Hometown Indies

[cm funk]

Closest thing to a local for me is In Your Face Wrestling which runs out of Ballston Spa, NY....near Albany. Never been to a show, looks like they run every couple of months. They're advertising Justin Credible for their next show, and past shows have had guys like Shelton Benjamin, Guido, Boogeyman, Finley and Val Venis. I'm curious what kind of crowds they draw.

 

Tommy Dreamer's House of Hardcore is based in Poughkeepsie, NY which I believe would be the next closest, but they don't run many shows. They do have a show coming up next month headlined by Tommy Dreamer & TERRY FUNK vs. Sean Waltman & Lance Storm. I so badly want to go to this as I assume it will be the Funker's last match (yeah, I know) but I don't think I'll be able to that day. Dreamer loads up the card with stars too, the highlight of this one being GOLDUST in a match that was booked before he went back to WWE.

[cheapshot]

I am from Blackpool, England; and if anyone has followed British Wrestling / William Regal's career you will know how Blackpool played a large part in British Wrestling in the past.

From the shows that were on in Blackpool Tower Circus, to the '£10 if you can survive for 3 minutes with a wrestler in the ring' at the Pleasure Beach to all the other spot shows around the resort.

ALL the major WoS names have worked in Blackpool at some point; timing is everything though. WoS went in 1988, I didn't start really taking a big interest in Wrestling until 1991 so I never had a chance to see any of the WoS in Blackpool as a kid *sigh*. More recently a promotion called UWA ran their second set of tapings out of the Ice Arena of the Pleasure Beach in 1998 that I attended.

All Star (Dixon) has run Blackpool forever, and he has a weekly show in the summer months at the Winter Gardens as well as spot shows on the same day at two of the holiday camps in the area.

[soup23]

 

I got to witness this touching fairy tale live.

[Log]

At least the dude put on his good Dale Jr. sleeveless t shirt for the occasion.

[Exposer]

The best part about that last vid is the ring announcer yelling immediately after the engagement, "ALRIGHT Y'ALL ARE YOU READY FOR SOME MORE WRESTLIN!"

[Exposer]

The Tale of the Incomparable Wes Blaze

 

Going back to our previous discussion of one of the more highly touted individuals related to the periodic table "The Element" Dustin Hales we will now discuss his former colleague Wes "Oh My God!" Blaze.

 

Wes Blaze was given the birth name Wesley Davis. Young Wes was the son of a local independent professional wrestler who went by the name of Johnny Blaze. Johnny Blaze made sporadic appearances at the local indie promotion I frequented here in Chattanooga, UEW. He was more or less a jobber to the stars type and was not particularly engaging in the ring. He did however have a classic southern independent wrestling look. He was a big guy, kind of tall, but wasn't in all that great of shape. He had a thick brownish mustache and a tremendous mullet that stretched down to his shoulder blades. He was the sort of guy one might catch on the news after a meth lab bust. Well, his son Wes had many desires to be like his father. So, he began watching and talking about wrestling as a kid. In middle school, he met my brother Dustin. Dustin was huge into wrestling at the time so they would chatter constantly about what was going on in the "sport" at the time. As mentioned prior to this Dustin was big into backyard wrestling as was I. Wes, being the son of a professional athlete such as his father, felt inclined to take part in these wildly dangerous activities as well.

 

In the spring of 2002 Dustin and I began hanging out with Wes a good bit and we would converse on such hot topics as the return of the NWO or the unfortunate events pertaining to HHH's dog. One day, Wes asked Dustin and I if we wanted to join his backyard wrestling federation. Dustin and I discussed this with other members of our organization and chose to produce a joint promoted show similar to the early to mid 90s joint productions of New Japan Pro Wrestling and World Championship Wrestling. WCW and NJ may have had Fujinami, Hase, Ohtani, Liger, the Steiners, and Flair but we had "The Man" (Dustin in a mask), "The Element" (Dustin without a mask), Jaws (me), D.J "The Show" Lashus (our wrestling hub was located in his homestead), and "Scream" (portrayed by Wes Davis).

