Looking back at SCCW’s SoCal Supercard from January 15th, 2005

Taking a look at SCCW’s SoCal Supercard featuring Super Dragon vs. Chris Bosh, Scorpio Sky, Human Tornado, Davey Richards, Kenny King, El Generico, and more. Plus a look at what the scene was like during this time.

You can watch the entire non-deathmatch portion of the event from SCCW’s January 15th, 2005 SoCal Supercard on the Highspots Wrestling Network.

SCCW’s Origins

Originally founded in 1997 by Dynamite D., Patrick Hernandez, and Kevin Kleinrock, Southern California Championship Wrestling was created after the closure of the Slammers Wrestling Federation. For the story of how that happened, check out Part 1 of Steve’s interview with Kevin from 2003. SCCW shut down in 1998 after the promotion’s founders teamed up with adult film producer Rob Black to form XPW. For those who weren’t around the scene at the time and are unaware of its legacy, XPW was the most controversial and divisive promotion in Southern California.

On April 8, 2003, the offices of XPW and its parent company, Extreme Associates, was raided by federal agents who had seized several videos produced by the company. Later that year on August 6th, the company, and its owners, Rob Black (real name Rob Zicari) and Lizzy Borden (real name Janet Romano), were indicted by a federal grand jury on several counts of producing and distributing obscene pornographic materials by mail and internet. After the indictment, XPW was shut down. Extreme Associates remained in business.

In 2004, about a year after XPW had closed, the three founders of SCCW decided to relaunch the promotion. Acknowledging that XPW had been a source of many bitter divisions in Southern California, the promotion made it clear that its goal was to unify the territory by holding a series of super cards with matches presented by various promotions that were running in SoCal at the time.

The promotion would also announce it would be teaming with SoCalUncensored.com and Steve Bryant. However, because of location, time, and other stuff, Steve was unable to actually be part of SCCW.

SoCal At The Time

The Southern California scene at the time was in a weird transition period. One of the area’s most beloved promotions, Revolution Pro, had just closed down, while another beloved promotion, PWG, was beginning to make its rise in the wrestling world. David Marquez, through his affiliation with the Inoki Dojo, had just established a new NWA territory in SoCal. The San Diego area at the time was also nearly dead. Aside from some Lucha Libre shows, the area hadn’t seen much in terms of professional wrestling events there aside from WWE.

Today SoCal has a wide variety of prolific promotions holding events in SoCal. PWG, Lucha Underground, Bar Wrestling, and occasional NJPW events are several examples of this. Around the time of SCCW’s revival though, things were a lot different. XPW closed up a year before, and UPW became less prolific and was holding fewer events. PWG was also still growing, but nowhere close to being the attraction they are today. Full Contact Wrestling, who have held the biggest non-WWE events in SoCal this century, was still a month away from holding its first event, but the promotion wouldn’t last long.

The scene at the time had a lot of divisions among fans as well. Fans of traditional, technical, and high flying wrestling styles weren’t fond of deathmatches. On the other hand, deathmatch fans weren’t appreciative of matches that didn’t have blood or weapons. Despite there being several different demographics, SCCW aimed to cater to all fans of wrestling in SoCal in an effort to help grow the scene.

One other thing about SoCal at the time was a lot of workers who came up through schools and or performed in promotions such as XPW, UPW, and EWF often worked exclusively for those promotions and other select promotions. While some promotions these days have exclusive talent and try to put restrictions on where certain workers can work, there has been more freedom for performers in SoCal to get booked where they can. Looking back at the way things have changed in SoCal over the last 15 years, it really is amazing to see how much progress has been made with the majority of promoters/bookers/trainers in SoCal being less controlling over talent.

Now with that brief introduction out of the way, let’s get into the show.

The Live Experience

SCCW’s SoCal Supercard (as well as the follow-up event, SoCalMania) was held at El Potrero Nightclub in Cudahy, CA. El Potrero Nightclub as a venue was very spacious. Even though the show drew around 300 fans, there was still plenty of room to fit in several hundred more people. Before the event, I noticed how there were several vibes in the air that day. I can’t really describe what it was like, but the atmosphere was one of the most interesting experiences I’ve had in SoCal.

