Southern Fried Wrestling Report from Monroe on February 7

Photos courtesy of Tommy Polnaszek From Larry Goodman: Southern Fried Championship Wrestling was not able to match the resoundi...

Photos courtesy of Tommy Polnaszek

From Larry Goodman:

Southern Fried Championship Wrestling was not able to match the resounding success of “New Year’s Nightmare” with “Survivor Games”.

I’ll start with the good. Hell of a crowd. The show drew close to 400 people to the Nowell Rec Center. The cage match main event delivered as promised, and the incendiary postmatch took the feud between AJ Steele and Jagged Edge to a whole other level. The show had its share of high caliber wrestling (Kyle Matthews vs. Drew Adler and the three-way for the Cruiserweight Cup won by the debuting Slim J). The booking of the tag title switch clicked as did the aftermath of the Monroe City title match.

On the other hand….four hours is ridiculously long for a pro wrestling show, or for just about any form or entertainment. SFCW got away with going that long at the New Year’s show, but pacing was a real issue last night. The first half dragged, and the crowd was ready to tap out in the second half. It was a good thing the main event came through the way it did. This show was indulgent to a fault, weighed down by too much talking that wasn’t entertaining, THREE three-way title matches, and some stuff that should have been left on the cutting room floor.

SFCW has an incredibly loyal fan base, so I wouldn’t say shows like this hurts them. But it surely doesn’t help to needlessly wear out your fans. The Team Georgia/Team Florida rematch is what the people came to see, and they would have been better served by a less is more approach with the rest of the show. 

SFCW is also in something of  a transitional phase. AJ Steele is the new booker. They have are bringing in better talent, but blending in said talent and figuring out how to best use the roster members that their fans have grown to know and love (or hate) over the last 18 months is a challenge. 

(1) Nigel Sherrod defeated Lobo (with Ace Heffner) and Champion Kody Jack (with Billy Jack) in a 10 minute scramble match to win the Monroe City Title. The deal was that the last one to score a fall before the time limit would be the winner. None of them were shy about cheating to win. Sherrod took punishment then took a powder and let Lobo and Kody go at it. Maverick sauntered to ringside to second Sherrod. Kody had Lobo pinned with a moonsault but Sherrod yanked him off and stole the pin at 6:54. Referee Wolfman raised Sherrod’s hand. Time literally stood still. They paused the 10 minute clock. After much confusion, the match was restarted. Nigel and Kody collided. Lobo covered Nigel and I could have sworn he pulled him up at the count of two which would have made no sense at all. Then again, this was not a night where good sense was in ample supply. Lobo tried to steal the pin after Sherrod DDT Kody but Sherrod dumped him out of the ring. Sherrod kicked out of Kody’s roll up and scored a second pin with a stunner on Kody just before the time limit expired. The confusion about the rules sucked. Sherrod could not have been booked stronger.

Sherrod said it was black history month, and like MLK, he had a dream – to end Justin Legend’s career as pay back for costing him the SFCW heavyweight title in Royston. Legend (recovering from a broken leg) hit the ring with a crutch. Sherrod bailed leaving Maverick to get choked out by Legend. Legend then announced that he was medically cleared as of now and somebody was getting hurt on March 7. The postmatch worked. Sherrod get tons of heat for being a complete ass. Legend has interesting charisma, a southern-fried CM Punk if you will.

(2) Colt Calloway defeated Tommy Penirelli in 8:46. Referee Ken Wallace made his SFCW debut. A little pro wrestling exaggeration on Calloway’s height. He’s tall but he ain’t 6-5. Penirelli claimed to be the smarter of the two, and backed it up when he hit a classic Eddie Gilbert hotshot to decisively take control. Penirelli did a good job of working the crowd and his spiral backbreaker looked impressive on a larger man. Man oh man did Calloway’s comeback offense look weak. No commitment to the blows. Calloway fought off Penirelli’s ankle lock and scored the pinfall with a puny variation of the GTS. Not bad match just unnecessary.

