Tuesday, June 16, 2009

Arena Report: "Tank Benefit" Show Newbern, TN 6.14.09


----Sicilian Kid beat Tim Edwards to win a Battle Royal. They were the final two in the ring featuring Bonecrusher, Rob Justice and more. Typical Battle Royal and nothing special. This is the perfect way to use Edwards though – either putting him over beating everyone in a battle royal or putting a little guy over in the final. [*]

----Dustin Starr defeated Derrick King to retain the EWE Title. Just solid work with DK getting his shine. Jimmy Tidwell was ringside with Starr and helped him start heat. Sweet slingshot in the turnbuckle. Garvin stomp to DK from Starr. Starr hit a short big boot. DK to the top turnbuckle. Starr up with him and pushed off. DK misses a frog splash. DK ends up hitting a superkick for a count of three, but Starr’s foot was on the bottom rope doing the famous Dusty finish. Bell rings and Starr hits DK with “Ghost of Don Bass” for the win. [***]

----Hambone Express beat Southside Brawler/Outlaw. Not as bad as you would think. It was solid with perfect psychology. Brawler has some of the best punches. He is really underrated. Finish had Outlaw come out of heat with the hot tag – Southside turned on him and Hambones pinned him. [**]

----“Asylum” [Psycho/Pappy] with Tasha Simone beat “Genocide” [Albino Rhino/Maxx Corbin] and “Missouri Bad Boys” [Missouri Renegade/Mark Southern] with “Cookie” St James. This featured three of my favorite teams. MBB pissed everyone off by just going around the ring. Even though this could have been a flustercuck – they worked perfect psychology with heat on Pappy. Southern has some good punches. Everyone was working hard. Albino hit a Lawler fist drop. Maxx missed a legdrop from the second rope. Fun to see the big guys working the turnbuckle moves. Asylum ended up getting the win with one of their finishers – Samoan drop from Pappy with spinning headbutt from Psycho with both guys wrapping up legs. [**1/2]

----Jeremy Moore beat Neil Taylor. Moore came out with both NBW Tag Team titles and got a good pop. This is his building though. Another good solid bout with just good psychology. Taylor hit a very hard loud forearm/slap to Moore’s back. Moore came out heat with an Ace Crusher which led to a DKO. As they got up, Moore hit another Ace crusher for the win. Smart finish. [**1/2]

----Kilo/J Weezy/Gaylon Ray/Shannon Lee won an 8-Man Elimination Match over C-Money/Rockin Randy/Hardcore Yaw/Jon “Biscuit” Roberts when Kilo pinned Roberts to win the match for his team in the match of the day. C-Money got a huge pop coming out. This was another match that could have been a flustercuck, but everyone shined putting spots in perfect places in the match. Match started out with two oldest of the bunch with Kilo/Money trading spots and good exchange. Crowd was into the match from start to finish. All the guys in this match have gotten really good in understanding the process of putting a match together – everyone got their signature spots in. Yaw needs new gear because he is still wearing the Phoenix X gimmick. This is also one of those bouts that there is no way to describe all the spots. They did do a series of dives with each guy getting to dive over the top rope or jumping from the top turnbuckle. A lot of markout moments in this match. In the end, Money was killing Biscuit with moves with Kilo ending up pinning Money and then superkicking Biscuit [his 4th finisher] to pin him for the win. Kilo had the fans chanting “Tank, Tank” after the bout. [***3/4]

----“Picture Perfect” [“Girl Candy” Christian Jacobs/”Trendsetter” Jon Michael] beat “The Golden Boy” Greg Anthony/”Dynamite” Seth Knight. Huge SUPER pop for PP. This goes to show the fans were from all the promotions, but these guys are over like a bologna sandwich at homeless shelter. [Now that was just wrong..LOL] Good long shine with the fans popping. Heat on Jacobs. Jacobs blew up with the heat lasting two long. Crowd was lost here. TGB/Jacobs doing just basic stuff here. Hot tag [which was flat] ended with them using their finisher for the win. Crowd got back into it with the finisher and them doing it on both guys. [**3/4]

