PWG The Secret of Guerrilla Island 6/28/2009

Written by: Jim

The Secret of Guerrilla Island
June 28, 2009

Before the opening bout, Excalibur holds a ten bell salute to Mitsuharu Misawa.

Johnny Goodtime vs Charles Mercury
This is Goodtime’s PWG debut. He was originally booked against Human Tornado, but due to Bryan Danielson’s staph infection, several matches had to be altered. Luckily for Goodtime, he’s against The Chuck. Goodtime goes all out to impress the fans. Goodtime picks up the victory following his modified DDT. I guess he calls it the JTT? It’s a standard DDT, only Goodtime tucks Mercury’s knee against his stomach. Not much to say about the match other than Goodtime came off as very good. The fans in attendance seemed to be pretty into him. Mercury continues to come off as the guy who is just…there. Good enough start though. 2 Stars.

Chuck Taylor vs Human Tornado
A match made thanks to Danielson’s staph infection. I believe this was Taylor’s first match after having his head shaven by The Colony. It’s possible he worked some smaller show though. Early on, Taylor hides behind the ref before being forced to bust out some moves. Tornado busts out some even bigger moves with a huge dive on the outside, taking out several chairs. Taylor locks in an unique submission where he crisscrosses Tornado’s hands, has a head scissors all while Tornado is in the seated position. Tornado hits TNG (?) which drops Taylor on his head. Chuckie T and Tornado battle it out to be hit either another TNG or the Awful Waffle. Taylor wins out and hits the Awful Waffle to score the victory. Quite the upset in my eyes. Maybe I was just underestimating Taylor, but I didn’t think he had a chance in winning. Maybe Danielson’s staph infection turned out good for Taylor. Nothing spectacular here, but it was entertaining nonetheless. It’s more interesting to watch knowing that these two may be the next PWG tag champions than for the quality of the match. Still, the show is getting better as it goes on. 2 1/2 Stars.

Malachi Jackson and Jerome “LTP” Robinson vs The Cutler Brothers
This is LTP’s PWG debut. Excalibur openly admits that he has no idea what LTP even stands for. Basic story of the match is Jackson and LTP are the underdogs using their flashy spots against the bigger Cutlers. Neither Cutler is too concerned with their smaller opponents so they’re not taking the match as seriously as they should. LTP ends up stealing the show with some of his spots. He reminds me so much of 2 Cold Scorpio. Despite coming close a few times, the faces fall to the Cutler’s sick spike piledriver. The match served it’s purpose with debuting LTP and Cutlers get a much needed victory. All four guys are ones to keep your eyes on in this new decade. 2 Stars.

Kenny Omega vs Roderick Strong
This was originally going to be Omega and Taylor vs Strong and Bryan Danielson. But once again, the staph infection caused some change in booking. Joining Excalibur at the commentating table is Davey Richards. Acting as if he’s a grizzly vet talking about wrestling Tully Blanchard, Dick the Bruiser and working in places such as Pensacola and Saskatoon while hating on everything new age. It’s God damn hilarious, but at times distracts me from the quality match. First time around, I’d watch the match without the commentary just so you can concentrate on the match. However, be sure to then listen to the commentary because Davey is gold. This match starts with a lot of comedy, but builds towards an intense hard hitting match. A fun spot occurs when they’re both on their back on the mat and they take turns laying one hand on the other, knocking it off and laying the hand on the other opponent. Up on the top rope, Strong superplexes Omega. Both men traps their legs together resulting in a double pin. The fans are chanting for 5 minutes and both men agrees to it. Before they can lock up, Omega just leaves for some good heat. Before Strong can leave, Omega comes back out to talk on the mic. Calling Excalibur “El Generico”, Omega agrees to one extra minute, but Excalibur has to count on the mic. The match restarts with Excalibur having the single most inconsistent count around. There’s a large amount of quick roll-ups. Strong hits a German Suplex on Omega, but gets the three at 61 seconds, resulting in a draw still. Omega tries to leave, but Excalibur tries to stop him by saying how everyone will think he’s a coward. “He’s yella!” – Davey. Omega heels it up and just leaves. This was such a bizarre match. Despite having the lame original draw, it was a draw after a pretty exciting match. With all of the weirdness after that fall, it’s difficult to figure out what to make out of this thing. As far as I’m concerned, the actual match ended with the double pin and anything else was just post-match events. The combination of a quality match along with Davey Richards leaving me laughing during most of it left me very entertained. What this does accomplish is that it makes me want to see their BOLA match even more. Despite all of the wackiness, this is the best match thus far. 3 3/4 Stars.