Several people who attended the event were seeing some people they hadn’t seen after an extended period of time. There were also people who mostly stuck around their groups of friends. The crowd was a diverse and opinionated mix of deathmatch fans and non-deathmatch fans. It was an interesting crowd, as certain people were there just for certain matches. For example, some deathmatch fans yelled “BORING” during some matches that didn’t feature blood or weapons.

During the deathmatch portion of the event, several people I had been sitting near were taking time to read certain articles from S.C.R.A.P. Magazine as some deathmatches were taking place. S.C.R.A.P. Magazine was a published by referee Rick Knox between 2003-2007 with a total of 17 issues. At the time, S.C.R.A.P. Magazine focused on wrestling in the SoCal area and featured contributions from people in the scene. Rick Knox would sell copies of his magazine at events he would work, and would sometimes give away copies to fans who attended shows.

Despite differences between fan bases, it was nice to see a diverse group of people from different parts of the scene come together for one day.

Leading up to the event, it was mentioned that there would be an “All You Can Eat Mexican Buffet” at the event. It would end up being a big disappointment to many people. Most of the items at the buffet appeared to be rice, mashed potatoes, some bread, and no meat. It was so underwhelming that Bo Cooper had asked for his money back.

Jack Evans, who had just injured his neck at a Pro Wrestling WAR event the night before in his first match as Blitzkrieg II after attempting a Phoenix 630, was in attendance for the show. Vince Russo and Ed Ferrara were also in attendance for the event. Yeah. Those guys. More on that in a bit.

The show itself went about four hours, and the venue was scheduled to host live music and dancing after. Once the event ended, the SCCW staff rushed to get the venue ready for its next event. Inside the venue, SCCW’s staff quickly took down the ring while cleaning up spilled blood, trash, and weapons. Outside the venue, a line of Latino men dressed in their best outfits and cowboy hats stood alongside dolled up Latinas waiting for a night of drinking, music, and dancing. They had no idea that a violent pro wrestling event had just taken place.

The way the show was structured saw deathmatches take place before and after non-deathmatches. On the commentary for the event, former XPW commentator Kris Kloss called the entire show. G.Q. Money (Ryan Katz) provided color commentary on the non-deathmatch portion of the show. For the deathmatch portion of the event, J.R. Benson would take over on color commentary, with Supreme joining Kloss for the finals. The non-deathmatch portion of the show was released a few months later on DVD, while the deathmatches were later released on a separate DVD.

Right now I’m going to take a look at the non-deathmatch portion of the show, which can be found on Highspots Network. I’ll also be giving brief descriptions and histories for each promotion that presented a match.

Revolution Pro: AWS Light Heavyweight and RevPro Jr. Heavyweight Championship Match: The Aerial Xpress (Scorpio Sky (c) & Quicksilver (c)) vs. Human Tornado & Ronin

Revolution Pro

Not to be confused with the Revolution Pro that currently runs in the UK, SoCal’s Revolution Pro had just closed up shop a month before, with their final show having taken place on December 5th, 2004 in Hollywood. On that final show, two chicken mask wearing rookies wrestled as Los Gallineros (Gallinero I & Gallinero II), going over the team of BJ Samson & Diablo. While nobody would realize it at the time, those two rookies in chicken masks would go on to change the wrestling world nearly a decade later.

RevPro’s final show also featured Quicksilver finally defeating his longtime friend and tag team partner, Scorpio Sky, to win the promotion’s Jr. Heavyweight Championship. While the promotion would end up closing after this show, the Jr. Heavyweight Championship lived on.

Despite closing in 2004, SCCW decided to showcase a match from Revolution Pro and continue its legacy by featuring the Jr. Heavyweight Championship on its shows. The title’s lineage continues to live on to this day after it was merged with the AWS Lightweight Championship.