----Crazy Train/Derrick King/Stan Lee/Chris Rocker beat Eric Wayne/Kid Nikels/Mark Justice/Motley Cruz. Another solid bout with everyone working hard. Someone made mention that Train was probably the guy the “odd man out” here, but damn he worked hard and shined. Good shine from the babys with the fans into it. Train hit a nasty stiff looking flying closeline on Wayne that even workers were popping for. Double heat with first on Lee. Lee did a Tiger bomb to come out of it. Heat on Train. Justice hit an elbow from the top rope. Flying closeline for DKO and then hot tag. Train ends up pinning Wayne with “trail of tears”. [***]

NOTES

----$633 was raised and paid on the funeral expenses…There were over 100 in the crowd. The arena was hot as a HELL!! This arena needs AC!!...Refs were Ron Bryson, Kaleb and Buckwheat. Bryson was getting requests from guys to do their bouts. He needs a nomination this year…Funny thing I was in the dressing room for about 2 minutes and one of the workers [kayfabe..lol] noticed my haircut. All three women that I work with never noticed it and I see them EVERY day!!!...A few lessons learned – “Trendsetter” did not fair well against THE EXPRESS. LOL And never be so stupid that you slap a Rhino on his bald head more than once. LOL…Starr won the EWE title on Saturday night and made his first defense against Derrick King – only on a benefit show. LOL…I was talking with Starr outside the dressing room before the show and there were lots of fans coming up saying they seen him on ECW…This crowd seem to be a little smarter than the average crowd in this area. It was packed with family and hardcore fans. They didn’t buy the DK/Starr finish and other things like that did not sell them. This crowd would be fun to book for…Asylum got the first big pop of the show coming out…”Cookie” St James was introduced as “Cash McCoy” [their other manager]. “Cookie” got on the mic and said, “I have been in this business for 13 years and people still don’t know who I am.” I just cracked up. Cookie has always had an unique look – he carries a BROOM to the ring with him. LOL…As my “partner in crime” for the day – Mark Tipton and I discussed – most times we would hate Moore with both belts. But what else was he suppose to do?? The champs were walking out and I think it is just hilarious that they had to put him alone over as the champions…All Most Improved 2009 candidates [my picks] were on this show – Pappy, Crazy Train, Shannon Lee and Jeremy Moore…If they can continue to work as a team, I would put “Good Ol’ Boys” [Shannon Lee/Gaylon Ray] down for a Most Underrated nominee… It was funny before the 8 man elimination with everyone in the match putting over the pop that C-Money got – Kilo went over and shook his hand. LOL…Getting the biggest pops in this order – “Picture Perfect”, C-Money, “Asylum” and Moore…First CCW champions in that tag bout – TGB/Seth [tag] and Christian Jacobs was the first CCW Mid-Southern Champion… Another “only on a benefit” – DK teams with Crazy Train and Train calls the finish…This has nothing to do with ECW/WWE thing, but I can see why he was picked to do the ECW bout – and this was something I notice during MAYHEM – Starr’s workrate and confidence is at the best it has ever been. He seems to not be hesitant on anything and everything flows so much better now…Promotions represented – DCW, NBW, EWE, MCW, RWA, TIWF, NEW and XOW…Someone said this was one of the best benefits they had watched as in workrate. But, take a look at that roster – the best in the area!!! Five members of the RRO Singles Top 10 and four teams of the RRO TOP 10 Tag Teams…I am going to kayfabe my last two statements here – but you know who you are – #1: if it is a benefit EVERYONE works for free. #2: Special thanks to everyone that donated extra money and helped pay the expenses down!!...And finally, thanks again to everyone – fans and workers!! Everybody worked real hard and I think everyone had a great time. If you see Crazy Train this week, tell him he did a great job – he did all the “running” for this event. You did a very good job!! Tank would have been proud of you and this show.

Photo Credit: Dustin Starr with EWE Title by Kayte Tramel