 

This show took place later that spring but not before some setbacks. Johnny Blaze had his own wrestling ring that he had in his side yard. This is not a lie. It was actually a nice ring with ropes, turnbuckles, and everything else in between. Wes had this plan where our show would take place in that very ring. So, we went to his house and tried the ring out. We all got on the turnbuckles and tried unsuccessfully to run the ropes. We were fully prepared to have this show take place in that ring. However, Johnny Blaze was having none of it. He nixed the whole plan with the real wrestling ring so we had to resort back to our traditional habits. That was wrestling on four king sized mattresses set up in D.J. Lashus's garage.

 

Sure enough, we had our joint show right there in the garage. We even had a crowd. The proud parents of the Hales brothers took themselves down the hill and joined us for this spectacular attraction. They actually paid us the large sum of a dollar a piece for admittance. This was a terrific show that had several match-ups with four or five well-trained athletes. In the opening match "The Man" defeated Jaws with a flying elbow drop from atop a couch's right arm and the show ended with a brutal ladder match between "The Element" and "Scream." We used a small step ladder and the belt kept falling down from the ceiling. Dustin and Wes spent the whole match readjusting the belt and holding the step ladder for each other but it was still one hell of match.

 

After that legendary card, Wes began to slowly turn away from our pack of friends and headed towards a real career as a professional wrestler. The last show he ever did with us was a taped card that coincidentally didn't involve a Hales brother. Unfortunately, I'm not sure that tape made much circulation. He might be most remembered by me for his tremendous attempt at the Rikishi close line bump where he did a 360 and smashed his nose on the ice cooler we used for "steel" steps. He bled everywhere. Wes moved on to bigger and better things. It wasn't long before he was in the wrestling ring. Myspace and Facebook photos proved these rumors true and Wes was becoming quite the young talent here in the area. He spent a long time at the recently defunct promotion TWA. There, he acquired his magnificent gimmick of Wes "Oh My God" Blaze. No one can truly compare to his great success in the past ten or so years since his famous joint production show in a garage. He still wrestles today all over the area. I have yet to see him live but I've taken a few looks at him online. With that, let's give a short look at an unforgettable introduction to the incomparable Wes Blaze.

 

[Dylan Waco]

Awesome Wes Blaze write up Devon. He's got a shot at my top five hundred. Not sure he's a top fifty local guy, but there is a lot of local talent in that area.

 

There is a ton that should be written about TWA but Devon isn't the guy to do it and neither am I. I will say they were a local promotion that ran for twenty years which is fucking nuts when you think about it

[concrete1992]

I can't touch some of these golden posts. At 20 years old and only having attended my first indy show at 15 I think I'm just gonna start there and work my way through my experiences at my hometown indy, Squared Circle Wrestling (2CW).

 

At the age of 15 there were 3 promotions in America then I was even aware of in WWE, TNA, and ROH. I knew others existed but if you would have asked me to name a single one I doubt I would have been able to give an answer. Being these were my teen years I was looking for something different and that is when I stumbled upon Ring of Honor and I was in awe. Living near Binghamton, NY, without the ability to drive and even if I did not really wishing to ever drive to NYC or Philly (still ZERO interest), I had zero clue how I'd be able to see anything resembling this unique and amazing stuff happening in this relatively small promotion like ROH. Like any person would do I took to the internet hoping to find something and I stumbled upon 2CW which ran shows in Binghamton. I saw they had brought in Samoa Joe as well as Bryan Danielson to their shows in the past so they had to be somewhat good and to extent I was right.

 

After I had found this little promotion I thought that if I didn't go I'd regret it so I purchased 2 front row tickets for my dad and I. He wasn't a big wrestling fan anymore but my mother didn't want me going alone cause she was worried about her baby. She probably was right because when I went on February 23,2008 for the Fight To No Avail show I would not have wanted to walk into American Legion Post #80 by myself. There were probably over 200 people there and it was much more diverse a crowd as I would have expected. Had no idea that for a few hours we'd all be the same.