The Match

First, a bit of a backstory to this

Big Vision Entertainment, the company SCCW promoter Kevin Kleinrock had worked for, was producing a series called Ultimate Insiders. The first edition of the series would feature Ed Ferrara and Vince Russo, and featured a segment where Ferrara and Russo booked and produced a match. Sadly, that match was this one.

Now for the actual match

The story of the match was that both Sky and Quicksilver’s titles were on the line. Whoever got pinned would lose their title. During the match, Ronin and Tornado were arguing over their tactics. You could tell this had Russo’s fingerprints all over it. Quicksilver played Ricky Morton during the heat segment and took a lot of offense before getting the hot tag to Scorpio Sky. Sky would get some offense in, and the AXP hit some double team offense. Later in the match, referee Patrick Hernandez was taken out after Quicksilver accidentally threw Tornado into him. Ronin would then grab the RevPro title and tried to get Tornado to hit Quicksilver with it. Instead, Ronin did. Tornado would then hit the D.N.D. to win the title. Ref bump, partners not getting along, and contrived rules. Yup. This was definitely a Vince Russo production.

Aside from the stupid booking, this was a good match. GQ Money was terrible on commentary, especially when he was trashing the AXP for looking like Power Rangers. I get that he was a heel, but it came off as really unprofessional.

Pacific Championship Wrestling: PCW Heavyweight Championship Match: Bo Cooper vs. Al Katrazz

PCW

No, this is not the same PCW as the one that is running now. During its run, this PCW featured workers from SoCal and nearby territories. It was never really one of the more notable promotions in SoCal, and at the time the promotion was sort of dormant. PCW would attempt a revival with a show scheduled for May 28th, 2005, but it would later end up being canceled. After the cancelation of the show, one of the former owners of PCW opened a new promotion called Battle Ground Pro Wrestling.

The Match

Joey Ryan, who was taking time off because of injuries, was the PCW Heavyweight Champion at the time. Before the match, Joey vacated the title because he was unable to defend it against Al Katrazz. This moment wasn’t shown on the DVD but was mentioned on commentary. GQ Money trashed Joey on commentary during the match. Looking back, GQ might’ve been the worst commentator ever. The match started out with Al Katrazz getting some offense in on Bo early on. Bo would mount a comeback and controlled the match for some time by getting some offense on Al Katrazz. Things would even out before Al Katrazz won with a DDT. This was a quick and decent match but isn’t worth going out of your way to see. It was nothing spectacular, but also nothing awful.

Pro Wrestling WAR: El Generico vs. Davey Richards vs. Tony Kozina w/ Gary Yap and Bo Cooper

WAR

Pro Wrestling WAR was Gary Yap’s second attempt at running a promotion after EPIC Pro closed in 2002. It was sorta like what Maverick Pro is now; a promotion that would spend money on bringing in talent but was terrible at making business decisions. WAR was also seen as a promotion that strived to be like PWG, but couldn’t pull it off.

The promotion was also known for its many attempts at being controversial and having wild shows in an effort to stand out from other promotions. WAR would close up a year later before being revived as EPIC Pro Wrestling WAR in 2007. EPIC WAR picked up where WAR left off before fading away due to the same poor business decisions made by the promotion.

The Match

Around this time, Davey Richards was just a few months into his career. El Generico had just started wrestling for PWG a few months prior to this. He, along with Kevin Steen, had just started being booked by Pro Wrestling WAR in addition to being booked on PWG shows. This match was a fun spotfest. It’s really interesting looking back on the early days of Davey Richards and El Generico’s careers and seeing how far they’ve come. The finish saw Kozina dropkick Generico’s knee as he was hitting Davey with a Brainbuster, Kozina by him throwing Generico out of the ring to pin Davey for the win. This was pretty good. Whatever happened to El Generico?

