck Liddell. This is life in the car with Jubs and Roderick Strong. Genki missed a moonsault and Hero dropped him right on his head with a backdrop driver. Jesus Christ. None of these Dragon Gate guys will ever be returning at this rate. Hero went for his finish and Genki pinned him with a flash backslide. Good match. (***1/4)

5. Joey Ryan vs. Petey Williams vs. Excalibur vs. Human Tornado in an elimination match for the PWG Title. The first three guys came out, then Human Tornado’s music played and he never came out. Ryan claimed Tornado was injured last night. He guaranteed Tornado wasn’t coming out. So then Tornado came out. I must have missed something somewhere. Tornado’s blonde manager was out there wearing the exact same outfit she wore the night before. Tornado went for a dive almost immediately and missed. I mean, he did a tornillo dive over the top rope and Williams sidestepped him and Tornado crashed and burned on the hardwood floor. They stopped the show and sold it like he was dead. They were doing fine until they sent out a bunch of dudes to carelessly lift his body up and drag him backstage. With all this said, that was one insane bump to take. So it became a three-way. Ryan and Petey double-teamed the masked man. Excalibur made a comeback. The hecklers were in full effect. “YOU CAN’T TELL ME THIS SHIT IS GOOD!” a dude in front of me, highly inebriated, screamed. Petey went for the destroyer on Ryan, but Excalibur caught him from behind with a schoolboy for the pin. One down, two – or THREE – to go. Petey tried to give Excalibur the Canadian destroyer afterwards, but Excalibur apparently fucked it up. Crowd knew it and booed like crazy. Petey didn’t even try it again. He just gave him a normal piledriver and walked out. I was trying to figure out how this move could have been fucked up considering you can hit a man with the move in a real fight. Joey pinned Excalibur to seemingly win the match. The fans were NOT happy. Suddenly, Tornado hit the ring. Actually, not Tornado – SNOWFLAKE, his alter-ego from Nacho Libre. He ran wild, hit a flying chop off the top, and then Joey bailed to the back. Ref counted him out. I guess the idea was to build to day three, but I’m not sure about that one. The place was going nuts for Snowflake, all on their feet chanting his name and going nuts, and then this was the finish. “THAT WAS THE WEAKEST SHIT I’VE EVER SEEN!” the drunk fan screamed. Well, I don’t know about EVER. (*1/2)

The ring announcer said it was intermission time. Then he said:

“Chris Hero has lost an elbow pad, so if anyone sees it, he’d like it back.” WELCOME TO THE FUCKING INDY SCENE~!

6. Briscoes vs. Homicide & B-Boy vs. Scott Lost & Chris Bosh. Have you ever had a Tokyo Tea? It was introduced to me by our buddy Eric. It’s a Long Island iced-tea, but with some other wacky green concoction instead of Coke. It basically looks and tastes like anti-freeze. The stuff will kill you. Broke down into a crowd brawl with Homicide, B-Boy and Briscoes. Crowd was going nuts even though stuff was happening everywhere and nobody really had any idea what was going on. One of the Briscoes – and it’s impossible to tell them apart – was bleeding from the face. I’ll be stunned if WWE doesn’t go after these two within a year. Homicide apparently had a fork and was not afraid to use it. Bosh is so white that it’s inconceivable that he could live in Southern California. These guys were moving a mile and minute and it was all good. Lost and Bosh ended up outside and Homicide wiped them out with a dive. Someone sounded the LUCHA HORN~! People were stomping their feet and clapping. “THIS IS AWESOME!” Everyone was on their feet. Homicide hit one of the Briscoes with the cop killa, but then Bosh threw him outside and stole the pin. I was going to write that the last few minutes of this were awesome, but quite frankly the whole thing was awesome. (****1/4)

7. Scorpio Sky vs. Frankie Kazarian in a tournament match. Fast-paced early. Frankie was sitting on the top rope and Scorpio did a running vertical leap right into a frankensteiner. That was insane. The drunk heckler was going to town on Scorpio Sky, calling him a stupid piece of shit and challenging him to a fight. Scorpio was clearly amused. The crowd was screaming for Scorpio to put Frankie in the camel clutch, break his back and then fuck his ass. Instead, Scorpio hit a pedigree and Frankie kicked out at one. Sky cut a promo saying Frankie was supposed to be the Future, but instead he was a washed-up geek that would never make it in WWE. So Frankie snapped and pummeled him. Sky suplexed him outside and then hit a huge tope con hilo. They brawled up onto the stage. Jade Chung ran out and was begging for Kazarian not to kill her man. Well, her man was killed. Kazarian powerbombed him off the ramp through some chairs on the floor. That was crazy. I believe the finish was that Sky got DQ’d for Jade running into the ring after they returned. Yes, not the powerbomb off the ramp through the chairs. Jade had scissors and STABBED FRANKIE IN THE BACK. Swear to God. This was not worked; she had the scissors, she plunged them into Frankie’s back, and he was bleeding all over. Do not ask me why this happened, I have no logical explanation. Crazy Asian women. Frankie survived, grabbed the scissors and threatened to cut her hair off. Joey Ryan made the save. Jubs was trying to explain some whacky stipulation or backstory to me. I explained that I, like the other 400 people here, didn’t read the entire 40-fucking-page press release. Jubs, of course, had to ask Caldwell if he’d read the press release. He hadn’t either. Jubs refused to quit and started asking fans if they’re read it. A fan finally said yes. “YEAH!” Jubs screamed with pride. So there you go. Something happened here with something or other. YAY. Match was fine. (**1/2)

Jubs, I should note, was driving me fucking CRAZY at this point. On Night One he worked the merchandise booth. I don’t know if they fired him or what, but on Night Two he came over to the stage by the press table and watched the show through the curtain. He was constantly — and I use that term in the literal sense, meaning “at every moment” — poking his head back through the curtain to give me information. He was telling me back stories and angles and this and that. Then he would walk over and start reading over my shoulder as I typed. He would read two sentences and then bark out either a correction of further information. I asked him if he wanted to write the goddamn report himself. He said no, he was just trying to help. Eventually, as I consumed more and more alcohol, I took to throwing empty water bottles at him to keep him away.

