EWF “Loser Leaves the Empire” February 2, 2018 – review

On February 2nd EWF was holding their monthly show at the EWF Arena in Covina, headlined to the end of the feud between Super Beetle and Ty Ray. They were to meet in a loser leaves the EWF match, with a stipulation selected by the fans in attendance. Wrestlers from Japan’s Kaientai Dojo were scheduled to be in action, as well as Fidel Bravo wrestling against a broom, so I decided to head up.

The traffic was absolutely brutal getting there due to a number of accidents on the freeway, and I almost turned around. I’m glad I didn’t as it turned out to be a pretty good show.

The show started right at 8:15 and Ben Tomas making his ring announcing return was a nice surprise.

Dicky Mayer over Akiyori Takizawa by submission [11’06]

Takizawa is the more polished of the two Kaientai Dojo students that have been training with EWF over the last few weeks, having wrestled a bunch for Asuka Project and recently appearing on more K-Dojo shows. He was accompanied to the ring by Jack Fancy, who is a heel manager in the promotion. He cut a promo saying how everyone should bow to the Japanese wrestlers which lead to lots of “USA” chants. Dicky Mayer had trained at Kaientai Dojo over the summer, and I’m not sure if or how much he and Takizawa worked together, but they matched up really well here. Both wrestlers looked great on offense and the match was pretty even. Dicky Mayer eventually was able to get Takizawa to submit. This was really good.
Rating: *** 3/4

Maritza Janett over Allie Parker [4’29]

Maritza Janett’s entrance is great. There wasn’t a whole lot to this match. There was nothing bad about it but at the same time there was nothing great about it either. It was just a really short match without much substance.
Rating: **

Jorel Nelson & Davion Foreman over H.A.T.E (Che Cabrera & Rico Dynamite) to retain the EWF Tag Team Titles [15’05]

This was a Tornado Tag Match. This was my first time seeing Davion Foreman live and I thought he was really solid. He looks like he’ll be a strong 2018 rookie of the year candidate. Jorel Nelson and Rico Dynamite looked good too, but I thought Che Cabrera was the match MVP. He has really brought his intensity up lately and has some really nice matches of late. No one looked bad in this, but I thought the format took away from the match and it would probably have been better with more structure. At times it really hurt the flow of the match. It was still good, but could have been much better.
Rating: ** 3/4

Broomstick (Andy Brown) over Fidel Bravo by DQ [11’09]

Fidel Bravo started out by wrestling an actual broom, but then EWF Commissioner Jake Alexander came out and said that they weren’t letter him wrestler a real broom and introduced A. Broomstick. This was Andy Brown in a broomstick costume. Fidel tried to leave but the EWF locker room carried him back out to the ring. Once the match got started it was really good. Broomstick dominated a lot of the match, and Fidel Bravo did a great job of selling his offense. The crowd was really hot for this match too, which really added to it. This was some really good work from both wrestlers. I wish it had a little more time to develop. Bravo hit the ref and got DQ’d and kept the title. It looks like they are building to a Andy Brown versus Fidel Bravo at the promotion’s 22nd anniversary show.
Rating: *** 1/2

Adrian Quest over Shunsuke Sayama [9’45]

This was good but Adrian Quest definitely looked to be the more polished of the two wrestlers. Both Sayama and Quest had some really nice sequences, but there were a couple of spots that came off a little sloppy. Adrian Quest was so much quicker than Sayama it seemed like he had to slow himself down at points for Sayama to keep up. Still, even with the miscues this was good. With the right break Quest is going to be a super star some day.
Rating: ***

Super Beetle over Ty Ray in a tables match [16’43]

The fans voted for this to be a tables match. Ty Ray did a lot of working over Super Beeetle’s arm, even taping his arm to the rope while he beat it with a chair. Wearing a mask and a full body suit it is harder to sell the punishment than for a non-masked wrestler who can use facial features, and while I think Super Beetle has made some improvements in that area there is still some work to do. Ty Ray looked really good and his offense had a lot of intensity too it. The transitions between sequences weren’t the best, and slowed the action down a little much. His mannerisms really sold the match as the blowoff to the feud that it was. Beetle eventually put Ray through a table on the outside of the ring to get the win. After the match Ty Ray got a nice send off from the crowd.
Rating: ** 1/2

Overall I thought this was a really fun show. The crowd was really hot for the whole show, which added to the fun. EWF as a promotion is dependent on the students that come through its school, which leads to ups and downs as far as the quality goes. The last few years have been a really good period for the promotion with wrestlers like Andy Brown, Adrian Quest, Dicky Mayer, Super Beetle, and the return of wrestlers like Fidel Bravo. This has been the best period in the promotion’s history since probably the 1998-2001 period when wrestlers Frankie Kazarian, Mikey Henderson, Keiji Sakoda, Chris Daniels, and Eddie Williams were there.

EWF will be back at the EWF Arena on April 6th, then they have their 22nd anniversary show on Ma7 4th. They also have a bunch of shows in between so check the SCU events calendar for info.