SoCal News & Notes 04/13/2017

Today we take a look at the SoCal Pro Hall of Fame, AWS, FIST Combat, Blood Brothers, Vendetta Pro, and this week’s Southern California pro-wrestling lineup. Click for today’s update.

SoCal Pro has announced that they will be inducting “Radiant” Jason Redondo and Charles Steele as the first members of their hall of fame at their 10th anniversary show on April 15th in Oceanside.

“Radiant” Jason Redondo, who has been a long time staple in the San Diego wrestling scene, began his wrestling career in the 90s after being trained by Jesse Hernandez and Bill Anderson. In the 90s he regularly worked jobber matches for WWF, and was the first wrestler that Shawn Michaels used a superkick as a finisher on. In 1998 he began wrestling for San Diego’s CCW, where he quickly became one of the top stars. In August 1999 he defeated Al Katrazz to win the CCW Heavyweight title for the first time. He also won the CCW Heavyweight title a second time after it was vacated by TNT. He was actually the last heavyweight champion in CCW’s history, which makes it fitting he was the first SoCal Pro Heavyweight champion, as SoCal Pro was sort of a spiritual successor to CCW. Since SoCal Pro opened its doors in 2007 Jason Redondo has been a main stay in the promotion.

Charles Steele (Gibbs) was the promoter of San Diego’s first modern independent promotion, California Championship Wrestling or CCW. The promotion opened in 1998 and was quickly drawing big crowds at Brengle Terrace in Vista, CA. They would also frequently run elsewhere throughout San Diego County, including likely being the only wrestling promotion to run in Warner Springs. CCW also had a pro-wrestling school, The Palace of Pain, which in its short time ended up being very influential to the Southern California wrestling scene. In fact, it is still the only Southern California pro-wrestling school to have produced two Southern California wrestler of the year award winners (B-Boy and SoCal Crazy) despite having shut down in 2001. After CCW closed its doors in June 2001, Charles Steele has made occasional appearances at SoCal Pro events.

On a more personal note, CCW was also my first exposure to the Southern California independent wrestling scene and I was instantly hooked. I would later go on to work for CCW where I made some of the connections that later lead to the start of this website. If not for CCW and Charles Steele there would likely be no SoCalUncensored.com.

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AWS has announced they will be holding their 7th Summer Heat show on July 29, 2017 in South Gate. Already announced for the show is a rematch between Ruby Raze and Taya Valkyrie, the AWS debuts of Deonna Purrazo and Hernandez, the AWS return of Papadon, JR Kratos, Douglas James, Sage Sin, and Violet Payne.

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Delirious, who is known for his work in Ring of Honor, Chikara, and Pro Wrestling NOAH will be wrestling at the June 9th FIST Combat show in San Diego. He will also be holding a seminar for pro-wrestlers the next day at FCW’s Battle U school in Imperial Beach.

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NWA Vendetta Pro has added Ray Lyn versus Sage Sin Supreme to April 14th’s April Cruels Day show in Santa Maria.

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Blood Brothers Pro Wrestling, which is holding a 16 wrestler deathmatch tournament called the SoCal Crimson Cup for its inaugural event on August 19th at the Clela Arena in Los Angeles, has announced Aidan Blackhart as the 14th entrant in the tournament. Previously announced were JD Horror, John Wayne Murdoch, Neil “Diamond” Cutter, “Ref of Death” Guido, Michael Krueger, Sage Sin Supreme, Homeless Jimmy, Drew Chaos, B.C. Killer, Matt Tremont, Ray Basura, Max X, and Supreme.