8. NECRO BUTCHER VS. SUPER DRAGON IN A NO-DQ NO COUNTOUT TOURNAMENT MATCH. YES~!~!~!~! Apparently, since the press table also housed the tripod and HD camera, we were in the only “safe” place in the building. Nervous dread permeated the air. They took a bunch of production equipment and hid it under our table to make sure it was safe. It was as if a hurricane was about to hit. One of the ring crew guys took his wife and directed her to the press table, presuming she would be safe by us. She was probably 35 to 40 years old, very small, and could speak no English. She looked terrified. Necro came out to “Freebird” and smashed a chair into his own head repeatedly. YES! THIS IS THE BEST MATCH EVER SO FAR. The Necro Butcher is a tall, long-haired balding man with a giant beard who looks like a serial killer from West Virginia, who made his name in Death Matches up and down the East Coast. It was not long before VIOLENCE ERUPTED. After a sequence where both guys just punched each other in the face as hard as they could, they ended up brawling all over the place at ringside. Crowd was strangely quiet. I think a lot of them – myself included – couldn’t see anything. Soon chairs came into play and they could HEAR stuff, so that was enough. Everyone was on their feet trying to see, and the whole first row left their seats and were pounding on the ring apron. Something weird happened with the lights. All the wrestlers were out by the bar watching this. Dragon KILLED him with a chairshot as Necro’s head was on the apron. “YOU SICK FUCK!” the fans chanted. Vince fucking bailed to the back by our safe haven table. I used two fingers and my tongue to indicate that he was a pussy, and he extended both arms to the side to indicate that he was, in fact, a humongous pussy. In the ring, Dragon put him in a rest hold. That would be so awesome if this match ended via chin lock. Jubs said it looked like Necro’s eye socket was broken and his eye was about to fall out. I love Jubs. What the hell is a Necro Butcher, by the way? A dude who fucks dead people and then cuts them up for meat? That would make sense given what I can determine of his gimmick, which is that he is a man with no real gear (except boots this time) that takes a monumental beating in every match. I couldn’t see a damn thing. I just heard the sound of metal and wood on flesh and screaming. They set up a table by the stage and brawled up terribly close to us. The ring crew wife suddenly walked over and clung to me. I didn’t know what to do, so I put a hand on her shoulder, pretty much the same thing I figure I’d do if some complete stranger came and clung to me as the two of us stood on a street corner in Reseda watching a mushroom cloud growing in the distance. They teased a powerbomb and Necro was supposed to backdrop him through a table. Dragon came up short and bumped on the stage. He immediately grabbed his knee like he’d twisted it badly. They kept brawling on the floor. Necro hit him with a piece of a table, then gave him a Tiger driver on the stage. BRUTAL. Crowd was stomping their feet and pounding on the ring apron. Necro rolled into the ring and Dragon was dead on the stage. They were now both in the ring literally throwing chairs at each other. Dragon was supposed to running powerbomb him through a table, but dropped him early and Necro splatted on the mat. He tried another suplex attempt and Necro landed awkwardly on his neck and the table didn’t break. I hope no one dies. Dragon went for something up top, but Necro cut him off and actually delivered a top rope frankensteiner. Crowd went nuts for that. Homicide and the other wrestlers were out there chanting “HOLY SHIT!” with the crowd. They did a few more things, including a reverse rolling cradle by Necro, and the crowd was silent. Jubs, near the curtain five feet from me, started clapping, and he actually got the entire crowd to start clapping and chanting. GO JUBS! They got into a huge chop/forearm/punch battle, then Dragon swept his legs and delivered a DOUBLE FOOT STOMP TO THE FACE. I actually jumped and screamed “JESUS CHRIST!” It gets worse. Dragon draped a chair around his face and then smashed it with another chairshot. There was another loud “JESUS CHRIST!” moment. Necro Butcher may be dead. Dragon hit a curb stomp (you have to see this one to believe it) on a chair, but Necro kicked out. Dragon finally set up a chair, sat Necro on the top rope, and gave him a burning hammer (inverted DVD) headfirst onto the chair for the pin. Necro’s head actually went through the chair. This was one of the craziest things I’ve ever seen in my whole life. Not a technical classic by any means, but an unforgettable spectacle. They played Necro’s music afterwards and everyone was clapping their feet and stomping and chanting “NECRO!” Necro is one of those guys where you can say all sorts of things about him, all sorts of criticisms, and make all sorts of assumptions, but in the end he’s just fucking awesome because he’s the NECRO BUTCHER. (****1/4)

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Sep. 22nd, 2006 @ 09:19 am F4W Battle of Los Angeles 2006 Part 2

VIII

So after sitting around for 48 hours the night before waiting for everyone to get last call, I was flabbergasted when, probably 20 minutes after the final bell, Jubs came up and told us to get ready to go, and to think of someplace to eat. Someone mentioned Denny’s.

“No,” Jubs said outright. “I hate Denny’s.”

“Why do you hate Denny’s?” I asked.

“The service is horrible and the food sucks.”

“Well, what else is open around here at midnight?”

“We can go back to IHOP.”

“OK, so after last night you’re telling me that IHOP has better food and service than Denny’s?”

“We’re not going to Denny’s.”

So we went to IHOP. This evening we had to give a ride to Kevin Steen and his friend Marilyn, who works for Carmen Electra’s Naked Women’s Wrestling League. Now this was a major league star. Marilyn was a beautiful blonde girl with a hot French accent who didn’t speak a whole lot of English, but knew all the important words like “fuck” and “pussy”. She was appalled that Penthouse had done a story on NWWL and basically made up quotes from her where she claimed to be a lesbian. “I am no lesbian!” she proclaimed, blatantly breaking kayfabe.

“So what is this league?” I asked. “I mean, I understand that you’re naked, but do you actually do wrestling matches or do you just roll around on the mat?”

“Oh, we wrestle,” she said. “We do spots. We take bumps.” She explained to Kevin that I was her new friend. This made me happy. They did a lot of talking in French since both are from Quebec. Kevin explained that sometimes they would go back after shows and bury certain guys in French, and they had a code for everyone’s name so that nobody would know who they were talking about.

We had to drop her off in Hollywood because she was shooting a video or something the next day. I have never been to Hollywood and it was something else. We drove Sunset Strip, we drove through West Hollywood where all the gay bars with names like BIG WANG’S are located, and at one point when Jubs got lost we did a U-turn right next to the legendary Howard Fine Acting Studio.

Kevin Steen is one funny dude. Most guys in wrestling are because you have to be pretty funny or fucked-up in some way to want to get heavily involved in this business in the first place. He was happy that we were going to this IHOP because there was a man there named “Reuben” who was apparently a great waiter, and he hadn’t seen Reuben in at least a year. I was wondering if this Reuben would even remember who Kevin Steen was. I was a fool. We arrived at IHOP and when Kevin saw through the outside window that Reuben was in there, he broke into a full sprint, hurdling bushes and screaming “REUBEN!” Reuben did, in fact, remember Kevin Steen, and he was also a great waiter. This was the anti-Last Night at IHOP. I ordered a top sirloin steak, figuring they could fuck up a Philly cheesesteak sandwich with no onions, but nobody — particularly with Reuben there — could fuck up a top sirloin steak. They did not. This was one fine meal.

Kevin talked about how most wrestlers don’t give a shit what fans on message boards wrote about their matches, but he did, because the fans were the guys that you did the matches for, and if they didn’t like them that was not a good thing. He said if a person was rating a bunch of matches and was fair, that was one thing, but sometimes guys had grudges or hated certain wrestlers for whatever reason and gave them low match ratings as a result.

“That’s bullshit,” said Kevin Steen. Jubs revealed that Vinny and I used to be wrestlers, and of course, like he always does, pointed to me and added, “HE TRAINED JACK EVANS!” So I had to explain the situation and also explain why, if I loved wrestling so much, I quit after having a bad match with Vince.

“It’s slightly more complicated than that,” I said.

Kevin complimented Reuben on his meal. Reuben, a mustachioed, middle-aged Mexican fellow with jet black hair and a gigantic smile, beamed ear-to-ear. “It is good,” Reuben said.

Kevin explained that he hated his “Mr. Wrestling” nickname because it was given to him years back before he started doing a bunch of shows with guys like Brian Danielson, Chris Daniels and AJ Styles, “who are better wrestlers than I will ever be.” But it caught on, he said, and he was stuck with it. I cannot tell you how many guys there are in this business who got a gimmick they didn’t like and it stuck with them forever. “Chico Alvarez” actually springs immediately to mind.

