That's Just Bad Part 3: So Where's My Show?

IWA Mid-South was one of the indies to watch in the mid 2000s, it used some of the best wrestlers and they put on some of the best shows. However in 2009 the company was a shell of its former self and this show “Turn Back the Clock” is a prime example of how things changed. IWA MS has a reputation for drawing pretty small crowds which I found was sometimes true but they had a spell of time where the crowds were pretty good, this is not one of those times. So let’s head back to May 3^rd 2009 for Turn Back the Clock.

Stephane Saint vs. Alexander Rudolph vs. C-Red: For those who don’t know C-Red is a manager for Da Soul Touchaz most of the time. The other 2 look like general indy guys, those 2 start by trading forearms. C-Red hits a nice back elbow on Rudolph, him and Saint do a very poor double hip toss to throw the other guy out. Rudolph pulls Saint out and slams him, then goes in and throws out C-Red. Very typical 3 way with one guy being thrown out and the other 2 doing a match. Saint and Rudolph seem to mess up a suplex spot, Rudolph then hits a poor knee to the chest of Saint for the win. Just a complete mess here that went 3 minutes.

Hunter Matthews vs. Alex Whybrow: Alex is better known as the late Larry Sweeney, who is looking pretty rough here, comes out in a Riberia steak house jacket, jeans and no shoes. Hunter jumps before the bell but Alex comes back quickly. Hunter is wearing the other indy style of outfit being a singlet and tights with stars. Alex gets a jaw breaker and gets a headlock. I should note that at this time Alex wasn’t working a lot of places and was in a down period of his career, I’m guessing he’s working here for the love of wrestling. Alex hits a nice suplex which gets claps from the 20-30 people in the crowd. Alex goes back to the headlock and yells “Take it Easy” every time. Hunter fights back and hits a weird dropkick, goes for a piledriver but Alex reverses to the 68 Comeback Special and top rope elbow for the win. Meh this wasn’t great, you got the feeling that Alex didn’t want to be there and it showed a bit.

Ninja Bill Open Challenge: Stupid gimmick comes out, literally the guy is dressed as a ninja. The referee he comes out with then rolls him up and counts the 3 himself. There was a point to this somewhere I swear.

Michael Elgin vs. Marshe Rockett: Remember the Soldier Boy dance? No one else did in 2009 but Da Soul Tourchaz didn’t drop it and wouldn’t until 2011! Trading arm locks to start, a very different Elgin to today’s a lot bigger. Elgin is using some lucha moves to reverse Marshe honestly didn’t expect that here. We get a break from the action when Marshe goes for an Ace Crusher and Elgin bails to the outside, when he comes back in he does a kick to the cut but Marshe comes back with a cross body and dropkick after being whipped.  Elgin catches a jumping kick and hits a backbreaker now that’s shades of today’s Elgin, this starts the attack on the back including a nice powerslam from Elgin. Elgin runs to Marshe, who is in the ropes, but he moves and we then get a dive from Marshe over the top to the outside but Elgin gets the offense right back including a body slam. Marshe reverses a suplex by landing on his feet and hits a neckbreaker. Marshe hits 3 stiff clothesline with Elgin not going down, he then gets the jumping kick to knock him down. Another Ace Crusher attempt is reversed and Elgin gets a weird cross armed brainbuster looking thing for a 2. Elgin catches Marshe on the top and hits a top rope Frankensteiner for a 2, Scott Steiner would be proud or pissed he seems like an angry man. Elgin goes for a powerbomb but Marshe floats over goes for another Ace Crusher is pushed off, he then catches a kick and finally hits the crusher for a 2. Elgin reverses a sunset flip attempt by rolling through and hitting a seated lariat for a 2. Marshe then catches Elgin on the top but he fights him off and hits an amazing elbow drop, he got some serious height for a 2. Marshe catches Elgin again on the ropes and hits a super Ace Crusher for the win. A really good match between this two, you could tell they wanted to work hard and this is potentially the best match on the card it got a lot of time and really put over both men, also bit of a surprise with Marshe winning.