El Generico vs Scott Lost
Human Tornado is suppose to join the commentating station, but is nowhere to be found. After awhile, LTP comes out to make not only his PWG debut, but his PWG commentating debut all on the same night. Despite typically hating Scott Lost and anything Lost does, he actually impressed me. He had several really good spots into an unique 619 variation when he was chased around the ring by El Generico, only to swing around the ring post, come back under the bottom rope and nail the kick on Generico. Who knew Lost had it in him to impress me with such a cool looking spot? Lost nails the Superman Spear and runs back to the other corner only to be surprised with a vicious Ole Kick! Damn, that was a fun spot. Lost counters a half nelson suplex into the Big Fat Kill kick to pick up the surprise win. I’m not sure what surprised me more, Generico losing or Lost impressing me. Lost has a few rather good spots. As long as he can figure out a way to make the rest of his act entertaining, I may have to cross him off of my hate list. 3 1/4 Stars.

Davey Richards vs Nick Jackson
Matt Jackson is away at a funeral, although I have to wonder why CK and Nick was here. This has some decent backstory as Nick Jackson pinned Richards back at Gentle Art of Making Enemies to retain the tag titles against Richards and Roderick Strong. Early on in the match, Davey heads to the back and returns with a shovel. I guess that’s how they did it back in Pensacola in ’72. Jackson botches a closeline by selling it despite not even touching Davey. DR driver. Jackson once again fucks up after Davey nails the shooting star press, but Jackson fails to kick out before the three so the ref is forced to stop it on his own. It’s completely obvious that it’s BS and the fans are reactions towards it. Richards locks in a Texas Cloverleaf and Jackson taps out. I’m not sure if it was supposed to happen or not, but the referee call at the end of the match was horrible if it was a botch. More than anything, this match can be a reality check for Nick Jackson. I love the Young Bucks and think that they’re really getting good, but due to his lack of experience, Nick still needs a lot of work when it comes to singles matches. Take the closeline botch for example. Only Davey and Nick knows who really fucked up. However, even if Davey was the one who messed it up, if you don’t get hit, don’t sell. People will instantly forget about the opponent messing up when you’re selling to the air. The match did have it’s moments though. However for 2009, it’s not one of Davey’s best matches. Jackson’s botches at the very end were the worst things possible for the match. Davey tried to pull something really good out of Nick, but Nick just wasn’t ready for this. 2 3/4 Stars.

Joey Ryan vs Necro Butcher – No DQ Match
Ryan is wearing jeans and a shirt to the match. If Ryan wins, Chris Hero may give him a future title shot. Early on, Joey brings back the chain that Aries used on Necro at Express Written Consent. They brawl to the outside where Necro pulls out a pair of scissors. Necro nails Joey with the pair and scrapes it across Joey’s forehead. At which point, Necro licks the pair of bloody scissors. Holy. Shit. Joey Ryan is pulled to the various walls of the building and has his head scraped against them, leaving bloody markings everywhere he goes. Back in the ring, Ryan concentrates on Necro’s leg getting in some great leg work. Necro can barely even stand on the bad leg. Back on the outside, Necro throws Rick Knox into some chairs just for shit and giggles. Necro Butcher sunset flips Ryan and has Joey down for several seconds. By time Knox is able to get back into the ring, Ryan kicks out before three. Necro ends up upset at Rick Knox which only makes Necro seem as intelligent as Jim Duggan. While Necro goes to pick up a chair, Joey Ryan kicks it up into his face. Superkick follows it up to give Ryan the main event win. After the match, Necro knocks Ryan out with a chair. While Necro is in pain in the middle of the ring, a man (The owner of the building I believe?) yells that Necro is banned from the building. This was a weird choice for the main event, however; there’s the possibility that the original main event was the Hybrid Dolphins vs Omega and Taylor. For a Necro match, I really enjoyed it. Joey Ryan is quickly becoming one of my favorite west coast wrestlers. He has the charisma, character, mic skills and can deliver in the ring. The sick nature of the blood and Ryan ensuring a good match with the leg work leaves me happy. I should really check out some of Ryan’s ROH work. 3 1/2 Stars.

Overall
It wouldn’t be PWG if they didn’t have some issue with wrestlers not showing up for whatever reason. Losing Dragon for this show was a pretty big blow since they already wouldn’t have Chris Hero (In Japan) and with Matt Jackson not here, that meant there wouldn’t be any title matches. Despite all of the problems before the show even started, they ended up delivering a good C-show. We get the exciting debuts of Johnny Goodtime and LTP. Meanwhile, 3 matches ended up being 3 stars or higher. The biggest news of the event is Scott Lost finally impressing me. That alone made the show worth watching.