“By the way,” Jubs said. “It’s not a burning hammer. It’s a psycho driver.”

“What?” I asked.

“The move that Super Dragon did. It’s a psycho driver.” He’d been reading over my shoulder.

“It’s a burning hammer.”

“Well, he calls it the psycho driver.”

“So what?”

“Well, you put ‘reverse death valley driver’ in parenthesis, so you should probably put ‘psycho driver’ too.”

“Why? Who the fuck cares? It’s the same move.”

“Yeah, but more people know it as a psycho driver.”

“I guarantee more people know it as the burning hammer.”

“I didn’t know it was the burning hammer.”

“Well, many people do.”

“Yeah, but you should still call it the psycho driver.”

“Why? WHY THE FUCK DOES IT MATTER?”

“Because it sounds like you don’t know what you’re talking about. You’re writing about PWG, and the guy in PWG calls it the psycho driver, so if you call it the burning hammer it sounds like you don’t know anything about PWG.”

“I DON’T know anything about PWG!”

“Yeah, but do you want people to know that?”

“I don’t really care! I’m doing a Road Report! I’m learning about PWG! Most of the people reading this probably have no idea about PWG either!”

“Yeah, but if you’re learning about it and trying to tell people about it, you should probably let them know that Super Dragon calls his finisher the psycho driver and not the burning hammer.”

“Reuben, can we get our check?” asked Kevin Steen.

IX

We got back to Mama Talwar’s around 3:30 or 4:00 AM. There was going to be a much bigger crowd this evening, and since most of the guys ate elsewhere, we figured we’d wait up for them. Jubs refused to leave until he’d said hi to the guys, and since they didn’t get in until around 5:00 AM or so, he didn’t start driving back home until around 5:30. We all watched a bunch of lucha, specifically AAA. All the wrestlers hated it. It’s funny, because PWG is a promotion in Southern California with a bunch of masked guys, some of whom have lucha names, and the consensus in this particular room was that lucha sucked. Of course, the consensus was also that this was AAA and CMLL was way better. Scott Lost, who was all beaten up and felt even worse the next morning, finally wandered in. Since Mama Talwar’s has two rooms, Vince, Scott and I ended up crashing in one room while the rest of the guys went into the other room and laid out air mattresses and such. I felt like I was part of a traveling carnival. I’m not sure how long they stayed up chatting — it was like a teen girl slumber party, in fact — but I know that at about 6:30 AM the alarm on my phone decided to go off and scared the shit out of them, and thankfully Kevin Steen figured out quickly how to shut it off as opposed to just throwing it and smashing it to pieces against the wall. I did apologize the next day and told him that had he thrown it and smashed it into pieces against the wall, I would have completely understood.

X

I woke up the next morning at about 11:30, my second straight day with maybe six hours of sleep. All things considered, this wasn’t too bad. After doing a bit of work on the website, Vince and I wandered back to Albertson’s to drink more liquor in the hot sun. Quite the motley crew wandered in and out of this Albertson’s. Strangely, many of them didn’t bother shutting off their cars. They pulled up, got out, left the engine running, walked inside for awhile, came back out and drove off. None of these cars were to be stolen anytime soon.

“Vince, I cannot believe how disgusting you are in the morning,” I said.

“I don’t like the mornings and the mornings don’t like me,” he said.

“The mornings clearly don’t like you,” I said. I took another swig of Jack. “Can you believe that we’re out here at 1:00 in the afternoon with absolutely nothing to do in the world but drink?”

“It really is great,” he said.

“You know Jubs is not going to be here anytime soon,” I said. “I am going to drink this whole thing of Jack, then I’m going to drink this whole thing of Sobe, then we can take our time and walk back.”

“I am totally down with that.”

I looked up at the mountains surrounding the valley. “Some day I am going to live up there.”

“It’s awfully hot.”

“I know.”

“Where are you going to live?”

“I’ll build a little shack or something. Something out of adobe.”

“You’ll need a sombrero. And a burro.”

“If I had a sombrero I would take a siesta right now.”

We threw bottle caps at each other. Then we wandered down the strip mall, which was closed on Sunday afternoons. This was a day of rest, here in Southern California by Mexico. The donut shop was closed, the Laundromat was closed, even the martial arts academy was closed. The academy did have a sign out front that explained they were closed for five days due to the Labor Day holiday, but they would return on September 9th with — and this phrase was in all caps and underlined — “RENEWED EVIL”. Jubs later vowed that he would call them up on September 9th and ask them what in the hell this meant.

Speaking of Jubs, he was late again. The wrestlers were supposed to be at the building at 3:00 PM, so they left at about 2:15. Jubs called at 1:00 and said he’d be by around 3:00 or so. We knew this meant 4:00. It actually meant 4:10.

“I overslept,” Jubs explained. He was wearing yet another jersey. I don’t know if he owned any shirts that were not jerseys.

“You called at 1:00,” Vince said. “So you called at 1:00 in the afternoon and then went back to bed?”

We hadn’t eaten a thing all day, so our first stop on the way to the venue was a restaurant. Which restaurant was the question. A sit-down place was ixnayed since we only had 50 minutes to get to the show and it was a 20 minute drive. In and Out Burger was suggested, but as good as that 4x4 was at the time, I wasn’t ready for another one. We finally ended up at Quizno’s, a fantastic restaurant that makes the best sub sandwiches on Earth. Even though Vince and I both got combos, which included a drink, and even though we were running low on time to get to the building, Jubs insisted we go next door and get a smoothie as well. I tried to explain that I wasn’t the world’s biggest fan of fruit and already had a drink, but Jubs would absolutely not take no for an answer. I ended up getting some wacky strawberry concoction that had bananas and assorted other fruits in it. Later, I felt bad that I took maybe one sip of it on the way there and left the rest of it in his car.

We were still on the freeway at 5:00, and since it was Sunday afternoon that meant I had to call in for Wrestling Observer Live. Aside from the cell phone dying early, it went pretty well. I was flabbergasted that Jubs was completely silent throughout the entire affair. I thought for sure that he’d be jumping in with comments and corrections the entire time. I did the first 20 minutes of the show, then had to bow out because we were at the venue. We walked in and the crowd was sitting in hushed silence watching El Generico versus Chris Sabin. I didn’t have time to make it to the press table, so I just sat down by the bar to watch the match. After it was over and the computer was set up, this was my entire initial report:

“1. El Generico vs. Chris Sabin. Awesome. (****1/4)”

This match was fantastic. By midway through I had determined that Jubs might be on to something with this Generico character, and by the end I was convinced. They had a match that built slowly towards the highspots at the end, and they teased spots to the point where when they finally hit them the crowd went crazy. The defining moment was when, after several failed attempts, Generico finally hit his top rope brainbuster finish (basically, he stands on the middle rope and drops the guy headfirst on the top turnbuckle) and everyone in the building was jumping up and down and screaming and clapping. And that, perfectly, was the finish. Just a fantastic encounter.

“Was that not awesome?” Jubs asked from his position at the merchandise booth.

“That was awesome,” I said.

We soon learned the whole crew was back, including Todd Martin, who was accompanied this evening by Ben Miller, also of WrestlingObserver.com. Ben is a tall, skinny, funny dude who sees wrestling much the way I do. He hates shows that are long for the sake of being long. During intermission, he talked about this one show he went to that started around 8:00 (meaning at least a half hour later), and come 11:00, before even going to the main event, they had a guy come out and cut a promo just for the sake of cutting a promo.

