Thanks to Larry Goodman for sending in the following report.
My Spring Fling Weekend Tour of Georgia Rasslin’ kicked off in McDonough Thursday with a night of Deep South Wrestling action. The show drew the usual full house of 300 fans to the Deep South Arena. Decent heat but far from the rowdiest crowd I’ve experienced at DSW’s strip mall venue. The hour taped for television had some good stuff. Unfortunately, it was also plagued by technical problems.
Ring announcer Ted Guinness introduced Nigel Sherrod and Matt Striker as the announce team for the dark matches. A fan blamed Striker for his decision to become a high school dropout.
(A) Onyx beat Mikal Adryan in 4:36. Onyx picked up his first DSW win over the reigning NWA Anarchy Heavyweight Champion with a reverse bulldog. An OK match given the time constraint. The crowd is taking to Onyx as a babyface, even though he was at least 0-3 coming into this match.
(B) Biohazard beat Jacob Ladder in 3:30. Short but lousy. I expected better since they’ve worked as a team for Pro Wrestling Evolution. They botched a leapfrog spot in the first minute and never got untracked. Biohazard worked as the face. Minimal heat. Ladder’s head got busted open the hardway on a kick. Biohazard got the pin with a quebrada.
(C) Bradley Jay (Brad Bradley in IWA Mid-South) beat Cru Jones in 5:38. Jones is ripped to shreds. Jay worked over Jones’ knee for most of the match. Jay used a kneebreaker to set up a spinning toe hold. Jones made the comeback but was still hobbling. Jay hit a powerslam to get the 1-2-3.
(D) Damien Steele & Ray Gordy & Scott Fantastic beat Frankie Ciatso & Slaughter Brothers (Johnny & Joe) in 5 minutes. Joe’s man boobs drew a titty twister chant. Ciatso posted Fantastic’s shoulder, followed up with a divorce court, and the heels poured on the heat. The crowd was way into Steele’s work off the hot tag. He hit a belly to belly on Ciatso but one of the Slaughter boys saved. It broke down to six-way action and Steele pinned Ciatso with a schoolboy counter. Big pop for the finish.
The heels gave the faces a beatdown in the postmatch. Steele issued a challenge to Ciatso to face him a singles match next week.
Krystal Marshall and Krissy Vaine came out to assist ring announcer Dan Masters with the t-shirt giveaway during the intermission.
Nigel Sherrod and Eric Perez (with his arm in a sling) were introduced as the announce team for the TV taping.
The television taping opened with a funny backstage vignette. DSW owner Palmer Canon was seen walking down the hall with his attorney, Quentin Michaels. Canon was upset that the Assassin’s attorneys were taking action to regain control of the company. Michaels said he had it under control, and Canon’s first order of business was to deal with his “domestic help.” Canon and Michaels entered a bathroom where Assassin (Jody Hamilton with his face blurred by special effects) and his wife appeared to be cleaning a toilet. The video went out for a bit here. Canon told Assassin to get off his back. He referred to Assassin’s wife “a raggedy catcher’s mitt.” Assassin’s sprayed toilet water into Canon with her scrub brush. Assassin said he couldn’t idly stand by and watch his wife assault Canon. Assassin assaulted Canon instead. The two men were separated. Michaels said that was just what they needed to have Assassin arrested on assault charges. Canon said the videotape would make great evidence.
(1) Sonny Siaki beat Tommy Suede in 5:40. Second best match of the night. Siaki gets heat. Siaki sucker punched Suede, who made an aerial comeback. Suede works like a muscled up slo-mo version of Paul London. Siaki turned the tide with a capture suplex and did a number on Suede’s chest with his chops. Suede escaped a suplex and hit a spinning heel kick. Both men down to set up THE BIG BABYFACE COMEBACK. Suede went down in flames on a spectacular corkscrew 450. Siaki used a HHH facebuster on the knee and a rabbit lariat to score the 1-2-3.
Canon came out in his ring gear. He said in an ornery mood because of the difficult time he had defeating that pesky Antonio Maeste last week. Canon summoned Maestre to the ring and ordered him (“I’m the boss”) to pick a number between 5 and 10. Maestre picked 6. Canon said he could beat Maestre twice in 6 minutes, and called for a countdown clock. That lead to…
(2) Anthony Maestre “defeated” Palmer Canon when Canon was able to score only one of the two pinfalls stipulated during the 6 minute time limit. Canon won the first fall at 2:10 with an Alabama Slam but not without the much smaller Maestre being able to score a near fall. They did a 30 second rest period. Canon tried to end it. Maestre kept kicking out. Maestre decked Canon with a wheel kick. Canon’s frustration level was through the roof. Canon caught Maestre’s high crossbody attempt and nailed an STO as the time counted down, but Maestre kicked out. Canon hit the Executive Decision (pumphandle faceplant) and made the cover. The bell rang at the count of two. Good stuff. The countdown clock built the tension level nicely.
