WPW Best of the West was a killer show. There were a lot of good matches, as well as a few disappointments, but all in all it was a good night of wrestling. Had we been in the South, this would have to be dubbed as “Scott Lost’s Debutante Ball,” as this was the night he came out and proved himself a major player. Little Cholo stepped up to the plate and showed the entire SoCal scene what I have known for a long time, he truly is the, “Best of the West.” The tourney kicked off with Disco Machine vs. Excalibur. Excalibur seemed happy to be working in front of a crowd, and flashed those mega white teeth. Disco was his usual Village People loving self. Rev Pro fans were happy to see this reunion of sorts between the two former dojo regulars. Excalibur started out trying a high knee to Disco, and ended up on the floor. He got a Disco plancha for his efforts. Once they got in the ring, Excalibur gathered his wits about him to give Disco a sweet brain buster, which led him to try to give his opponent the, “Drops of Shit, “ but to no avail. Disco gave the pile driver to go to the next round of the tournament.
Scorpio Sky wrestled B-Boy. Scorpio hit an early ‘rana, followed by a high knee. Something to add about Sky, you’ve got to love any wrestler whose battle cry is,” Argle bargle!” After absorbing more punishment, B-Boy turned it around, hitting a massive array of offense. He hit chops, punches, kicks, and of course his signature sliding dropkick in the corner. After this barrage of offense, B-Boy tried a backbreaker, but only got 2. After slowly getting himself back into this match, Scorpio threw B-Boy to the outside, and was able to pull off a nice somersault dive onto B-Boy. B-Boy was able to get him back into the ring, where he worked that magic he has to turn the match around, and finished it with the shining wizard.
Eric Matlock wrestled Lil’ Cholo. To start there were a flurry of punches, with Matlock gaining control. If I may say so, it was killer to see Matlock coming to the ring to a Social Distortion song. It may have been an early tune, but Social D is the shit and they are as local to OC as any band is. Hearing, “The Creeps” this close to Fullerton was a beautiful thing for me. Almost as cool as it was to hear Mike sing it in Fullerton a few weeks ago. Matlock climbed the ropes early to get a neck breaker off the top turnbuckle. After fighting back, Matlock had some nice kicks. It appeared that Eric had the duke when he gave Cholo a massive teabag from hell, but it wasn’t in the cards. Cholo hit a sunset flip for the win. Cholo might have one this thing earlier, but he may have gotten some of Matlock’s hair grease on his hands and messed up a move or two.
Tony Kozina had a match with Joey Ryan. Joey tried to cheat right from the outset, by doing a Pearl Harbor job on Kozina. It really disappoints me when Joey reverts to cheating tactics, as it is so beneath him. Joey is very successful when he acts like a gentleman. Kozina was very effective working Joey’s legs, performing many a dragon screw leg whip. Joey the cheater tried to work on Kozina’s arm, but it was useless. Joey tapped to a submission move and learned once again that cheaters never prosper.
Hardkore Kidd locked up with Scott Lost. I’d be remiss not to mention that earlier in the night Kidd cut a wicked promo about the fans that like to hate on the Marketplace. He mentioned the history it has in SoCal wrestling, and even worked in a “shoot” for the smart fans. I’d like to add to this that without the Marketplace ring, many a SoCal show might not have ever happened. Kidd took control early with a lot of moves working Lost’s back. He dropped Lost’s throat off the top ropes, and tied him up in an abdominal stretch style move. Lost turned the corner with a flying forearm, but it took a three-move combo: clothesline, shoulder block, dropkick, to get Kidd off his feet. Kid accidentally knocked out El Jefe, and Lost took advantage to get a quick 3 after a dropkick.
Jardi Frantz beat Preston Scott. I went out to stretch my legs, and this match was so fast it was over when I got back.
Infernal and Super Dragon hooked it up in the next first round match. Infernal went to work early using a string of kicks, dominating Dragon from the start. One thing about Dragon is that no matter how down he is, he is always one big move away from taking control, and tonight that move was an elbow to the face of Infernal. Dragon started stretching Infernal in a number of ways, also delivering a side suplex and the dreaded boot stomps. Infernal turned thing around with a northern lights suplex, and hit a pretty fisherman’s suplex to boot. Dragon then took Infernal’s head off with a lariat, and went for the psycho driver, Infernal rolled out of the set up, only to find himself locked up by Dragon and tapping out.