“It didn’t lead to anything,” he said, “he just talked because they wanted him to have a chance to talk.” He added that he was ready to get into a fight. MY KIND OF GUY.

I grabbed a Blue Hawaiian — my last drink of the weekend as I’d indulged to the point where strong mixed drinks were no longer having any effect — and quickly found my way to the press area, where Caldwell was sitting busily typing up his report.

“It’s so hot in here,” he noted.

It was. There were rumors that the air conditioner was broken, but someone pointed out that this little flag near the vent was blowing about, meaning it was working, just not very well. It was so hot that beads of sweat were pouring off my forehead and dripping onto the keyboard.

2. Kevin Steen vs. CIMA in a tournament match. Crowd told Steen that he was a fat fuck, so CIMA went to the corner, tied himself in the tree of woe, and did some sit-ups. That should tell you something when the fans chant “YOU FAT FUCK!” at Steen, who would be in better shape than at least 75% of your typical indy crew. An old-school match with the big dude beating the crap out of the young Japanese lad. By midway through, the fans who had been chanting “YOU FAT FUCK!” at Steen were now cheering him and chanting “MR. WRESTLING!” This was while he was getting the heat, by the way. Basically, every time he bitched out people in the crowd, they got more into him as a babyface. CIMA turned them easily by screaming “SON OF A BITCH!” in English. He fought and fought to bodyslam Steen, then when he finally hurked him up and hit it the impact caused him and the ref to take a bump. CIMA’s bump was so awesome, as he leapt high into the air and waved his arms back and forth, fringe flying, as he plunged towards the mat. Best spot of the weekend. Steen hit his huge moonsault for a nearfall. He finally went for his finish and CIMA cradled him for the pin. This show is back on a roll again. (***1/4)

3. Roderick Strong vs. Dragon Kid in a tournament match. Roderick threw around the diminutive masked man and it was fine entertainment on a Sunday afternoon. I have determined after this weekend that if there is only room in this business for one short-haired brunette man with plain trunks and boots, then it should be Roderick Strong, and Matt Sydal, Austin Aries and Davey Richards must change their gimmicks immediately. Dragon made his comeback, tossed Strong outside and then hit a moonsault off the middle rope to the floor. Roderick finally dropped him RIGHT ON TOP OF HIS HEAD with a clothesline from the ninth circle of Hell. Ref counted three, but Dragon had kicked out of two, so the ref said “IT WAS TWO!” Mixed reaction for that. This clothesline was unreal. Dragon finally went for his springboard huracanrana, but Strong caught him in mid-move and sat down into a lion tamer for the submission. Very good. (***1/2)

4. Davey Richards vs. Austin Aries in a tournament match. Davey considers Aries his big brother in wrestling. Very basic mat wrestling early. Aries finally threw some forearms, tossed him outside and hit a tope. He went for a frog splash and Davey got his knees up right into Aries’ taped ribs. Well, taped midsection. Crowd seemed tired for much of this. Well, we are on the 10th hour of live wrestling in the last three days. Nearfalls galore, then Davey finally put him in a wacky lucha submission, basically a reverse Texas cloverleaf, for the win. Crowd didn’t want Aries to tap this early and there were some boos for the finish. (**3/4)

5. Jack Evans vs. Genki Horiguchi in a tournament match. Jack’s own father, Jack Sr., was worried about this one going in, thinking perhaps it would end up a cluster. It was exactly the opposite early. They hit everything they tried, and they tried a lot. It was great. “DO ANOTHER FLIP, JACK, THAT’S WHAT YOU’RE GOOD FOR!” some heckler screamed. This was the wrong match to scream that in. Jack made a comeback and they had some very complicated sequences. Jack got dropped on his head like 40 times. I almost wrote 50, but let’s not exaggerate. Jack hit the 540 – I think – but Genki kicked out. Genki went for his BACKSLIDE OF DOOM, but Jack switched into a BACKSLIDE OF DOOM OF HIS OWN, with a bridge, for the pin. This was really fun. (***1/4)

6. Super Dragon vs. Frankie Kazarian. Joey Ryan and Scott Lost ran out before the match and beat the hell out of Kazarian with a chair. Jade Chung was there looking like no one in this world should be allowed to look like. Super Dragon ran in to make the save. Everyone bailed, but Jade was too slow, so Dragon, accompanied by much dramatic intrigue, grabbed her and gave her the curb stomp. The place went absolutely nuts and chanted “SUPER DRAGON!” That right there proves wrestling fans hate women. They announced that Frankie would not be able to continue, so no match. Crowd chanted “BULLSHIT!” So much for the Super Dragon love from this crowd.

7. CIMA vs. El Generico in a tournament match. Jubs, back at the curtain, alerted us that this would be the best match ever in the history of the Earth. “Mark the time,” he said, “7:43 Pacific. Heaven on Earth.” The ref said it was a 60 minute time limit. “I hope this goes 59:59,” Jubs said. Some fun mat wrestling early. CIMA got the heat with a back cracker. He went to work on the back and the building, tired and burnt out after 12 hours of wrestling on a humid Sunday afternoon, sat quietly. Suddenly, a little girl maybe 5 years old, out of the silence, yelled, “Let’s go Generico!” All 400 hearts in the American Legion Post #308 were instantly broken, including CIMA’s – but only for a moment. The dastardly Japanese man then began stomping a mudhole in young Generico, just to spite the little 5-year-old girl, and now he was the biggest heel in all of Southern California, and quite possibly the world. This was the greatest moment of the entire weekend by a gigantic margin. CIMA tied his mask to the ropes and pounded on him. Generico made a comeback and threw a crazy dive outside. I can’t even do justice to the last five or six minutes of this match. They hit all of their trademark spots and the place was going nuts. CIMA hit a modified iconoclasm and went for his frog splash, but Generico got his knees up. Generico hit his yakuza kick into the corner and followed it up with a half-nelson German, dropping CIMA right on his head. Nearfall after nearfall. Generico went for his top rope brainbuster, but CIMA gave him a super tornado DDT and followed it up with a kryptonite krunch. Generico kicked out. The crowd was all on their feet, now close enough to the ring where they could touch it. CIMA teased it forever, then hit a second krunch for the clean pin. Crowd was going crazy with “THIS IS AWESOME!” and “PWG!” chants, then gave both guys a long standing ovation when it was over. Jesus Christ, Jubs was right. CIMA led the crowd in an “OLE” chant for Generico afterwards. The guy really is fucking great. And CIMA, what can be said? Best match of the weekend by far. (****1/2)

8. Roderick Strong vs. Davey Richards in a tournament match. I initially wrote “Roderick Strong vs. Austin Aries.” Funny how stuff like that happens. The last match woke the crowd up because they were going apeshit for all the technical wrestling early. They TEASED the chop for awhile, which is always great. Roddy finally hit it, HARD. Not sure what happened but it appeared Davey blew out his knee on something. He was favoring it and having trouble doing, for example, the running part of a running powerslam. Davey missed the shooting star press. Roderick hit several moves including a hard powerslam. Davey kicked out so Roderick turned it into a lion tamer, but then Davey rolled through into a cradle for the pin. There were some boos for this, but then the “DAVEY!” chants started up. The first half was significantly better than the second half, so I’m thinking Davey did hurt himself somehow. (***1/4)

Super Dragon vs. Jack Evans was scheduled to go on next. There was a lot of concern about Dragon going into night two. He’d had his bell rung in the match with Necro, literally about 1 minute in when the two were exchanging punches. Necro punched him right in the jaw and pretty much knocked him out. Dragon finished the entire match, but afterwards he had no idea who anyone was, including his girlfriend. People were trying to get updates all night. By 4:00 AM or so the word was that it was scary for awhile, but by the time he got to dinner he could remember everything and was back to normal. So then the debate was whether he should work night two. The consensus from nearly everyone I talked to was no, but also that he probably would anyway.

