Young Boy Cooper's Birthday Bash -- Fayetteville on October 25

Photos by Matt Watkins From Larry Goodman: Dirty Finish was the first bonafide backyard wrestling show I ever attended and my last, most li...

Photos by Matt Watkins

From Larry Goodman:

Dirty Finish was the first bonafide backyard wrestling show I ever attended and my last, most likely. The occasion was Cooper Cumbee's birthday. He's got a ready-made pro wrestling name by birth, but he goes by Young Boy Cooper.  He had made it his mission to put on the worst indy wrestling event in Georgia this year. His meticulously laid plans may have been spoiled by one match in particular.

The event was held in Cooper's backyard. His mom's house is at the end of the road, down a long dirt driveway: feels like you're in the wilderness, in actuality, two miles from downtown Fayetteville, such as it is.

The driveway and garage served as a makeshift "dressing room". The crew was  the intersection of ACTION Wrestling, TWE Chattooga, Blood & Honey  and DWA. 

A smattering of chairs were set out for friends and what not. The audience was essentially the wrestlers that did not happen to be wrestling at the time. Cooper's mom was grilling hot dogs and hamburgers during the festivities.

Travis 3000 sang the national anthem. He was totally out of synch with the recorded anthem music which ended way before Techno finished singing. Intentional or not, I can't say but T3K's singing was an assault on the ears.

Don Miguel was the ring announcer, from color commentator at SHW alongside the announcer of the year to this. Is there is no announcing gig  beneath this man?

Refs were Adam Hunter (why Adam, why?), Garrett Kent and Chase (just Chase).

(1) Carson Rogers won the Jacey North Memorial Battle Royal (10 minutes). Other competitors were trainees JJ Colton, The-O and Khalil Kortez, AWOL, King Cole, Prime Works Off Work (still the worst name in pro wrestling) and Rob Weathers. AWOL bitched about missing the Broncos game on TV. Weather wanted out in a hurry and was gone in less than 60 seconds. It came down to Rogers, AWOL, Prime Works and Cole. Prime Works went flying over the top rope unassisted. AWOL clocked Cole with his megaphone and got him over the top rope and their second attempt. AWOL delivered his default move, a soul-crushing version of Take 5  and should have won the match but he fucked up (shocking, I know) and lost. 

The show was well on its way to achieving Cooper's goal. Carson probably wished he lost given what happened next.

(2) Hardcore Hillbilly defeated Carson Rogers in 4:30. HCHB wheeled a shopping cart full of light tubes across the lawn. Hillbilly unloaded on Carson with light tube upon light tube.  Carson was leaking blood from his forehead and back. I didn't see how HCHB pinned him, not that it mattered. It was all about ridiculously gratuitous violence.

Nothing like a little mercury dust to add to the ambience.

(3) Briefcase in a Tree: Prince Moulay defeated Dante Darko, Atrix, Hakeem Young, Vivian Cross and Neji Ichiban in 8:30. There was no briefcase. The prize was an Amazon box hung from a branch of a nearby tree. After a round of whiffed superkicks, everyone made a run for the tree but nobody was able to climb it. Darko headscissred Moulay onto a pile of leaves. The creative peak of the match was Atrix doing a flip dive out the tree limbs without breaking his freaking neck. 

Cross and Atrix managed to climb up and fight over getting to  the Amazon box, which got shook loose and fell into Moulay's hands as he was lying flat on his back below the tree branch.

Moulay certainly wished he had lost given what happened next. 

Moulay opened the Amazon box to find a giant dildo inside. Darko strapped the dildo to his knee. Moulay took a reverse atomic drop on the dildo. Moulay was then on the receiving end of a five-way superkick.

(4) Hunter Drake defeated KJ Valentine in a Trampoline Match (10 minutes). 

Drake checked out the trampoline by doing a back flip on it. I noted referee Garrett Kent had a disgusting wad of fake pubic hair hanging out of his pants. That was tough to get past. The giant dildo was brought back into play. KJ moved, allowing Drake to destroy himself with a homicidal cannonball into a chair. Valentine gave Drake a destroyer. They did spots involving a giant log next to the ring. 