Silver Tyger and Funky Billy Kim did a lot of hold-to-hold sequences interrupted by mutual respect poses. At one point FBK threw Tyger to the floor, and did a sick asai moonsault onto Tyger. When he hit the moonsault, Kim’s feet hooked onto the top of the guardrail, and things looked scarier than a Mike Vega / Mr. California match. After a lot more hold for hold action, Tyger took it home with a DDT into a front face buster on Kim. Good match. This brought the first round to its end. A lot of the reviews of the first round and second nay be brief, but so were the matches.
Disco and B-Boy opened up the second round. B-Boy was in cocky dick mode, and when Disco hit him with stuff it was as if B-Boy was way too cool to be hurt or fazed. After the initial cockiness, the two settled into a nice seesaw battle. Disco hit a choke slam for 2. B-Boy hit his kick into the corner early, but Disco fought back bravely. When B-Boy went for the shining wizard, Disco was able to block it. Unfortunately for Disco, in his celebration of blocking the first wizard he failed to see the second one coming. B-Boy moves on.
Tony Kozina and Cholo kicked off the next second round match. They did a lot of chain wrestling, but Cholo worked on Kozina’s arm once he was in the driver’s seat. He positioned Kozina’s arm over the top rope, and pulled off a hanging arm bar. This was very effective, but not nearly as effective as Kozina using the top rope to nut Cholo as he got back in the ring. Cholo suffered through an array of slams and kicks before hitting a belly to back to get back in control. He followed by hitting a big backdrop, but was denied on the Lucha backbreaker he relies on a lot of the time to get the win. Kozina got in some rolling German suplexes, but Cholo was able to schoolboy him for 3.
Jardi Frantz tried to start his match with Scott Lost with high flying, but Lost kept him as grounded as Aaron Proctor was the first time his dad caught him putting on makeup in the bathroom while flipping through a copy of Blue Boy. Both wrestlers exchanged chops in the corner, and Jardi killed Lost with a massive elbow, which he followed up with his first successful highflying move, a missile drop kick off the top rope. At this point, Joey the cheater appeared at ringside. Lost was thrown to the outside, and Joey was able to share the experience of a Jardi shooting star off the top to the floor with his partner. Lost got in the ring to receive a top rope DDT for 2, then when Jardi attempted a top rope 420 splash, Lost shook the ropes to hurt Jardi’s neither regions. When Frantz got back up, he received a super kick and Lost was in the semi finals.
On his way to the ring to wrestle Silver Tyger, Dragon took time out of his busy schedule to assault a fan. That was nice of him to do, and I’m sure the fan was marking out all the way to the hospital. Dragon attempted to Pearl Harbor Tyger, but Tyger was ready, as this happened to a lot of guys earlier in the night. Tyger took the upper hand, and Dragon powdered out to think things over. Tyger interrupted Dragon’s thought process with a somersault dive from the top, and I thought that was quite rude. Dragon rolled into the ring, and received a plancha for his efforts. Again, though, Dragon was a move away from being in charge, and a head and neck submission put him in control. Dragon then delivered a few stiff chops, and took the time to stand on Tyger’s throat. Dragon gave Tyger a massive kick in the back, then a few boot stomps for good measure. Tyger was thrown to the ropes, but tried a handspring elbow, and ended up in another painful submission move courtesy of Super Dragon. Dragon moved on to a figure four headlock, and Tyger looked like he was done. Tyger, however, made the ropes and things turned when Tyger turned an attempted power bomb into a good arm drag and hit the handspring elbow. Tyger got Dragon onto the top turnbuckle to give a big ‘rana, but it was to no avail as Dragon recovered to beat him down in the corner. Dragon then gave him a short arm clothesline, followed by a massive lariat. Dragon went for the psycho driver, but much like Infernal, Tyger countered Dragon to end up tapping out to a submission move.
The semi final matches deserve no mention at all, but this statement has nothing to do with the competitors. Both matches were good, but they both ended up in time limit draws, and forced a final of all four men in a four-way elimination match. Due to the way Junior massively messed up the endings to the matches, I’m just going to skip them. B-Boy vs. Cholo was awesome with no winner, and Dragon vs. Lost was top notch with no winner as well. It pisses me of that these matches had bad endings, as the sport of professional wrestling is so pure that we cannot allow bogus stuff to tarnish the sport’s reputation. We are not like boxing, where Don King fixes endings of matches. This is professional wrestling, where there needs to be a sense of decency. Long story short, Dragon/B-Boy/Lost/Cholo was our main event in an elimination style match. WPW should just have said the final four would end up in a match, then it would have been killer and shaved a good 45 minutes off the too long card. If they had done this, it might not have taken me this long to put together a review. Between my duties at work and my Indy wrestling addiction, writing these reviews takes up a lot of the little free time I have. I’m not bitching, as writing these shitty articles is a pleasure.