Pro Wrestling Guerrilla: PWG World Championship Match: Super Dragon (c) vs. Chris Bosh (No, not the basketball player)

PWG

During this period, PWG was starting to build up some steam after moving into a new home on the corner of Sunset Blvd and Bates Ave in the Silverlake/Los Feliz/East Hollywood part of Los Angeles. It was already the darling of the SoCal scene at the time, but PWG was still unknown to a lot of fans. Several months after this SCCW event, PWG held their first “All-Star Weekend” events during WrestleMania 21 weekend. The two shows would end up boosting PWG’s notoriety and helped the company grow its attendance. PWG would also hold its first annual Battle of Los Angeles tournament later that year in September.

As for PWG now? Shit. No point in even writing about them. You should know what’s up.

The Match

Dragon and Bosh had a really good match at Revolution Pro several months before this. I wish footage from that era would surface online. This match was considered the best on the show by many people in attendance. There were some deathmatch fans who didn’t appreciate some of the action, but overall it had the most positive reception from the crowd.

This match was a really fun showcase of what both guys could do. Dragon hit his usual spots, and Bosh got some moves in. Bosh also took a lot of punishment in this. At one point as the two were outside of the ring, Dragon hip tossed Bosh into the ring post. Older matches usually don’t hold up in terms of quality as time goes by, but this match did and was very fun to watch. The structure was really good and the action was fun.

One thing that was really interesting about this match was looking back at Bosh’s character. For those who are unaware, his gimmick was that he’d say some wild, racist, homophobic, religiously intolerant, and other politically incorrect things during matches and promos. At the time, it was funny. When I look back at this character today, I still find it hilarious. However, times change, and the Bosh character wouldn’t fly with people today. I’m sure the Lioncock Punch would be super over though, but I wouldn’t expect fans today to enjoy what he did.

Revolution X: The Fighting Santino Brothers (Kaos & Mongol) vs. Cyanide & Biggie Biggz

Rev X

Rev X was an offshoot secondary brand of Revolution Pro created in 2003. The shows would feature Rev Pro’s top stars, as well as local performers who weren’t regularly featured on Rev Pro events. Events were held at the Allen Theatre in South Gate on weekday nights, featuring a mix of regular and hardcore matches. Rev X shows would also feature live musical acts that would perform during intermission. In October 2004, the promotion introduced its own championship, the Rev X Xtremecore Championship.

Their most over performer at the time was Cyanide, as he would get really loud crowd pops. He was like the Hulk Hogan of South Gate in 2004. His name would be chanted before, during, and after his matches. Most of the fans in the crowd would also wear shirts and held up signs with his logo. This was mostly because the majority of the crowds at Rev X were relatives or friends of Cyanide. There were also many hardcore wrestling fans at Rev X events, and the crowds would get very rowdy.

Despite Revolution Pro closing in December 2004, Revolution X continued to hold events in South Gate before fading away. Cyanide’s career would never be the same.

The Match

Unlike the other matches presented by a promotion, this was a hardcore match. Cyanide’s family and friends were also in attendance for this match, giving it an authentic Rev X vibe. There was a lot of broken glass inside the ring from the deathmatches that had happened before this match. All four men brawled outside of the ring to start the match and then made their way inside. The Santino Bros. got the win after Kaos hit a Frog Splash on Cyanide while he had a chair on him. There wasn’t much to this match outside of brawling and chair shots, so I can’t really say much else about this match.

A Month Later…

One month after this event, a promotion by the name of Full Contact Wrestling held its first event at the Grand Olympic Auditorium. The promotion was run by Kaos, Mongol, and Cyanide with Cyanide’s father and realty business owner, Raul Altamirano, funding the project. FCW’s events at the Olympic would draw several thousand fans and were the biggest crowds SoCal had seen outside of WWE since AAA in the 90’s. Things wouldn’t last though, and the promotion began to fall apart after Raul Altamirano was convicted of fraud and theft charges.

Empire Wrestling Federation: Big Q & Kenny King vs. Cyrus & Plague

EWF

Unlike today, the EWF was pretty isolated from the rest of Southern California around this time. A lot of fans outside of their area didn’t attend shows, and a lot of the promotion’s workers weren’t working on non-EWF events. Most of the shows were filled with mainly homegrown talent, and the matches were considered to be more “old school” and story driven rather than work rate.