9. Jack Evans vs. Super Dragon in a tournament match. Crowd chanted “JACK IS GONNA KILL YOU!” That’s unlikely to happen. Some fan screamed, “TAKE OFF HIS MASK!” Another fan responded, “HE WOULD BE RONIN!” “OH~!” the crowd screamed in unison, stunned to hear such a disrespectful statement. Jack hit a twisting space flying tiger drop into a huracanrana outside. That was completely insane. Jack finally tried a round off something or other, and Dragon caught him upside down in the corner and tombstoned him right onto his head for his death. Much beating of Jack’s corpse followed. Dragon tried a powerbomb but Jack turned it into a huracanrana, but then he walked right into the scariest head-spike German you’ve ever seen. Jack missed a 630 and may have broken his ass. They ended up back on top and something happened. I don’t know what. It looked like Jack tried a top rope huracanrana and Dragon caught him upside down and just fell into a tombstone. This was the end of Jack Evans. They dragged him to the back very quickly after the pinfall. I can’t watch this poor guy wrestle anymore.

10. Colt Cabana & M-Dogg 20 & Quicksilver & Delirious vs. Rocky Romero & Chris Hero & Claudio Castagnoli & NECRO FUCKING BUTCHER~!~!~!~!~! I’ve never been so happy to hear FREE BIRD. I went home after last night and watched like five Necro Butcher matches on Youtube, including his two with Samoa Joe. Did you know he’s only 31 years old? He looks no younger than 50. In fact, in street clothes with his spectacles on he’s a dead ringer for Terry Funk. What saddens me is that Necro Butcher is now being booked in non-Death Matches all over the country, and that may cause him to become a better wrestler. It would be a tragedy for Necro Butcher to improve. They did a gimmick early where no one wanted to work with him so they all tried to befriend him and switch the teams up. Hero and M-Dogg did some complicated mat wrestling early. Necro, on the apron, suddenly slapped his fist into his palm and said, “Tag me in. I’ll PUNCH HIM.” I LOVE THE NECRO BUTCHER. Romero was in there with Colt and tagged in Necro. So Colt rapidly bailed and counted himself out. The ref was like, “It’s a 20 count, not ten.” So Colt said, “Nineteen, twenty!” Necro, I guess not wanting the match to end without him punching someone, tagged Rocky back in so Colt would return. When you see Colt from a distance, he’s William Regal. It’s the wackiest thing. Everyone took turns working with each other early – except Necro, who everyone avoided. This is the greatest gimmick ever. So they finally built to Necro vs. Delirious, since Delirious is crazy and will work with anyone. Suffice to say, this was the best match in the whole world. Necro finally got to beat the fuck out of someone, and beat the fuck out of the poor guy he did. He was hitting him with the stiffest non-pulled punches straight to the face. Delirious was covering up for dear life. I guess the other part of the Necro gimmick is that he’s some redneck from the South, likely untrained, who maybe doesn’t know wrestling is fake and just gets in there and with the most horrible technique imaginable hits men as hard as he can. There can only be one Necro Butcher. Delirious made a comeback and hit Hero 50 times in the corner. Yes, fifty. M-Dogg did a round-off Arabian dive to the outside. Gymnast. Big seven-man dive spot which included Cabana hitting a HUGE Asai moonsault. Crowd was chanting “NECRO!” At first he jumped off the apron and outright refused. But then he slid into the ring and hit the ropes a house of fire in preparation for a crazy dive. The ref jumped in his way to stop him. Thunderous boos. Necro threatened to PUNCH HIM, but then picked him up and powerbombed him over the top rope onto the pile outside. This was not enough, though. As the crowd was screaming in joy for the powerbomb, Necro climbed up onto the ringpost and threw a FLIP DIVE onto the rest of the crew. Crowd was going crazy with “PWG!” chants and I think some of them may have peed their pants. Yes, after seeing every single crazy highspot you can imagine, the biggest pop of the weekend came when Necro Butcher went up to the top and did the easiest dive there has ever been, a flip onto seven men outside. This is why I love him even though he really represents everything about this business that I hate. Everyone hit a highspot (Necro’s highspot was punching Quicksilver as hard as he could in the face) for nearfalls. Quicksilver finally pinned Hero with an Oklahoma roll. What was supposed to be comedy filler turned into a hell of a match, and this was ten different kinds of fun. (***1/2)

When it’s four hours into a show and I’m still having despite watching ten hours of wrestling over the previous two nights, that’s saying a whole hell of a lot.

11. Super Dragon vs. CIMA vs. Davey Richards in the finals of the Battle of Los Angeles tournament. Joey Ryan came out before the match and said he and his crew didn’t give a fuck about the Battle of LA. Yes, a promo prior to the main event. I looked over to see if Ben Miller was going to start fighting someone, perhaps Todd or Vinny. Crowd chanted “BORING!” They heckled and screamed, and some dude screamed, “HURRY UP JOEY AND GET THE FUCK OUT OF THE RING!” Then a “WE WANT WRESTLING!” chant started. Joey said Super Dragon was an idiot. He said last night he suffered a concussion in his match with Necro and had ignored doctor’s orders against competing. This was not his big mistake, though – his big mistake was putting his hands on Jade Chung. Actually, it was his foot. And it was stupid. Joey said Dragon had run into some trouble backstage, and now there was one less man in this tournament. Well, at least there was a point to this promo.

So let’s try this again.

11. CIMA vs. Davey Richards in the BOLA Finals. Pretty much the very first spot was a high angle back suplex, so they weren’t wasting any time. Willie Nelson emerged from backstage to watch this match. Oh wait, that’s NECRO. Davey beat the piss out of CIMA for a long time, perhaps for the 5-year-old Generico fan. Apparently his knee was fine. CIMA cut him off and did lots of stomp-related offense. Very solid back-and-forth match. Davey went up top and hit his shooting star press, but CIMA kicked out. Crowd was starting to get into it now after being relatively quiet up to this point. CIMA hit the kryptonite krunch and was going for a second one when Davey hooked him in basically an underhook piledriver for the pin. Good match, though way shorter than I would have expected. (***1/4)

Everyone hit the ring to congratulate Davey, which made me happy because among them was Jack Evans who was not dead. Davey cut a promo saying his first priority was not getting a shot at the PWG Title, but rather getting his tag titles back with partner Dragon. I was wondering why he cut this promo since it seemed odd to win the tournament and then not ask for a shot at the PWG Championship. Later, I discovered that the original plan was for Dragon to win the whole thing, and when he was unable to move on they had to completely switch things around.

XI

After the show, Jubs said he had some CDs for me at his house. It was just down the road, he said, and he’d be back in 10 minutes.

“Ten minutes? No way you’ll be back in ten minutes. You didn’t pick us up until 5:00 the last two days.”