“King of Florida” Francisco Ciatso and AJ Steele came out for the coin toss to decide the man advantage in the Survival Games. Ring announcer Rick Richards was a one man wrecking crew in this segment. I don’t know what was up with Richards, but the guy wouldn’t shut up. The crowd even popped a bit when Ciatso said he was sick of Richards’ mouth and his bourbon breath. For all his yapping, Richards never explained the rules of the match, and said the coin toss was to determine “the next man available”. Team Georgia won the coin toss. Ciatso asked for 2 out of 3. Steele said fine because Georgia was going to kick Florida’s ass anyway. Florida won the next two coin tosses.

(3) Trinity (Big Andy & Chris Nelms (with Tim Rice & Amber O’neal Gallows) defeated Cowboy Way (Jamie Holmes & Roscoe Way (with Tiny Jones & ?) via DQ in 7:07. The cowboys brought their bull ropes. Nelms said they didn’t sign up for bull rope match. O’neal Gallows cut a promo introducing herself as Luke’s wife and the Bullet Babe from New Japan, then used her feminine wiles on ring announcer Richards, who said she was welcome to any kind of match she wanted. Cowboy Way brought Tiny Jones and an unidentified accomplice to ringside to even the odds. Promoter Charles Anschutz said he had heard enough talking (he wasn’t the only one, back-to-back talk ) and introduced head of security Scotty Harvey the special referee. O’neal Gallows interfered freely during the match, at one point clubbing Way on the outside and putting him down with a boot. The finish was a problem. Nelms came off the ropes with a cowbell shot on Way and referee Harvey let it go. When Holmes used the cowbell to deck Trinity, Harvey DQed Cowboy Way. I’m not sure what purpose it served to have O’neal Gallows overshadow the local talent and make Trinity her eunuchs.

(4) Drew Adler defeated Kyle Matthews in 15:56. Tremendous babyface/babyface action. Matthews is back to his stellar old self. Adler is so quick and light on his feet, that the size discrepancy was a non-issue. I thought they had the crowd for the duration when they popped for a rapid fire back and forth that ending in a stand-off, but the reaction petered out. Matthews busted out all kinds of submissions, including a Muta lock, a stump puller and a crossface. Loads of strong style chops by both men. Adler got his knees up on Matthews’ frogsplash and hit the Drew Drop for a near fall, then went for a cutthroat choke submission. A mid-air collision of high crossbodys left both men down for an 8 count. Nice unexpected finish - Matthews was on the attack with stiff strikes and building up a head of steam when Adler caught him right on the button with a bicycle kick. The Anarchy fans would have loved it.

Billy Jack was introduced as the first inductee into the SFCW Hall of Fame for 2015. Richards said he had known Billy for 24 years, mentioned Billy’s hardcore battles with Vic Roze and said Billy destroyed his body for pro wrestling. Billy called Anschutz down to the ring to thank him for a giving the wrestlers a place to do what they love.

(5) Beautiful Bald Besties (Michael Stevens & Zac Edwards) defeated champions Silent Kill Syndicate (Azrael & Supernatural with Crystal) and Josh Storm & Demarko Knight to win the SFCW Tag Team Championship in 10:51. The Besties intro music is hilarious – Joe Cocker’s “You Are So Beautiful” with the words changed to “We’re Bald and Beautiful”. Besties didn’t like the way things were going and quickly exited the match. Knight looks a whole lot like Ray Candy from back in the day. Knight used his monster size to good advantage against SKS, the highlight being a double Samoan Drop. Azrael did a real number on Storm. This was the first time the SFCW fans got see Azrael’s vicious chops in all their glory. SKS did the Lost Boys Time Warp double team from the NWA Wildside era. The action spilled to the outside. Supernatural tried to come off the apron, but Storm caught him and gave him a nasty powerbomb on the ring frame. Storm went for the tag, but Knight jumped down and walked out on him. Before SKS could put Storm away, the Besties ran back to the ring. Stevens made a blind tag on Supernatural and rolled Storm up. New champions! Good match. Besties should have been counted out but what the hell.

Afterward, SKS shook hands with Storm. Then they beat him to a pulp with a stuff cutthroat Michinoku driver, the Lost Boys’ Excommunicator and a Thesz press off the top from the unidentified Crystal. Crystal wanted Pandora. Anschutz obliged and made Dream Team vs. Azrael & the unidentified she devil (known as Crystal in Cornelia) for March 7.