Things would change shortly after this event. Several EWF prospects began to branch out to different promotions, and more fans from outside of the EWF’s home base started to attend shows. Along with joining Dave Marquez’s NWA Pro, the EWF began using more prolific workers on events more often, which helped give them a boost. Several years later, the EWF would team up with AWS to present several joint shows called United Forces.

The Match

This match was pretty bad. It was poorly structured and got very sloppy at several points. At one point Kenny King went for what looked like a backdrop on Plague, but Plague ended up landing on top of him. Kenny King and Big Q got the win after a double team flatliner. Unless you want to check out one of Kenny King’s early matches, this isn’t worth watching.

NWA Pro/Inoki Dojo: Adam Pearce w/ Mr. Vanderpyle vs. “Iceman” Webster Dauphiney

NWA Pro/Inoki Dojo

After a failed attempt to produce a weekly TV show in 2004, the Inoki Dojo would join the NWA and would embark on what they called “Phase II.” It never amounted to anything. In 2006, the Inoki Dojo would begin holding weekly Sunday events that helped shape the careers of Karl Anderson and Fergal Devitt (Finn Balor). Dave Marquez, who was part of the Inoki Dojo staff, ended up establishing a local NWA territory called NWA Pro and recruited many local promotions such as AWS, EWF, the Young Bucks’ High Risk Wrestling, and more to join him over the next few years.

To read more about the Inoki Dojo, check out SoCal and Puroresu Part 3: The Inoki Dojo and NJPW-USA.

The Match

Adam Pearce got on the mic before the match and insulted the deathmatch fans in attendance. People use to give him a lot of praise for his promo skills, but I always felt he was overrated. The match was very short and pointless. It started off with Webster going after Pearce outside of the ring, where the two did some brawling at ringside. Iceman would try to suplex Pearce back into the ring, but Vanderpyle grabbed Webster’s feet, causing Pearce to land on top of him. Vanderpyle would continue holding the feet of Webster Dauphiney as he was being pinned, giving Pearce the win. That was the entire match. I’m not kidding. This is worth skipping.

Ultimate Pro Wrestling: Ma’Koa & Lil’ Nate vs. “The Predator” Sylvester Terkay & Andrew Hellman

UPW

Founded by Rick Bassman in 1999, UPW was one of the biggest and most prolific promotions in Southern California during the early 2000’s. The promotion and its school, Ultimate University, helped many performers get WWF (now WWE) contracts and bookings. At one point during its run, UPW was a WWF developmental territory and featured several WWF workers (including HHH and Kurt Angle) on their events. UPW was also the place where John Cena got his start in wrestling and was home to wrestlers such as Samoa Joe, Frankie Kazarian, and Christopher Daniels early in their careers. Along with their WWF connection, UPW had a working relationship with Pro Wrestling Zero-One of Japan.

Around the time of this event, UPW had gone from regularly holding events to having sporadic shows. Despite having a major event in 2004 that featured Scott Hall, Kevin Nash, Ken Shamrock, Jimmy Snuka, Jerry Lynn, and Ivory on the card, the promotion’s notoriety fell off. After this SCCW event, UPW began to hold most of their events at their training school in San Clemente, CA before shutting down in 2007.

The Match

For some reason, this was the only match that had entrances shown. One thing I like about wrestling these days is that nobody uses any Disturbed songs for their entrance music. Nate and Ma’Koa were the babyfaces here. This match was structured better than the EWF tag match, but it still had several wonky moments. Hellman and Terkay worked over Lil’ Nate before getting the eventual hot tag on Ma’Koa. Then the action got awkward. At one point Terkay went for a dropkick but ended up landing on his head. Moments later, Ma’Koa clotheslined Terkay and got a three count on him, but referee Marty Elias called it a two count. It looked like Terkay knocked himself out and forgot to kick out. The match kept going until Lil’ Nate hit Hellman with a Code Red. This match was pretty bad and is not worth checking out.