“Well,” he said, “Just pretend I said an hour, that way I’ll be early.” And off he went.

I looked over and saw Davey sitting there on a box all by himself listening to his iPod. I went over to see how his knee was feeling. He said his knee was fine and had never been injured, but he had gotten knocked out very early in the match with Roddy. He was knocked batty, he said, and thus most of what he did felt off. I noted that, all things considered, it was a pretty damn good little match. He was overall fine with it, but is one of those guys who holds himself to a very high standard and never thinks his matches are as good as they are.

Davey is a huge fan of Dynamite Kid and is saddened that much of indy wrestling has gone the way of highspotrrific action. “The art of pro-wrestling is dead,” he noted. He said he just wanted to have good matches that told great stories without having to drop a guy on his head fifteen times. He agreed with Steve Sims that many of the matches followed the same formula — chain wrestling, heat, tons of crazy nearfalls, finish. He didn’t say it, but from watching all of his matches this weekend, it was clear that he’d made a concerted effort to try to work a different formula. This also explained why after some of his matches there were boos, because the fans expected the crazy nearfalls and when the match ended without them, they considered that “wrong”. I asked him about WWE or TNA, and he said at this point in his career he was happy working in Ring of Honor and getting well-paying indy dates. He said when he first started out he loved going to Europe and Japan, but now the trips were getting harder and he’d rather just be the best wrestler he could be in the United States. WWE isn’t high on his priority list because he knows that he wouldn’t be able to wrestle the kinds of matches he’d like to wrestle there.

Jubs returned about 45 minutes later. He was wearing yet another new jersey and had the CDs in a plastic bag.

“I see you changed your jersey,” I said.

“It was hot in here and I was sweating in the other one.”

“How many jerseys do you own? Do you have like a thousand of them?”

“Actually, I don’t have that many,” he said. “I need more.”

I looked at the CDs. They were old, rather obscure blues discs.

“Where did you get these?”

“Just some store,” he said. “I needed them for a project. I forget what it was.”

“I like how you got them for the project yet they are all unopened.”

“Well, like I said I forget what the project was.”

“Perhaps,” I said, “it was a project involving the blues.”

“Yeah, well, I don’t know.”

And so it was time for the post-show trip to IHOP. I suggested somewhere different, and pointed out that after shooting down the Denny’s idea in favor of IHOP, we ended up going to IHOP the night before and Jubs didn’t even order anything. He insisted that this happened Friday night and not last night. He had to go up to a number of people, including a very drunk Joey Ryan, to confirm that he was, in fact, correct in his timeline. Whenever Jubs proves that he is right he extends his arms and says, “YEAH!” in a victorious manner, and it’s almost worth it to allow him to be proven right just so he will do this. It was ultimately determined that yes, it had been Friday when he’d said no to Denny’s, and Saturday when he had not eaten at IHOP.

“YEAH!” he said, extending his arms. “I’m right again.”

“Jubs, when do you think you will finally be wrong?” I asked. “By 25? By 30? Or never?”

“That’s the pot calling the kettle black,” Vince said.

What a dick.

As we were piling into Jubs’ car, I got a text from my friend Sam. It said: “The croc hunter died. Say a prayer.” I immediately texted back for more information. She responded with this: “I heard he got bit. Ridiculous! But I mean if you fuck around with dangerous animals long enough they probably will get you.”

I was very sad. The Crocodile Hunter was a great man. One time on Conan O’Brien, during some wacky skit, Conan decided he was going to try to get the better of the man who wrestled crocodiles, and the Crocodile Hunter tied him up in a knot and humbled him. I will never forget that.

Jubs didn’t believe he was really dead. “It’s probably an urban legend. Where did this person get this information?”

“I don’t know.”

“It sounds like an urban legend.”

“You find it impossible to believe that the Crocodile Hunter would get eaten?”

“That’s what makes it sound like an urban legend.”

“Fine, when we get back to Mama Talwar’s I’ll get on the Internet and we’ll find out if it’s an urban legend or not.”

“Ok,” he said. “I’ll bet I’m right.”

It was determined that since Denny’s was off limits we were going to go to this other little diner, the name of which I have forgotten. It is unimportant. This was a multi-car trip, and joining us on the ride this time was Disco Machine, one of the owners of PWG who also happens to do a lot of the production work. Mr. Machine actually recognized my voice from Eyada. These things never cease to amaze me. He’s one of the few guys whose real name — Michael Mondragon — is arguably cooler than his wrestling name. His wrestling character, however, is awesome. He’s a disco dancer, and he goes all out with the mirror ball, the dancing, the whole nine yards. His entrance is a sight to behold, and Vinny told him it was the best one by far all weekend. Disco Machine seemed genuinely touched.

“I’m not the best wrestler in the world,” he said. “But I think I’ve got a pretty good gimmick.” He said he did what he could in the ring, but quite frankly it was awfully hard because he had so many other responsibilities he had to take care of on the day of the show. It was exhausting, he said, but in the end it was worth it. We told him that we’d been to a lot of indy shows, and suffice to say this Battle of LA weekend was a huge success.

“Thank you so much,” he said. “That really means a lot. The thing I love about PWG is that everyone works so hard, and it really feels great when it all comes together. This DVD is going to be awesome.”

We stopped by his house on the way back to drop off all the camera equipment, then headed for the diner. On the way, I asked him if Jubs was the worst driver in the entire world, and he said he’d seen worse. Well, I don’t think I have. Jubs has this amazing inability to drive in a straight line. We’d be hauling ass down the freeway, going 200 or so, and the car would be zigzagging right and left. Jubs always had an explanation for this. Later, we were stopped at a green light preparing to turn left. The drivers heading the other way had the right of way. Some guy was turning right, and Jubs decided because of that it meant he now had the right of way. So he turned left and we almost smashed into the other car, and the car honked and zoomed past us angrily. Jubs insisted that this was not his fault, that he had the right of way.

“Wrong,” Vince said. “That guy had the right of way.”

“Well, maybe in Washington he had the right of way,” Jubs said.

“Jubs, you’re 19, right?” I asked.

“I’m 20", he said, “21 in November.”

“So you’ve had your license four years or so.”

“Two,” he said.

“That explains everything.”

“Yeah but I got 100 on my driving test.”

“I find that impossible to believe.” I did notice that Jubs always drove with both hands on the wheel, always insisted we buckle up, and refused to park in a tow-away zone even if it was 2:00 AM and the chances of being town away due to parking in front of a building that was closed were about zero.

“I got a 100 on both tests,” he said, “written and driving. I could become a cop.”

“You took the test to become a cop?” Disco asked.

“No, I got a 100 on my driving test. The guy told me you couldn’t become a cop unless you got 100 on your driving test.”

“So what does that have to do with becoming a cop?” asked Disco.

“Well, I can, because I got 100.”

I said just because he satisfied a requirement didn’t mean he could become a cop. I said it was probably a requirement to have both arms and legs to become a cop, and just because I satisfied that requirement didn’t mean I could become one.

“Yeah, but you didn’t get 100 on your driving test,” Jubs said. “I did, so I could become a cop.”

This debate lasted a good fifteen minutes. We finally arrived at the diner, but when we went inside no one was there. Blizzard Beast had followed us and was sitting in the parking lot. We thought he’d taken AcidHelm with him, but there was no AcidHelm to be found. The guy inside said a party of 20 had shown up, but then left. He said the diner was understaffed and that the aforementioned party of 20 had gone to the same diner in Studio City. Blizzard Beast related a similar story. He had no idea where AcidHelm had gone.