A spider got on KJ's back and met its demise via chair shot. They did a spanish fly off the trampoline through a bridged board. Drake pinned Valentine with a 450 off the trampoline and stuck the landing.  A "five stars" chant broke out.

There's an element of danger in every pro wrestling match. This was one had more than the norm and really was an impressive stunt show that took full advantage of the environment. 

(5) Darian Bengston defeated Nasty  Leroy to retain the Action World Championship in 11 minutes. It was stipulated that Leroy was not allowed to shoot on Bengston during the match. 

Leroy evidently does not know how to take a snap mare. Try as he might, technical wizard Bengston could not make it happen. Leroy barred Bengston's arm and gave him a taste of his own medicine. 

Bengston had to resort to gutter tactics. The crowd got behind Leroy. Bengston was losing his mind when Leroy kicked out of his cutter at one. Leroy then pinned Bengston and had the ACTION title in hand before referee Adam Hunter saw Bengston's foot on the ropes.

Leroy had Bengston ready to tap to a crossface when Bengston got Leroy's shoulders to the mat long enough to eke out a victory.

Bengston wanted to shake hands. Leroy shook...and knocked Bengston on his ass with a body block. Laid the champion out and called him a rat bastard. Leroy said he was PG but Bengston would make him R-rated next time. I shudder to think.

At this point, it looked like Cooper had worst show of the year in the bag. Things change.

(6) Last Blood: Sam Axl defeated Nathan Mowery in 9 minutes. 

 

Sam has moxie. Not a large woman, she's long on determination. Sam was giving as good as she was getting and swings a mean cookie sheet. 

I also liked the way she walked up to introduce herself and shake my hand before the show.

Right at the jump, Sam stapled Mowery's forehead and he was bleeding copiously in not time at all. Mowery carved Sam's head with a jagged edge of a busted light tube and chewed on the glass. A plexiglass sheet got busted. Lights tubes got busted over Sam's head. Mowery gave Sam a frightful DVD into the glass shards. 

Sam whacked Mowery with a bat lined with plastic forks. Sam took a sitout powerbomb onto a tube-loaded door and got a well-earned "she's hardcore" chant. Mowery then gave Sam a burning hammer onto a styrofoam chest with plastic cutlery sticking out of the top. 

Enough was enough, Cooper and Matt Griffin attacked Mowery with light tubes.

I guess the idea of the finish was Mowery was still bleeding and Sam wasn't, though I might have that completely wrong. 

This and the trampoline match kinda spoiled the worst show thing. They put on a solid, credible death match.

(7) Matt Griffin (with Young Boy Cooper & Young Boy Sam) defeated Chaynmale (with Travis 3000) in a no DQ match (13:45). On the heels of Dynamic Wrestling Association's triumphant debut event at Buford Mall the night before, ChaynMale arrived just as the match was supposed to get underway. 

They had no choice but to "call it in the ring" with the assistance of the spots Griffin had scrawled on his wrist tape and shameless John Cena-like spot calling.

Leave it to Griffin to hog the spotlight and go too long. He more than made up for that by attempting to choke Chaymale out with the giant dildo.

Griffin tried to pick Chaynmale up. Chaynmale deadweighted Griffin and collapsed on top of him. Griffin applied a bearhug. 

Halftime was called. The combatants went to their corners and to be ministered to by their seconds like it was a boxing match. 

They picked up right where they left off after halftime with the bearhug. Out came the indy tropes -  slow-motion spots ala PWG and the Orange Cassidy love taps. 

Griffin got a "499" chant. My favorite moment -- Griffin yelling "It's a joke!" after Chaynmale mistakenly potatoed him.

Griffin hulked up and tore the t-shirt off his toned torso, then finished Chaynmale off with a People's Leg Drop.

They gave it their all to put the show over the top for the award. It may not have been enough. I was entertained and came away feeling like these misfit toys (count me among them) enjoy each other's company.