Intermission.

Dr. Joseph Brock came to the ring and was subjected to the torture of an unending “nerd” chants. Richards can be dangerous with a mic in his hand and was again overinvolved and annoying. Brock said Jagged Edge would not return his phone calls and brought out his new client Jacob Ashworth, introducing him as a former WWE wrestler seen on Smackdown. Ashworth said he found no competition when he came to SFCW a year ago so he went to Anarchy instead.

(6) Pain (with unidentified valet) defeated Jacob Ashworth (with Joseph Brock) via count out at 5:40. Ashworth felt the power of Pain until he used a cheap shot and a chop block to take over. Ashworth worked on the big man’s leg, using a Vader Bomb to the knee. Ashworth sprung off the ropes right into Pain’s choke bomb. Pain teased the Asiatic Spike and Ashworth headed for the hills. The match served its purpose in terms of introducing new characters to the mix.

(7) Slim J defeated champion Mike Cruz and former champion Kameron Kade to win the Cruiserweight Cup in 11:27. Excellent match. Too bad it happened when the show was already three hours long. All three got a chance to shine. The story was Cruz keeping J out of the match so he could work on Kade. Kade made the comeback hitting a Tiger Driver on Cruz. J broke that up with a missile dropkick and got a near fall on Cruz with Screwdriver on the Rocks, but crashed and burned on a moonsault. They did a sunset powerbomb/superplex tower of doom spot. Kade blocked Screwdriver on the Rocks and hit a Blue Thunder Bomb on J for a very close near fall. It looked like a three count that had fans yelling at referee Wolfman. For the finish, J hit a flying reverse DDT on Cruz and a german suplex on Kade, pinning both men simultaneously (same finish as when J won the Young Lion’s title at Anarchy’s Hostile Environment).

25 minute intermission to set up the cage. YJ ran into problems with the ring and couldn’t get Ox’s cage up as quickly as usual.

(8) Team Georgia (AJ Steele & Jagged Edge & Logan Creed) defeated Team Florida (Francisco Ciatso & Simon Sez & Leo Gold) in the Survivor Games match in 13:36. Match could be won by pinfall or submission although that was never explained. Ciatso elected Sez to start for Team Florida. Sez was petrified and had to be dragged kicking and screaming to the cage door. Ciatso said, “Don’t make me call your mother.” “I’m only 29 years old, Frank!” said Sez. Once inside, Sez was decimated by Creed. He took shots into all four sides of the cage and bled a wee bit from the forehead. A new wrestler entered roughly every two minutes with Gold being the first. A low blow from Sez set up a beatdown on Creed, who also bled a tiny bit. Jagged entered with the Big Thump powerslam on Gold. Team Georgia administered the 10 punches of doom in stereo. The fans had saved it up for this match and were chanting huge for Georgia. Ciatso entered to give Team Florida a short-lived advantage. Steele cleaned house on Team Florida. Ciatso bled like a pro. Creed stunned Sez and Steele pinned him clean with the Steele City Bomb. Anarchy has set the standard for cage matches in Georgia. I’m spoiled after seeing all the great War Games matches at Anarchy. SFCW fans weren’t expecting anything like that and this was a perfectly respectable cage match.

Jagged Edge immediately turned on Steele. Ashworth ran to ringside to cut off Creed. Cruz locked the cage door, and Steele was trapped inside with Jagged and Team Florida. They used a chair on Steele and wrapped a chain around his neck. Steele was a bloody mess before it was over. Pandemonium reigned with babyface trying to scale the cage and being knocked down by Team Florida while the ferocious beating continued on Steele. Jagged taunted the fans. “I’m from Chicago! Who cares about Georgia?” Security came down with the key and five security guys got into the cage to shield Steele. Jagged somehow made it to the back without being attacked by an angry mob. The fans were ready to kill Jagged. They made an appropriately huge production out of getting Steele from the cage to the dressing room. 

The conclusion was terrific – an enraged crowd and that panicky, chaotic feeling in the building with Steele helplessly trapped inside the cage. Jagged Edge has massive heat coming out of this. My only quarrel was Jagged going full force against Team Florida during the match. Why not have Jagged enter last, turn on Steele before the finish and keep the thing with Florida going?