Luchamania: Psicosis w/ Jezebel vs. TJ Boy w/ “The New York Knockout” Nikki

Luchamania

There’s not much to say about Luchamania. It was a Lucha promotion that was run by Masked Republic founder and CEO Ruben Zamora and held events in the San Diego area. Ruben would later go on to promote events under a different brand, Viva La Lucha, about a year after this event. SCCW promoter Kevin Kleinrock currently works for Zamora’s Masked Republic.

The Match

This match was decent but somewhat sloppy. Psicosis and T.J. Boy did some Lucha sequences and busted out some pretty big spots. At one point T.J. Boy worked over the knee of Psicosis, but as the match went on Psicosis stopped selling it. Nikki and Jezebel got involved in the match and brawled inside the ring. During this, Psicosis would put Nikki in a Sharpshooter as T.J. Boy looked on. T.J. Boy would then break it up with a missile dropkick from the top rope. After a distraction from Jezebel, Psicosis hit T.j. Boy with a Flatliner into a Koji Clutch for a submission victory. The match overall wasn’t smooth, but it was one of the more entertaining matches on this show.

Alternative Wrestling Show: AWS Heavyweight Championship Match: Babi Slymm (c) w/ Mr. Vanderpyle vs. Scott Lost

AWS

At the time, AWS was holding events at the Frank & Son Collectible Show in the City of Industry. The shows were mostly a mix of local workers and Lucha stars. There weren’t many women on the shows then compared to now, mostly because there weren’t many women in the business at the time. Later as the year went on, AWS would join Dave Marquez’s NWA Pro group, and Adam Pearce became booker of the promotion. After several years at Frank & Son, AWS would move across the street to its own retail shop where events were held for several years.

The Match

This match had a basic Big Man vs. Little Man formula to it, with Scott Lost trying to use speed and technique to overcome Slymm’s size advantage. The match saw Scott Lost get a lot of offense in early on. He almost got the win after hitting a top rope elbow drop on Slymm. Vanderpyle got on the ring apron to distract referee Rick Knox, and Scott Lost punched him off. This allowed Slymm to recover. Slymm would hit Scott Lost with a spear so powerful that it made the screen go black as Slymm was pinning Scott Lost. Then the first bonus match started to play. I don’t know if this was Highspots’ fault or the producers of the SCCW DVD. Either way, I don’t care. Slymm won in a short match.

The Deathmatch Tournament

After this match, we get some bonus matches from the deathmatch tournament on this show. The deathmatch portion of the show was released by Big Vision Entertainment on DVD as The Best of Deathmatch Wrestling Vol. 6: West Coast Warfare. That’s right. In addition to 10 individual matches put on by various promotion, we also had a deathmatch tournament on the same show, making for a total of SEVENTEEN matches.

Rather than review every match, I’ll just give a brief overview of the tournament.

SCCW’s deathmatch tournament featured seven SoCal workers and the infamous owner of IWA-Mid South, Ian Rotten. The local names in the tournament included former XPW performers Angel, Homeless Jimmy, and Leroy the Ring Crew Guy, as well as Evil Lonestar (Andre Verdun), Carnage, Robbie Phoenix, and Buddy George.

The tournament matches weren’t good in terms of quality, but the matches were a lot more brutal than I recalled. The spots were also built up pretty well, and the deathmatch fans in attendance were into the action. During Homeless Jimmy’s match against Evil Lonestar in the semi-finals of the tournament, deathmatch star “Mr. Insanity” Toby Klein ran in and attacked Jimmy to set up a future match between them. The way the tournament was booked did a good job at elevating Evil Lonestar on his way to the finals against Ian Rotten. At the time, Ian Rotten was one of the top deathmatch performers in America, while Lonestar was still unknown to many fans. The tournament would end with Ian bashing Lonestar with a series of chair shots to the head.