Taiji Ishimori wrestled Henry Sugawara III, and for some reason the building turned into a Japanese crowd. There was silence in the building as the two guys locked up. I was very surprised not to see streamers being thrown at the ring. They did the usual exchanges and mutual respect poses, then Henry hit a stomach kick, then both men ran the ropes until Taiji hit a ‘rana and then did a lot of flips. Henry worked a headlock submission, and then Taiji made it to the ropes. Henry continued his domination with kicks and worked the left leg of Taiji with dragon screw leg whips. Henry capped the legwork with a figure four, and when Taiji made the ropes, he laid into him with big chops. Taiji turned the corner with a ‘rana, a handspring elbow, a 619 into a ‘rana, but was stopped cold by an enzaguri. Henry tried a power bomb, but Taiji got a DDT in. There were a lot of more hurincanranas, and Taiji got the win with a ‘rana. There were so many ‘rana’s in this match I thought it might have been a ‘rana match. While both men were very good, the match was way too short, and the footage of these guys shown on the Luchatron all night made a lot of promises they didn’t live up to. I’m not saying the guys weren’t talented; they had a lot of talent to spare. I’m just saying the spots I saw of them on the Luchatron made me expect something from them that they didn’t deliver. I look forward to seeing the Toryumon guys at the next show do what Toryumon is famous for.
The main event was awesome. We had Lost vs. Dragon vs. B-Boy vs. Lil’ Cholo all trying to win the West Coast trophy. Cholo and Dragon started things off, with Cholo trying to work the knee of Dragon. Cholo tried an STF, but Dragon escaped and worked Cholo’s left arm. After an escape, both men made tags, and Lost proceeded to mat wrestle B-Boy on the mat. B-Boy got his left arm worked big time, and tagged in Dragon, who went to work on Lost’s neck. Lost tagged in B-Boy, and B-Boy shook hands with Dragon before going into battle. They exchanged blows before B-Boy tagged Lost in, only for Lost to get stuck in a backbreaker. Dragon tagged to B-Boy to kick Lost in the back, and B-Boy hit a DDT on Lost. B-Boy tagged to Cholo to hit a neck breaker, and gave Lost the Lucha back breaker. Lost looked like Rickey Morton at this point, but managed to make it to his feet. . B-Boy was then tagged in to do the dropkick in the corner he is famous for. Dragon was next to beat the hell out of Lost, giving him massive suplexes. Dragon made the tag to B-Boy, who got a stunner from Lost to turn the tide. B-Boy made the tag to Cholo, and when Cholo ran in to mangle Lost’s arm more, he got a neck breaker. Dragon ran in, and here is where the main turned into a mess.
B-Boy and Cholo battled on the outside, while Lost survived a spinning heel kick from Dragon to hit a super kick, but the referee was distracted. Lost tried to follow it up with a Macho Man top rope elbow onto Dragon, but ended up in a Dragon sleeper. Joey broke up the sleeper, but the cheater was given a psycho driver for his effort. Lost took the opportunity to pin the Super Dragon, and proved why he is on his way to Mexico. B-Boy quickly pinned Scott Lost, and we had ourselves a B-Boy/ Cholo main event.
B-Boy gave Cholo a massive suplex into the buckles, and followed by a top rope leg drop for 2. B-Boy tried a reverse Russian leg sweep, but failed to go over with that as well. They spilled to the outside, and B-Boy fell victim to a 187 on the floor. Once back in the ring B-Boy tried a reverse DDT, which connected, but the follow up shining wizard failed to get 3, as Cholo had his foot on the rope. As B-Boy tried to follow up, Cholo gave him a sunset flip to become the best of the west. Lil’ Cholo finally cemented his place in SoCal by proving what everyone knew to be true.
WPW put on a great night of wrestling. I didn’t review the non- tournament matches, but that was by design. There was just too much to review it all. Scott Lost was awesome at this show. Super Dragon was awesome as well. I do not have to say a thing about the final two, as everyone already knows. Hardkore Kidd’s promo reflected my personal thoughts, and it was nice to see a good tournament in SoCal again. I’m happy that such a thing could be thrown together. I’m looking forward to the show coming up where WPW brings in more international superstars.
Thanks for reading,
Benjamin Tomas
The Worlds Biggest Mark