Trauma vs. Will Venator: Will looks like a bad fat Billy Graham rip off, and Trauma is fatter. Trauma gets the advantage from the start, gets a spinebuster and splash in the corner. Hits some mean chops in the corner and then hits the Pounce for the win. A squash match in the simplest of terms which probably went 1 minute if that.

Yellow Dog vs. Jason Hades: In my tribute to Brain Pillman I mentioned that the Yellow Dog gimmick was originally his. Dog shakes paws with Hades and then pretends to pee on him after a double stomp, Hades rolls through and kicks him in the face. Dog reverses a sunset flip but rubbing his tail in the face but Hades quickly comes back with kicks. The Dog here is actually Jason Strife who if you remember ran the show were Davey Richards & friends bailed on a few months back. Dog comes back with a top rope cross body, tries to get the fans to woof and results in nothing. Hades tries to climb up Dog and hit a clothesline on the way down he just hit a clothesline. Dog does the Kurt Angle running top tope belly to belly spot for a 2. He attempts a jumping DDT and Hades tries the Killswitch but we get the Fish out of water spot, Hade then gets a weird half & half, half tiger suplex the other half pumphandle for the win. This 2 tried to do a lot in a short amount of time and it wasn’t bad but they can do better.

Jimmy Jacobs & Drake Younger vs. Dingo & Jim Fannin: This is the main event and we’re 37 minutes into the show! For those who don’t know Jim was a manager in IWA MS so it seems any manager can wrestle here. I’m surprised the other 3 showed up with how this show has gone. Jacobs shows off his Light heavyweight title which he just claimed back from Jim at a previous show. Dingo & Jim do the easy heel move of walking through the “crowd” which in this case was mostly chairs. The match begins with the ref finding a whole range of weapons on Jim, the best thing is Dingo’s excuses for each thing. Jim & Drake start but both tag quickly. The Jims were in a feud at the same as were Drake & Dingo. It’s been 10 minutes since the last match and there’s been nothing here. Jacobs gets a headlock and uses a chain, which he stole from Jim and Dingo pretty much no sold it, that’s a finish in some places. Jacobs gets a nice suplex and things speed up a lot. Drake gets tagged in and uses the chain as well follows that with a flapjack and a version of the Muta lock. Jacobs goes after Jim on the outside and Dingo gets a baseball slide and we get the Hennig neck snap back in the ring. Drake does a hanging suplex where he walks around the ring very impressive, Drake is very under-rated in terms of his wrestling ability. Dingo gets a jumping knee to a seated Drake and this results in a tag to Jim who proceeds to do very little except choke. Drake comes back with an O’Connor Roll and a school boy but is cut off with a boot. Dingo gets a single leg Boston crab Drake gets the rope but after the 4 he pulls him back out into the hold. Jim finally does a wrestling move with a reverse chin lock but it didn’t last long. Drake gets a capture suplex when Dingo goes for a kick. Then we get the spirit of Ricky Morton with the “hot” tag from Drake to Jacobs. Drake gets Dingo in a fireman’s carry and Jacobs hits a senton which made it look like Drake was going to crumble but he hung on and got a Samoan bomb for a 2. Jacobs gets the End Time but they fall to the outside. Jacobs gets the End time again but Jim passes brass knux to Dingo who punches Jacobs and Fannin gets the pin. This is the best we could get in this match and it was the best you could expect. The 3 actual wrestlers worked their asses off and the crowd were into it.

Overall: This show clocked in at about 1 hour and 4 minutes of action which is insane for an indy. The lack of crowd really hurt this show as did the lack of actual action. You really got the sense that a lot of guys didn’t care on this show, you could of put more experience people with younger guys and gave them a chance to help them learn but instead of we got guys just killing them off stupidly fast. After watching this I can see why crowd numbers decreased for this company as this is the best they can give us for a show, I’m not asking for the world here but this something that gives me a bit more would be nice. An hour is less than most films these days.