 

First match certainly helped me gauge where things were going. It was a 3-way tag with one team consisting of a fat man in a bikini and a guy with a standard lucha gimmick, two guys in matching singlets called The Killer Steves, and a team of your heels. Can't say I remember too much other than not being what I was expecting, even if I possibly should have.

 

Throughout the rest of the card I'd see matches involving Antonio Thomas, John Walters, Brian Fury, two guys dressed in these full red and yellow tasseled body suits, a Blue Meanie "match"(who was apparently the draw though I had zero idea who he was at the time and why people cared) with a guy wearing a long sleeved shirt and sweatpants (he is the trainer of a wrestling school), a ladies match that was better than all but one match on the card, as well as a match that was started by the booting of a camera guy who would later become one of the staples of the promotion. Crazy how that works.

 

Up until the main event I had thought that the dream of having an awesome indy promotion in my backyard was just that, a dream. I was 15 and thinking that maybe just maybe I'd get lucky. Then the main event came and it was supposed to be a tag match where the winner became champion but they scrapped that(wise decision) and just had it be a 4-way elimination match. The men in the match were the champion, Dizzie, Slyck Wagner Brown, Isys Ephex(the champion in 2013), and Eddie Edwards(WITH DREADS). It wasn't the greatest of matches but for a kid popping his indy show cherry it was everything I could have wanted. They were diving around, brawling in the crowd, and in the end I was a satisfied customer for the match I saw.

 

The main event was probably what made me a fan of the promotion and lead to me being more interested in what is going on in independent wrestling. I have now seen much better 2CW shows but that night nothing could have made me happier.

[Mad Dog]

Here's a couple of IWA videos I found:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pzryg-dBed0

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iYDAuTt3tAA

[Exposer]

Again, I'm loving all of these posts. Thanks a bunch for adding to this thread.

 

I figured I'd tell the story of my first time ever attending one of these indie shows.

 

When I was eight my wrestling fandom was limited to WWF on Mondays and Thursdays. Dylan actually gave Dustin and I a Japanese tape during this period. I'm pretty sure it had Liger-Sano and Funk-Foley King of the Death match. It's amusing now to think that I possibly didn't go outside to play once because I was watching a Naoki Sano match but that's beside the point. My uncle and cousin were a pretty big part of my childhood. After we left Charleston and came here to Chattanooga we spent a lot of time together. My uncle was sort of a long time wrestling fan but never watched it consistently and hadn't really paid much attention since the late 80s. He appreciated the old school, technical aspects of it. He loved average holds, bloody brawls, and simple angles. My cousin didn't watch wrestling at all until my uncle introduced it to him at an indie show. There was this show in East Ridge at the time that sent out flyers around town and I think my uncle spotted one at the flea market. Apparently, one Saturday evening my uncle and cousin are driving down Ringgold Road (the main road passing through East Ridge) and my uncle remembers this flyer and asks my cousin if he wanted to go see some wrestling. My cousin agreed and they went to this show.

 

Sometime later, my uncle brings it up to my Dad and says it was a fun show. This is probably around Spring or Summer of 2001. My Dad seemed interested enough and we all went to this place. The name of the promotion was Ultimate Extreme Wrestling or UEW. Now, this place wasn't some hardcore indie birthed out of the legend of ECW it just had the appealing name to bring in more fans. In fact, it was a very traditional southern style promotion that took tag wrestling seriously and had plenty of ring rats screaming for the babyfaces. It had traditonal mat work, bloody brawls, and simple angles. That's what my uncle loved so it stuck out to him. I was skeptical as an eight year old because I thought nothing could ever compare to the WWF. I found it hard to believe that a warehouse with a small ring and a hundred strange people could ever keep my interest.