So we went to Studio City. On the way, Jubs’ phone rang. He missed the call. It was Joey Ryan.

“Call him back,” said Disco.

“No, it’s probably nothing,” Jubs said.

“Well, let me call.”

A debate ensued, the specifics of which I forget, but it revolved around whether Joey was worth calling back.

“Well, he always calls,” Jubs argued, “and usually it’s nothing. He probably just wants to know where the money is at.”

The argument lasted until we got to the Studio City diner. No wrestlers.

“Ok, give me the phone,” Disco commanded. The debate was over. After a few moments, he reported: “They’re at the Denny’s — by the venue.”

Jubs was wrong at last. “Fuck, Jubs,” I said. “He called twice, why didn’t you answer? If he called twice, don’t you think that’s important?”

“Actually, he only called once,” Jubs countered.

XII

Denny’s was quite the little deal. AcidHelm was there, thankfully. When we arrived, everyone was spread out across three or four huge tables. Colt Cabana was muttering “HAMMY” over and over again. Apparently these guys had been there quite some time and still hadn’t been served. It was like 30 minutes before we got water. Finally the manager came out and took everyone’s orders. It never ceases to amaze me that a place like Denny’s can be caught completely off guard every single solitary time by people showing up to purchase food. I realize there were 20 wrestlers there, but still, bringing water to a table should not be a difficult, 30-minute task.

While we were waiting, to take a page out of Jubs’ own playbook, I stirred up trouble by asking Disco if he knew that a Canadian destroyer would work on a man in a real fight. Jubs was screaming that this was not what he said, and that I had agreed that it would work on an infant. I explained that I only told him that to get the fuck out of the venue the other night and get to dinner.

“And why would you give an infant a Canadian destroyer?” asked the Disco Machine, who, for historical purposes, ordered the Super Bird with no mayo.

Disco, obviously, had many stories to tell. He also had a lot of whacky gimmick ideas, some of which they’d used and some of which — like the HEAVY METAL CHAMPIONSHIP — never came to fruition.

“That’s one of the great things about PWG,” he said. “Everyone has a sense of humor, and everyone is open to all sorts of wacky ideas.”

“And you actually GO with the wacky ideas,” Vince noted.

Disco said Top Gun Talwar, Mama Talwar’s little boy, was noted for doing all sorts of totally crazy things, which was funny because in real life he was extremely shy.

“He does these crazy things and they’re so funny,” Disco said. “But then afterwards, he gets all quiet and is like, ‘Man, maybe I shouldn’t have done that.’”

We talked about Jubs a bit and it became apparent that everyone involved with PWG — and maybe everyone in Southern California — knows all about him. In a strange way, he is kind of legendary. JUBS. As noted earlier, he’s only 20 years old, and folks are always amazed when he explains that he’s only been going to PWG shows for a few years now. No one can believe it, and it’s like they cannot remember a time Before Jubs.

All the wresters from around the country who come to PWG are well aware of who he is. According to legend, he has been banned from picking up Bryan Danielson ever again. Apparently, Danielson got very upset because Jubs drove him and Jamie Noble to the airport and Jubs and Noble — you will be stunned — were arguing about something the whole way there. I believe Danielson is the only person, although Roderick Strong may be added to the list as he bitched for three days about how Jubs made him wait at the airport for two hours. Jubs explained that he was in class, but had no good explanation for why he didn’t bother to even call. He did have an explanation, of course, just not a good one.

We tried to convince Jubs to get choked out by Chris Hero. He refused and tried to pass the heat, saying Vince should get chopped super hard by Roderick instead. This argument had also been going on all weekend. Jubs told Roderick that the agreement was that Vinny would chop him four times, then Roderick could chop him once. Vince was unaware of this agreement and was not down with the idea at all. I kept pushing for the choke-out idea instead.

“Why should I be choked out by Chris Hero?” Jubs asked.

“Why should Vince be chopped by Roderick Strong?”

“Because everyone wants to see it.”

“Everyone who? Everyone on F4Wonline.com?”

“Yes.”

“We’ve got two people from F4Wonline.com here, AcidHelm and Blizzard Beast. How the fuck would everyone else see it? No one here has a video camera!”

“Yeah, but they’d rather see that than see me getting choked out.”

“Dude, nobody here in the Denny’s has any idea who Vince is, and EVERYONE here knows who you are, and I GUARANTEE they’d rather see you choked out than see Vince chopped.”

“Well, I’d rather not lose any brain cells.”

“Ok, that is the best counterargument you’ve given yet.”

“YEAH!” he said, extending his arms.

Our food finally came, and being that this was the last meal of this wonderful trip, I rapidly consumed a large t-bone steak with fries and hashbrowns and a giant slice of chocolate cake. Being that it took two hours to actually get this food, I should note that you’ve never seen professional wrestlers so excited. El Generico, who I do not think has ever sat down in his whole life, actually went into the kitchen to see what was up, and once the food started coming out men were actually standing up and aggressively grabbing their plates. The lady would call out orders, such as “Super Bird without mayo”, and the wrestlers who had ordered these meals would say “YES!” in roughly the same manner they would say it if asked whether they’d like a WWE deal with a $1 million downside guarantee. Colt Cabana is always happy, but he was the happiest I saw him all weekend when his Moons Over My Hammy finally arrived.

For some reason, strange men kept wandering into our section of the diner, looking around, and wandering out. This happened two or three times. I was worried that maybe they were scoping the place out for a robbery. Hopefully, I thought, they were just PWG fans who happened to follow the guys here.

“Why do those guys keep coming in here and looking around?” I asked. “Jubs, why don’t you go investigate.”

“I’m not going to investigate.”

“I don’t think that guy’s too much trouble,” said Beast. “He’s holding a child.”

“He’s got an infant?” I asked. “Jesus, don’t tell Jubs. He might try to give it a Canadian destroyer.”

Jubs made Vince tell his carjacking story, and before it began Disco said he had a funny carjacking story to tell afterwards. Once Vince wrapped it up, Disco spoke.

“I was once involved in a car jacking. It took two weeks to clean the upholstery.”

This joke was so bad that it was the funniest thing anyone heard all night.

The waitress, who hated us the entire evening, did a 180 once Jubs signed the check. According to legend, Jubs’ father is a plastic surgeon in Beverly Hills and is thus loaded beyond measure. Jubs bought all of our meals this weekend and often pays for all the wrestlers when they eat out after shows. It suddenly hit me why he was annoyed that Joey Ryan kept calling, and why he refused to answer the phone. The waitress, obviously concerned given the size of the party and Jubs’ age, asked to see his ID, and when everything went through she was beaming happily again. She asked what he did for a living.

“We’re in the circus,” I blurted out.

She was impressed. Each person told a different part of the story. Disco explained that Jubs was, in fact, a ballet dancer, which the woman found fascinating because she had been a belly dancer back home in Cairo, Egypt.

“I look Mexican,” she said, “but I am not. Sometimes I wish I was.”

We could not get Jubs to do a ballet dance.

