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| Photo courtesy of PCW |
Platinum Championship Wrestling presents Tag Team Season Championship
What-a-Deal Building, Covington, Ga.
PCW’s long standing tradition of the Tag Team Season gets
twerked for 2023; instead of several month’s worth of tag matches with a convoluted
system of points for wins, losses, and draws, they are doing a single night tournament
to crown a winning team. Teams entered are announced as follows: The Exotic
Youth, Washington Bullets, The Creeps, All-Star Special, the Eastside Ronins, Gold
Standard-Xavier Reyes and Hunter James, and Eddie Honcho and Hawk Thomas. A
Mystery team will be the 8th entrant, could it be the feared and
legendary team of the Warhorses? Nope, it’s the Midnight Premiers.
Jeff Jobs will handle ring announcing duties and will join
DJ Ton-Nek and Mike Fullilove at the announcing table. Referees are: Darryl Hall
and Nathaniel Spivey.
I counted 55 people in the seats.
Brian Blaze starts the show welcoming the crowd and explaining
the whys and whereofs of the new format. Blaze welcomes out all the teams from
the back for a group photo. They all come out and pose with the trophies, with
some words being exchanged between some teams, but no one started any fights.
1: The Eastside Ronin (Duncan Mitchell Avecilla and Cedric Terrell
with Trey Shaw and The Warden) vs. Midnight Premier (Nate Mansions and Marcus
Menos).
Warden’s carrying around a motorcycle helmet. Gee, I wonder
if that will get used at some point tonight? Saw Midnight Premier at and AWWA
show. Meadows shows up Terrell in the early going, Terrell’s short fuse is lit.
Some sloppiness with Mansions and Terrell. Meadows takes a kick to the head from Avecilla and
the heat is on him. Hope spot and hot tag after an enziguri to Avecilla.
Mansions’ running wide and plants Avecilla with a delayed codebreaker, but
Avecilla’s foot was in the ropes. Terrell sneaks around the ring and pulls
Meadows off the apron right before Meadows can make the tag and Avecilla takes
out Meadows while Terrell throws Mansions through 3 rows of chairs. Time 12:50.
With the Freebird rules in effect, I can easily see the
Ronin in the finals as no one in this team will be wrestling 3 matches.
Midnight Premier are fairly new to the state and are going to what promotions they
can.
2: The Varsity Imports (Xavier Reyes and Hunter James) vs.
Eddie Honcho and Hawk Thomas.
The Imports come to the ring with the SFCW Tag belts. Honcho
and Thomas get all the love from the crowd, with the usual Honcho shenanigans. Reyes
throws Honcho down, showing off his strength and does it again. Honcho responds
with some grappling and Reyes responds with some hits. Heavy-hitter Hawk’s in
and he leaves for Reyes and James on the mat. James and Reyes in the corner and
Honcho’s gives them the stinkface. Honcho with the purple-nurple on James.
Honcho and Thomas with the quick tags. Blind tag to James and Reyes clips the
leg of Thomas and the heat is on him. James targets the back of Thomas.
Lariat from nowhere leaves both Thomas and Reyes down and
Thomas tags in Honcho. Honcho runs wild on Reyes and James. Thomas makes a
blind tag, leaving Honcho confused. James pulls Honcho out of the ring. Reyes
and Thomas are throwing haymakers at each other. Reyes gets caught up in the
ropes, James sneaks in from behind and smacks Thomas with one of the belts as
Ref Hall was dealing with Reyes. Thomas gets pinned from that at 11:39.
Honcho was frustrated with Thomas and nut shots him and
delivers an avalanche. A smack to the face and Honcho throws Thomas out of the
ring and into the plywood wall on the entrance ramp. Honcho’s tired of being a
loser. Honcho throws Thomas into the wall again and a light fixture falls down
from the ceiling. The refs and Blaze come out to check on Thomas and help him
to the back.
Looks like the PCW crowd will be getting a vicious side
of Honcho going forward. Good.
3: The Creeps (Irving West and Andey Ripley) vs. The
All-Star Special (William Huckaby and Jay 2Strong).
The Creeps come out wearing white robes, possibly liberated from
a hotel somewhere. Allegedly. Some members of the crowd are wondering where HMB
Hanson’s at. Well, he’s attending to his very pregnant wife. Jay offers his
hand to Ripley and they shake. 2Strong and Huck don’t seem to be on the same
page or menu; Huck insinuates that 2Strong is on probation. 2Strong being nice
to Ripley backfires and he gets beat on by the Creeps. 2Strong muscles West
back to Huck and Huck destroys West’s chest with a chop. 2Strong wants to do
the switching vertical suplex but West reverses it and 2Strong gets beat on
again. Tag out to Huck and Huck and Rip face off; Rip’s laying in some strikes
to the chest of Huck to some effect. Huck with the right hand of God into the
jaw of Rip. Someone in the crowd says that you can’t hit a girl, Huck responds
with happy Trans Visual Day.
2Strong back in and Rip’s taking the heat. Two Amigos, then
a falcon’s arrow for a near fall. Huck picks up Rip, Rip squirms out and shoves
Huck into 2Strong who had tagged in. West in and leaps from the second
turnbuckle and right into the fist of Huck. Huck wants a double team, West
turns it around and sends Huck into 2Strong and Huck’s out of the ring. Double
team on 2Strong and he gets pinned at 12:37 by West.
Continuing thread with A.S.S. and 2Strong that has played
out in other promotions. It will be interesting to see where it leads.