The giant Dalip Singh entered the ring. He paused to headbutt Mastre into oblivion before confronting Canon. While Canon was making his peace with Singh, Freakin’ Deacon came to ringside. While Deacon was going through his gyrations for the camera, Canon departed with Singh trailing behind him. Deacon did a double take when he saw Singh leaving with Canon and bolted to the back.
(3) Michelle McCool beat Traci Taylor in 5:15. This was a lot better than I expected, as they smartly stuck with the basics. McCool is over with this crowd. She’s come a long way in a short time, and appears to have what it takes to make it as a wrestler versus being just one more here todayââ€Â€gone tomorrow Diva. She also has the abs of steel. Taylor is a beautiful Hawaiian girl with a great smile that never seems to leave her face. McCool applied a hammerlock. Taylor went for a snapmare, and McCool rolled through with the hammerlock still intact, and flipped into a bridging hammerlock. Nice stuff. They ran the ropes to set up back and forth pin attempts. McCool got it with bridging leg cradle. The girls hugged in the postmatch. Crowd liked it.
(4) Johnny Parisi beat Biohazard in 3:02. I’m not up on the storyline reason for this, but Parisi is now a face. Biohazard attacked Parisi as he was coming through the ropes. Parisi’s belt came undone. Parisi took over. Some kids in the crowd started chanting for blood. Yikes. Parisi used the Long Island Legsweep (Stroke) as his finisher.
Jindrak and Regal both cut backstage promos to set up their match. Technical issues made it difficult to hear them. Jindrak said opportunity was knocking. Regal said Jindrak might have the body of a Greek God, but it wouldn’t do him much good against someone that could hurt him very quickly and very badly.
(5) William Regal beat Mark Jindrak via submission in 9:03. The sheer force of Regal’s presence made this the best match of the night. With his head shaved, Jindrak looked like a taller version of Danny Basham. Regal’s entrance got more pop than Jindrak’s. Regal went deep into his bag of tricks to turn the crowd against him. He got heat plenty of heat but the crowd remained split. Regal’s facial expressions were awesome. Regal took a flip bump off Jindrak’s arm ringer, cocked his fist, and then ducked under the ropes like a miserable coward. Regal displayed his chain wrestling expertise. Jindrak revered the armbar and Regal took another flip bump. Regal cheated on the break. Regal dumped Jindrak over the top. Back inside, Jindrak responded with a backdrop. Regal dumped Jindrak again. A suplex back to the inside looked shaky. Regal hit a jumping double knee for a near fall. Regal applied a full nelson. Jindrak made the comeback with a series of impressive kangaroo-like dropkicks and lefty lariat for a near fall. Regal cut Jindrak off and locked in the STF for the tap out.
(6) Gymini (Mike & Todd Shane) beat Renee Dupree & Kevin Matthews in 5:10. From a physique standpoint, Dupree looked great. Couldn’t tell much about his work from this match. Matthews is totally miscast as a face. The guy was born to play heel. Gymini worked on Dupree and looked good doing so. Dupree hit a neckbreaker to set up the hot tag. Matthews tried to do the manic house-cleaning deal and it just didn’t click. Matthews hit a slingshot splash but the pin was broken up. Gymini whipped Matthews and Dupree into a stiff collision that had Dupree bleeding from the nose. Gymini pinned Matthews with the Crosstrainer.
NOTES: The crowd gave ref Mike Posey a solid appreciation pop when it was announced that he had worked the Smackdown tour this past week…A few notes on this weekend’s World-1 Wrestling shows in Valdosta featuring an 8 team tag tourney. World-1 promoter Jody Peterman announced that the World-1 Southern Champion Jon Davis had parted ways with company leaving the title vacant. The title will be decided tonight in a 2 out of three falls match between Matt Kuma and Dave Holiday…Nightmare has enlisted the services of Ricky Morton as his tag team partner. Other teams in the tournament include the Midnight Express, the Heartbreak Express, Tully Blanchard & Glacier, Kirby Mack (Krazy K) and T. J. Mack (Dexter Poindexter). Tonight’s show features A. J. Styles vs. Jimmy Rave in the main event…NWA Anarchy’s Hardcore Hell show on Saturday night looks like a sellout. The current seating configuration is already sold out but owner Jerry Palmer is adding enough seats to accommodate 300 fans.
