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Alternative Pro Wrestling’s annual Halloween supercard, “Nightmare on Cherry Street” was the kind of indie show that restores faith in the future of what often appears to be a dying art form.
APW doesn’t have the most talented locker room around, but the wrestlers all work their asses off, and under the leadership of booker Jeremy Vain, they surely know how to tell stories.
The draw was the War Games, a match more than six months in the making, which built to a crescendo -- Team APW winning with top babyface and former APW Champion Anthony Henry forcing current champion Vain to submit. It was the third War Games match I’ve seen in as many months, and this blew the ones by NWA Anarchy and GCW completely away.
There were 200 people at the Royston Gym, mostly kids and young teenagers, and the energy level in the building was off the charts for most of the night. It is a huge help when a show is paced as well as this one was. They had the cage set up in under 15 minutes. The total running time for the evening was 2:15. APW is clearly doing a lot of things right, as the attendance for their regular weekly shows has grown over the past year.
Ring announcer Michael Gentry opened the show decked out like Count Dracula for the occasion.
(1) Jacoby Boykins & Vincent Sykks beat Tommy Daniels & Brett Taylor in 3:30. After Sykks (Dustin Knight’s partner in DIE once upon a time) and Taylor got the match off to a manorexic start, it was all power moves by the 300 pound Boykins. Good thing because the greenness of the opponents made little difference. Boykins rocket launched Sykks into a splash on Taylor for a cool finish.
(2) Jacob Ashworth beat Scott Mason in 4:58. Mason is a lanky kid. He’s going to have good size for a pro wrestler once he fills out. Mason recently started at APW in addition to working the TNT shows in Clayton. His heel personality needs work. Ashworth has improved dramatically as a babyface. Not that it was an overnight thing, but it was much clearer here than at Anarchy, because of the way Ashworth has been booked (won the APW tag team championship as Officially Unstoppable with Shadow Jackson). His offense looks believable and he connects with the crowd. Mason pulled the straps down to show he meant business. Ashworth won it by coming off the top rope to catch Mason with a bulldog.
(3) Matt Sells beat Slim J in 7:17. Match was beautifully laid out and executed. Sells is another guy that is showing a lot of improvement, and Slim was nothing short of terrific. The back story is that Sells lost his tag team partner Ryan Michaels to injury and hitched his wagon to J to climb back to the top. When their bid for the tag titles didn’t pan out, Sells turned on J. Sells got a mixed reaction coming out. That was true for a lot of the heels, and then the fans would be solid for the babyface once the match started. At the bell, J went right at Sells to aggressively take control of the match. After J scored a series of near falls, Sells raked the eyes before hitting a big move to take over. The hope spots and cutoffs were spot on. J hit a brainbuster for a near fall. However, Sells ducked away from J’s vaunted flying reverse DDT. Sells hit All Sells Final but J kicked out. J came back with a suplex combo to set up a moonsault. Sells upended J and hit a draping version of All Sells Final to beat J clean. J is taking some time off from APW, and he could not have put Sells over any stronger on his way out.
(4) Tommy Capone beat Adrian Hawkins. Capone is a tubby Italian gangster from Chicago. It’s a stretch. The kids went nuts for Hawkins (flying the Bret Hart color scheme) doing the bandana give away gimmick. Things went downhill from there. Capone looked a bit lost at times. Capone hit a sidewalk slam, then missed a splash taking the full brunt of it on his knees. Hawkins went for the Unprettier. Capone blocked it and hit a choke bomb deal for the pin. Capone is a regular so the finish made sense. I was told they had a better match last week. I hope so because this was a clunky affair.
(5) N*Style (Don E & Josh O) beat Armed & Dangerous (Lane Vasser & Johnny Dangerously) to retain the APW Tag Team Championship in 11:23. Of the pushed matches on the card, this was the only one that underperformed. It was the cunning chickenshits against the massive physical and athletic superiority of Armed & Dangerous. N*Style jumped the bell. A & D quickly roared back with stereo backdrops. N*Style ended up laid out in the dreaded north-south position. That’s usually an easy pop, but their execution sucked, pardon the pun. When N*Style tried to walk out, referee Harold James just stopped counting. Vasser has developed an impressive fallaway slam. Don had to jump in to save Josh. N*Style got heat on the smaller Dangerously. Vasser cleaned house but was victimized by N*Style’s finisher, a double team Samoan Drop. Dangerously jumped in and had Don pinned with La Magistral cradle, while Josh (the legal man) pinned Vasser. Finish was mucked up. It looked like Vasser draped an arm over Josh for a double pin by the babyfaces.
