On Saturday night, I took the road less travelled and headed out to EWF’s first show in La Puente. With a crowd of 200 people, the place was very hot and ate up everything that was served to them. The show was at a nice little venue in La Puente, which was jam packed with 200 screaming fans. Right at 6 o’clock, Johnny Starr hit the ring and we were all set for action.
Bino Gambino over Night Wolf
This was Night Wolf’s first match and you could tell that he was not at the same level of comfort in the ring as Bino. Wolf seemingly got lost at times and Bino did everything he could to cover it up and make things work. The fans loved Bino, and popped like mad for his beanie spots. Night Wolf was able to get in some solid offense, but in the end was finished by Bino’s twisting reverse DDT. The match was a pretty decent opener that got the crowd going, but it went perhaps a little longer than it should have and dragged at times, but it served its purpose in getting the crowd going.
Dick Danger over Sonny Suave
These two put on a very solid match with Dick getting TONS of heat and Sonny playing the badass face. At the beginning of the match, Danger kept whining about his ring entrance and Sonny finally had enough of it and smacked bejesus out of Danger to get things going. Crowd was all over Danger’s ass, and even the referee got on him by shoving him down after being pushed by Danger. Suave continued with some punishing chops until Dick finally cut him off with a rake to the eyes. Dick hit a neckbreaker and then used his feet on the ropes to get the 1-2-3. A very solid match that had the crowd very involved, and got both men over in their respective character roles.
Hurricane Havana over Sexy Starlett
This was the only ladies match on the card, and the crowd absolutely ate it up. These two ladies keep improving more and more each time they go out against each other, building a fairly involving match on this evening. Havana would be on the offensive until Starlett would roll out of the ring and leg sweep Havana, causing her to inadvertently low blow the referee. With the ref down, Starlett turned things on, dealing some pretty crisp offense to Havana. Just as Havana started to make her comeback, Starlett again rolled out of the ring and after a second leg sweep, the ref was again down. Starlett then punished Havana on the outside. The finish came when Starlett went for a back drop, but Havana reversed it into a Gory Special (I was very impressed by this) that she sat out into a face buster. A very solid match from these women, and they have improved significantly from their first matches together.
Jason King over Psycho Silly Willy and Alex Pincheck
This was my MOTN. These three men worked a very crisp and flowing 3-way, filled with all sorts of dives and other spots. Rather than doing too many of the packaged three-man spots, these guys opted for beat one guy till hes out and then go after each other formula. As a result, there were no alliances in this match, despite Pincheck being over as the Russian heel. Willy hit a very nice Springboard Senton Dive to the outside at one point, and another very pretty spot was King hitting his Shining Wizard to Pincheck on the apron. The finish came when Willy shot off the ropes like e was going for some sort of headscissors, put King planted him with a Suicide Piledriver for the win. A fantastic effort by these three men and I’d really like to see each of them get booked outside of EWF.
Intermission was next with the EWF signature of taking pictures with the babyfaces.
Los Chivos over Vizzion and Bonzai
To start, let me say that the Chivos are fantastic in their role as the cheating luchadores. They work VERY well as a team, and it makes sense that they won as a result of this. Vizzion started off the match for the faces and dominated both Chivos. However, once Bonzai tagged in, the Chivos took over and used numerous double team moves to gain the advantage. Vizzion tried to come into the ring several times but was stipped by the ref for no tag, building very well to the eventual hot tag. Once Vizzion tagged in, he cleaned house and locked Kayam into an abdominal stretch. Just as it looked like it was over, Enigma rolled up Bonzaii while using the ropes to get the victory. Crowd was very vocally pissed at the finish of this match and hopefully this feud continues between Kayam and Vizzion, because the crowd loves their interaction.
Ragin’ Dawg over Cyrus to retain the EWF American Title
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, I think Ragin’ Dawg is one of the most under-rated guys in SoCal. I know most people reading this don’t even know who this guy is outside of some puking thing that happened a while ago, but you’re honestly missing out. Dawg is a bigger guy that moves very well and plays his character superbly. Dawg and Cyrus squared off for a pretty intense match that had the two men going back and forth for the whole match. Cyrus is still pretty new as he is a little unsure with some of his offense, but he has made vast improvements from the first time I saw him in a match. Dawg led him through the match very well and the finish came with a beautiful Dawg Splash (Frog Splash from the top) that saw Dawg get some great extension and come down hard on Cyrus. Overall, a good match that was worthy of semi-main, and the corwd seemed really into Dawg’s gimmick. Please promoters, book the Dawg more.
Brutal Ink (Bo Cooper and Tommy Angels) and Graffitti Kid over Big Q, Rudy Luna, and Black Pearl
Fir a six-man, this match was pretty well contianed until all hell broke losse in the end. Big Q was over huge as a psycho face that wanted to kill the heels. After Pearl started off strong against the heels, Luna tagged in and got the bejesus beat out of him. Both members of Brutal Ink looked very strong here, absolutely dominating Luna and using great tag team tactics. The faces were constantly trying to get at the heels, resulting in the referee holding them back while the heels cheated even more. Towards the end of the match, the faces finally had enough and just pearl harbored the heels outside of the ring which allowed Luna to finally make the hot tag to Big Q. Q came in and cleaned house and then Pearl and Q hit a devastating flapjack on Tommy Angels. While celebrating, Pearl turned on Q with a savat kick and then rolled Angels over the knocked out Q to screw over his team. All four men then put the boots to the faces and chucked the ref from the ring before Krazy KC and Under Pressure ran down to make the save. The crowd seemed really into this match and was going nuts by the end of it when things completely broke down.
Overall, a very fun show from the EWF crew, and a great first showing in La Puente. The fans were very hot and a few angles were set up for further shows so it should be interesting to see where this goes from here.