4: The Exotic Youth (Bryce Cannon, Zach Mosely, and Cornelious
Pepperbottom) vs. The Washington Bullets (Jon and Trey Williams).
Pepps looses the rock, paper scissors so it will be Cannon
and Mosley in this match. This is Mosley’s second or third match back from
surgery, looking good. Mosley’s left arm getting the abuse from the Bullets.
Versace stomps by the Bullets on Mosley. Cannon prefers Gucci and rushes at the
Bullets, but the Bullets trip him up so Cannon lands face first into the crotch
of Mosley; more Versace stomps with Cannon’s face hitting Mosley’s crotch. EY
bail out of the ring to regroup.
Please excuse me while I snigger for a minute.
Back in the ring, Cannon trips up Jon and Mosley does some
finger manipulation on Jon’s hand. Jon gets choked by both of Cannon’s Polo
shirts when Ref Hall is distracted. Jon’s in beg trouble and he gets tossed out
of the ring. Pepps gets some cheap shots in while Hall is dealing with Trey. Jon
nails Mosley with a leaping piledriver from the ring apron back into the ring
and makes the tag to Trey. Trey going off on all three members of EY and almost
pins Mosley with a leaping leg drop.
Double team by the bullets and Mosley just gets a leg on the
rope. Cannon in and sends Jon out of the ring. Double team on Trey, Jon just
gets into the ring to break it up. All four men take shots at each other and
all four men are down. Cannon and Trey are up; Cannon and Mosley collide in the
corner. Trey and Jon look for the Marion Berry and land it. Hall goes for the
count and Pepps pulls him out of the ring. Jon tries to splash down on him, but
Pepps backs out of the way. Pepps continues to distract Hall on the floor and
Cannon smashes the frat paddle over the head of Trey and pins him at 12:48.
The 4 quarter-final matches were an interesting blend of
styles with some story lines being tossed about.
Intermission.
5: The Varsity Imports (Reyes and James)
vs. The Creeps (West and Ripley)
Creeps steal the Imports jackets as the Imports were
preening in the corner. They put them on and parade around with them on as
James and Reyes throw a tantrum. The Creeps put James’s jacket on Ref Hall, he
looks great in gold. West and James start out, Reyes gives James a shoulder
massage before the action starts and a wonder bra chant emanates from the crowd,
sending James into a tizzy. He’s begging Hall to throw those fans out of the
building. West takes the early heat from James and Reyes.
West trying to fight back against James, Reyes distracts
Hall while the tag happens. Hall gets Rip out of the ring and more punishment
to West. Figure four on West, and he makes the ropes, more punishment to the
leg of West. James goes for the Fig 4 again and west shoves him off into Reyes.
Tag to Rip, and rip takes down James and almost gets the pin, but Reyes stops him.
James tries to do a Guerrero with one of the tag belts, Rip reverses it and
James is left holding the belt. Hall sees the belt and tries to take it away
from James. James lets go and stumble back over Rip and Rip rolls him up at
that for the win at 11:52.
James gets a cry baby chant directed at him.
6: The Eastside Ronin (Trey Shaw and The Warden with Duncan Avecilla
and Cedric Terrell) vs. Exotic Youth (Cannon, Pepperbottom, and Mosley).
A rare heel vs. heel match, I think EY have more fans
thought. Cannon’s got shorts on, so it looks like Pepps and Mosley for this
match. Very much Freebird rules for both teams. Pepps has Shaw off guard with
his quickness. Pepps wants to walk the ropes, Shaw yanks him off and head butts
him on the way down. A 2 for 1 senton for Shaw on Pepps and Mosley. The Ronins
are doing more heel work here. Mosley fighting
back and takes out both Shaw and Warden with a second rope moonsault.
Tag to Pepps and he’s flying all over the ring, knocking down the Ronin. Warden
shoves Mosley off the top turnbuckle and Mostly crotches himself. Shaw takes
care of Pepps for the win at 6:13.
A quick intermission before the main event. Next show is the
second Friday of April.
Ronin storm the ring. Avecilla says the rules say all
members of the team must compete, everyone in the Ronin has competed, except
for the newest member of the Ronin. Avecilla brings out Hakeem
Main event: The Eastside Ronin (Avecilla and Hakeem with
Warden, Trey Shaw, and Cedric Terrell) vs. The Creeps.
West and Ripley have got be exhausted by now; they try to be
enthusiastic with their entrance, but are walking gingerly to the ring. Avecilla
was in the first match so he’s rested. Avecilla’s up in Ripley’s grill and Rip
smacks him. Hakeem’s in and muscles over Rip for a suplex. Rip’s taking some major
hits from the Ronin. Hakeem tosses Rip over to West, West gingerly gets into
the ring, Ronin start beating him down. They work over the already damaged leg
of West. I’ve never seen Hakeem before, he’s very vicious. Duncan gives West a
free shot, West unloads but it’s not very effective. Duncan with a bear hug,
don’t see someone of Duncan’s size do that often. Ankle lock on West and with
Ripley being restrained out on the floor, West is forced to tap at 9:19. The
Eastside Ronin are the 2023 PCW Tag Team Season Champions
The Ronin parade in and around the ring with the trophies while
a disgusted crowd looks on.
Final Thoughts:
Well, as expected, The Eastside Ronin really worked the
rules of the tournament to their favor. The Creeps never could get anything going
in the match; both West and Rip were basically running on empty.
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