(6) Dustin Knight beat “Superstar” Aaron Lee (with Tommy Capone) to become a four time NWA North Georgia Champion in 15:12. This was way better than I ever thought possible for a Lee singles match of such length. Story was the key. Lee came into the match confident of retaining because of the injury inflicted to Knight’s arm. Lee jumped Knight in the aisle and destroyed his arm for several minutes. Knight finally hit a hanging basement dropkick, his first big offense of the match. Lee hit a hotshot for a near fall. Knight sold it great with the unraveled bandage flapping in the breeze. Lee went for a submission on the arm. Knight rallied with a jumping neckbreaker and applied a crossface. Knight’s selling of the arm was stellar except for that one piece of illogic. It could have worked, if he had sold agony when he released the hold, the idea being that he sacrificed his arm to do mortal damage to his opponent. Lee made the ropes. Lee hit Starstuck (RKO) and Knight rolled out of the ring. Once Knight was back inside, Lee covered but too much time had elapsed. Lee hit Starstuck again, and Knight got a foot on the ropes. In frustration, Lee tried to use the belt. No go. Knight then hit his signature flying bodypress for the pin.
(7) In the War Games match, Team APW (Anthony Henry & Kareem Abdul Jamar & Billy Buck & Shadow Jackson) beat Duncan Enterprises (APW Heavyweight Champion Jeremy Vain & Stryknyn & Chaos & Brandon Parker with Kevin Duncan) in 29:41. The beauty of this match was how they got so many of the little things right. Speaking as someone who sat second row for the first War Games ever held, it felt true to the original spirit of the gimmick. It was remarkably free of cluster moments and told a crystal clear story. Since winning the title, Vain had thrown every obstacle possible in Henry’s path, including his alliance with Duncan and the monster Chaos. They did a ringside coin flip to determine which team would have the man advantage. Super fan Bo Miller represented Team APW. With supreme confidence, Duncan called heads and for good reason. Duncan is an old style manager and an underrated promo guy (check out his work on the [url=www.youtube.com/alternativepro]APW Aftershock[/url] mini TV episodes) Buck and Parker started. They worked a nice piece of a drama about which one would take the first shot into the cage. That would be Parker. Vain entered with the fans hating on him bigtime. The numbers game took hold. The heels nailed Buck with a double superkick. Henry entered to the biggest pop thus far. Vain and Parker tried to head him off at the cage door. Henry exploded 1 on 2, damaging both of them with the Texas Cloverleaf. Stryknyn was next. His spear is over and he used it on Henry and Buck. 3 on 2 mayhem ensued. Jamar entered with Zig Zags on Parker and Vain. Stryknyn had Jamar lined up for the spear, but Jamar saw it coming, and Stryknyn went head first into the cage, drawing the first blood of the match. Duncan Enterprises was in a world of hurt when Chaos entered with a round of choke slams that left Team APW laying. Stryknyn was wearing the crimson mask. Jackson was the last one in. He superplexed Chaos. Duncan slid a chair to Vain. Jackson stripped the chair away. Vain took the Flair flip bump of the top, except he flew a lot further than Flair ever did. Team APW gave Duncan’s guy (minus Chaos) a triple 10 punches of doom. They couldn’t hang with Team APW, but Chaos came to their rescue. Jamar jumped on the back of Chaos and stabbed him in the ear with his comb. Sick stuff as he drew hardway blood. Strykyn wiped out Jamar with a Doomsday Device lariat. Jackson and Henry were bleeding, but Vain and Stryknyn were bleeding worse. Vain was a complete mess. He came into the match with his right eye swollen up like a balloon. Vain put Henry in the figure four. He refused to give up. Team APW took out the other three members of Duncan Enterprises, but they still had to contend with Chaos. Jamar kicked Chaos low. Buck superkicked him. Jackson hit him with the 1031. Henry hit the spot of the night - a spectacular frogsplash from the top of the cage. A roll of duct tape was introduced. They lugged Chaos into the corner and taped his arms to the bottom rope. Vain tried to climb out of the cage. Henry pulled Vain down exposing his buttocks in the process. Henry locked Vain in the Cloverleaf. Fans were on their feet chanting for the Vain to tap out and went nuts when he did. Afterwards, Team APW got Duncan in the cage and hog tied him with the duct tape. The picture of babyface triumph was complete.