After the match, Ian cut a promo about how he’s been successful in every deathmatch tournament he’s been in and proceeded to call out SoCal deathmatch legend Supreme, who was on commentary for the finals. Supreme would then break a glass bottle over his head while screaming the word “fuck” a lot. The show would end with Supreme being held back by security while Ian yelled at the crowd. This would set up a match that was scheduled to take place between them later that year.

The Aftermath

SCCW would run again on April 9th, 2005 at El Potrero Club in Cudahy, the weekend after WrestleMania 21. This time the format had been changed, as the promotion decided to hold deathmatches after the non-deathmatches in an effort to please the different demographics SCCW was trying to appeal to. The non-deathmatch portion of the event featured Austin Aries, Super Dragon, Joey Ryan, B-Boy, and Kaos in various matches.

The event was supposed to feature Supreme vs. Ian Rotten in the main event, and J.C. Bailey vs. Evil Lonestar. Both were scheduled to be deathmatches. On the day of the event, Rotten and Bailey would end up missing their flights because security would not let them on after they tried to bring blades onto the plane. The main event was then changed to Supreme vs. Evil Lonestar in a No Rope Barbwire Match. Supreme would defeat Evil Lonestar after hitting him in the head with a flaming chair.

On that same night, Ian Rotten was in a match with Chris Candido on an event held by his promotion, IWA Mid South.

SCCW’s SoCalMania would end up being the last held by the promotion. Less than a year after the end of SCCW’s revival, Kevin Kleinrock would go on to create an MTV series called Wrestling Society X. On May 24th, 2008, Kleinrock would help produce the XPW “Cold Day In Hell” reunion event in Redondo Beach. The event would draw about 700-800 fans, the largest crowd for a non-Lucha Libre event in the SoCal area that year.

While it would take over a decade for the scene to build itself up, SCCW’s SoCal Supercard felt like the beginning of a shifting mindset in SoCal. Even though there were still several divides in the scene, more and more promoters began to work together. Workers began to branch out, and fans would start to check out promotions they normally wouldn’t have. Even if things weren’t perfect, it really felt like this show did help bring the SoCal wrestling community together.

If a SoCal Supercard happened today

As I was watching this event, it made me wonder how a SoCal Supercard event would work in today’s environment. The first thing that came to mind was which promotions would be considered to be part of such a project? While there is more unity in SoCal, there are so many different promotions running now (more than thirty) that even a 17 match card like this wouldn’t be enough to represent the entire scene.

There’s also the question of whether behind-the-scenes politics would come into play. Even though this scene has made more progress when it comes to promoters being more cohesive with each other, certain things still haven’t changed. We still have promotions in SoCal that have poor relationships with others, and we still have promotions that are run by people who try to undercut other promotions.

Another thing that came to mind is whether or not SoCal’s most prolific entities, PWG and Lucha Underground, would take part in such an event. PWG has been on another level for years now and uses a lot of high-profile talent. Lucha Underground is a television product that doesn’t hold live events outside of seasonal television tapings. It’s hard to imagine either of them being associated with a similar project if it were to happen today. The lack of involvement of those two promotions would be a major blow to the drawing power of a potential SoCal Supercard in this era.

Despite that, I think a SoCal Supercard today could work if the right promotions were involved. The quality would also be better as the level of talent in SoCal is better now than it was at the time of this show. I also think plenty of fans would be intrigued enough to want to check something like this out.

Final Thoughts

You really have to give Kevin Kleinrock a lot of credit for this. While he was part of a promotion that divided the scene, XPW, he did more than anyone else to try to unify it with SCCW’s revival. Aside from Super Dragon vs. Chris Bosh, the matches weren’t great, but the show is still pretty historic when you look back at it. This was something that could’ve easily fallen apart, but Kevin and his crew pulled it off.

Another thing that amazed me in hindsight was how this event brought together several important figures in SoCal wrestling’s modern era under one roof to be part of one show with Super Dragon, Rick Bassman, Jesse Hernandez, Gary Yap, Bart Kapitzke, Kevin Kleinrock, Joey Ryan, Ruben Zamora, and David Marquez. To this day, no other person or promotion has been able to do that, and probably never will.