It was 3:10 AM at this point and since our flight left at 6:00 and we still had to go to Mama Talwar’s to get our stuff, we advised Jubs that we’d better go. The process of saying goodbye to everyone and getting Jubs the fuck out of Denny’s and into his car took a good twenty minutes. All the while, he kept muttering, “There will be no traffic, you’ll be there in plenty of time.” Twenty guys were gathered outside Denny’s in the pre-dawn darkness, saying goodbye and bowing and throwing around the word “brother.” No one was tired. For a few minutes there, we all really were part of a traveling band of carnies. Claudio Castagnoli, who is nine feet tall and Claudio Castagnoli at every conceivable moment, said goodbye with the sincerity of a man who has known you all his life, even though he has never met you. Disco asked Dragon if Jubs looked like Mike Lano and Dragon said, “A young Mike Lano.” I felt vindicated. I said goodbye to AcidHelm and Blizzard Beast, two fine men. They’d had no idea what they were getting into when they first showed up, and all I could hope was that they had a good time. Jubs was saying goodbye to everyone multiple times. It nearly took physical force to get him into the car and on the road.

We got to Mama Talwar’s a little after four, grabbed our stuff, said goodbye to the guys, and jumped into the car again. Mama Talwar was asleep, but I was glad I’d gotten a chance to say goodbye to her earlier in the day. I had been downstairs reading and she walked in to ask us if we wanted any bottled water or pop, and to tell us that there were donuts on the table if we hadn’t seen them yet. I told her I was fine and thanked her. She asked how the show was, and I said it went well with the exception of Super Dragon’s injury. There had also been talk, I told her, that Human Tornado had been coughing up blood and was hospitalized. She knew Human Tornado by his real name — Mama Talwar knew everyone — and indicated that being hospitalized was a regular occurrence for him. She said she might show up for night three, but it was awfully hot and awfully wild. I told her it was probably for the best that she didn’t show up the night before because the main event went all over the building and was pretty crazy. I said if I didn’t see her there, hopefully I’d see her again very soon. She shook my hand and told me thank you for coming. This was strange. This woman had opened up her house to Vinny and I, two total strangers, and had provided us with water and pizza and donuts, a couch, a bed and several air mattresses, and here she was saying thank you to me for coming. I said I couldn’t thank her enough.

I thought of this as Jubs tore down the freeway at seemingly 200 miles an hour, zigzagging the whole way. We argued long and loud about what pro-wrestling was all about and what Jubs wanted for the PWG. We argued about whether PWG being rated #6 or #10 in the Observer Year-End Awards meant a goddamn thing in the grand scheme of life. We argued about why ROH got so much more exposure than PWG, why in a city the size of LA they only drew 400 people to a show, and whether it was better to pack small buildings and make up the money on DVD sales or attempt to pack larger buildings and make money off the gate. The basis of my whole argument was that the point of pro-wrestling, to me, was to have fun and make money, and if you were having fun and making money then your promotion was a success whether you ran in front of 100 people, 400 people, 1,000 people or 50,000 people. We had been in the sweltering heat all day, on a day that seemed like five days, and we argued with such passion that I finally began to lose my voice. Then suddenly we were at the airport, an hour before our flight left, and I was scurrying out of the car and grabbing my bags.

I shook his hand. “Jubs, seriously, thanks for everything, and I’ll call or e-mail.”

“Do you need any help with anything?” he asked.

“No, I got it, but thanks.”

He still waited at the curb until we’d gotten our tickets confirmed and started heading to the gate. The last thing I saw as I walked inside was Jubs’ darkened profile in the driver’s seat. He was waving goodbye.

Jubs is a very argumentative fellow and I think we spent a good sixty or seventy percent of our time together yelling back and forth, but in the end it was sad to see him go. He’s like the youngest childless father in the entire world. He picked up the tab for everything and his primary concern was always whether we needed any help with anything. He made sure we were comfortable and drove us pretty much all over the entire southwestern part of California, all without complaint, and he never asked for a single thing in return except that we should have a good time at the PWG Battle of Los Angeles. I figured going in that he worked for the promotion or was part-owner of something like that, but the reality is that he’s just the biggest PWG fan in the entire world and was willing to spend his family’s own money to help spread the word about it. It wasn’t until the final half hour or so that I really made the connection between everything that went down this weekend and all of his wacky jerseys. Jubs is, more than anything else, a gigantic sports fan, and PWG is his home team. To Jubs, PWG is the best promotion in the world with the best wrestlers in the world (and the best wrestler IN HISTORY, El Generico), and no matter what it takes he wants the rest of the world to know that there is a little group in Southern California that runs two shows a month and is filled with some really cool people who want more than anything else to have fun promoting their own style of pro-wrestling. I joked with him about everything, about the absurdity of the Canadian destroyer and how he was a young Mike Lano, and how he was always thinking and started every sentence with “but” or “well” or “actually”, and how El Generico had some really good matches but they weren’t all five-star classics, and how he was a living cartoon, and how I had no idea how I was going to return to the normal world without this wacky Jubs character in it, this weird dude with the big hair and the glasses who despite everything else had that one characteristic that I appreciate in a person more than anything else, the ability to be absolutely completely himself all the time, no pretense, no matter what the situation. I thought of these things as I walked into the airport to fly home, these things, and also Mama Talwar, the wonderful Mama Talwar, who took my hand and thanked me for being her guest.

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May. 4th, 2006 @ 06:07 am More Phil Hendrie

I uploaded another bit. It's wrestling related so I thought some of you would like this:

http://rapidshare.de/files/19597337/Steve_Bossell_-_WWF_Suit.mp3

Here's what the clip is about:

"The WWF Lawsuit"

Steve Bosell was injured in a wresting match with his son... now he wants a ruling from Vince McMahon of the WWF to decide whether or not the move was legal. Mavis Leonard calls to throw in her two cents. from August 2001. (36:39)

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Apr. 29th, 2006 @ 06:54 am I Can't Sleep

Current Mood:

depressed

Tags: phil hendrie

I've been real depressed ever since hearing Phil Hendrie was retiring from radio on June 23, 2006.

http://www.mediaweek.com/mw/news/tvstations/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1002424290

I had been listening to his show on and off for the past 3 years, but for the past month, I had become addicted to it. I bought all his CDs and have been listening to all his bits on his website.

Also add to the bad news is that I think they will be shutting down his website on September 29th...which means I won't be able to listen to his archived stuff anymore. =(

I've uploaded some bits for everyone to enjoy.

"RC Collins joins the program to explain to Phil why he and other cadets roughed up a homeless man with a wooden leg who claimed to be a Vietnam veteran."

http://rapidshare.de/files/19185706/Phil_Hendrie_-_Mar_28_2006_-_Hour_1.mp3.html

You've got to realize that RC Collins is actually Phil Hendrie. It makes what he does all the more amazing and funnier.

Here's another one:

"RC Collins wrote an article in "La Opinion" that called on the president of Mexico, Vicente Fox, to quit his job and come to the US to get a job as a Gardner."

http://rapidshare.de/files/19186335/Phil_Hendrie_-_Apr_14_2006_-_Hour_3.mp3

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Apr. 18th, 2006 @ 02:10 pm I'm Back!

What? You didn't miss me? Well, screw you then!

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Jul. 26th, 2005 @ 07:20 pm So is this me?

the Provacateur

(65% dark, 39% spontaneous, 44% vulgar)

your humor style:
VULGAR | COMPLEX | DARK

You'll crack on anything, and you're often witty, even caustic, about it. Therefo