 

I don't recall my first reactions to walking into this place but I probably wasn't too impressed. It was a warehouse with two gigantic garage doors. In the entrance was a window where a lady behind a desk would take up the fans money and stamp them. The "arena" was to the right and in the front lobby was a huge sign that read "UEW" and it was in red and black with white in the background. There was a shit ton of photos of fans with wrestlers pinned up on the wall. There was an entire backstage area to the left of the UEW sign. In the "arena" were chairs lined up in rows facing the ring. There was a commentary booth at the far end of the warehouse that had the same UEW sign directly behind it on the wall. Two sides at ringside had wooden barricades, the other two did not. We ended up sitting in one of the front rows without protection.

 

I honestly couldn't say what was on this first card but I sure as hell remember the main event. It was a battle royal. One of those nights where there weren't enough guys on the roster to build a big card so they closed the night with some chaotic fun. There was this wrestler named Blackie Lawless who our cousin liked so we cheered for him. He had long black hair, a short black beard, and was average sized. It's in the middle of this battle royal and we're enjoying ourselves. Someone throws Lawless out of the ring on our side. He ends up going over without even trying to slow down his momentum. He comes crashing down right into my lap and takes me down with my chair. I was fucking shocked. I had no idea what had just ocurred. I just laid there frozen on the ground for a few seconds. I probably resembled someone who had just witnessed paranormal activity. The promotor, Crazy Eddie, rushes over to help me. He pulls me up and everyone gets me back in my chair. Dustin and my cousin are laughing at me. Some guy in the row behind me who won a miniature belt with his raffle gave it to me as a gift for being "tough" or something. Really, I was terribly embarassed and wanted to leave but I came back. Somehow, I think that first experience left quite the impression on me. It was such a unique coincidence and it really made UEW stand out as a place where literally anything can happen. So, I came back every week, minus a short few month hiatus in the fall of 01, until the promotion shutdown in June of 2004. That's one hell of a way to begin the southern independent wrestling experience.

[concrete1992]

The Night Things Got Real

 

2CW came back to Binghamton in July and this time I decided to go with my friend who didn't like wrestling too much but since I put my sad puppy dog eyes on he came. In the end he rather enjoyed the show but he had no idea what he was getting himself into.

 

2CW was in the midst of a cross-promotion feud(a feud that actually had a MAJOR impact on both companies and probably Upstate NY independent wrestling) with the Rochester based NWA Upstate and it was heated. Binghamton is one of the most heated wrestling cities in the country that no one really talks about and might take the form of a tinier ECW crowd a little too well. The match that took place was a 4-on-4 falls count anywhere tag match. Representing Team Upstate were Brodie Lee, Cloudy, Dunn and Marcos. Representing 2CW were JD Love(an owner), ZSIII(school trainer), Loca Vida, and Hellcat. This match took place after Hellcat(owner or booker of Upstate) turned on Upstate when he was a special guest referee during a Wargames match between the two promotions the month prior in NWA Upstate.

 

The 2CW probably lacked in talent but this ended up being a brawl throughout every inch of floor the fans could see so that wasn't so talent wasn't really necessary. My friend and I were eating it up digging the use of weapons and such. We we getting a fun brawl which 2CW showed me last time I came that they could do. This was more chaotic. Maybe a little too chaotic because things took a turn for the worst during the match. Bingo being Bingo likes to drink and fans were getting extra rowdy towards Team Upstate screaming obscenities and the such. One fan decided to throw a chair towards the action to maybe help out the faces even though he accidentally hit Loca Vida if I remember correctly . Brodie Lee did not take lightly to this action and saw the fan who did it. That fan must have wished he hadn't because Lee stopped what he was doing, went over the guardrail, followed the fan outside the building and knocked him out cold. The whole building emptied in a blink of an eye. I didn't know 200+ people could exit that quickly. My friend and I didn't know what the hell was going on and by the time we had gotten outside we had caught the tail end of it and returned inside. To everyone's credit past that the wrestlers finished the match with Upstate splashing 2CW through tables from an auditorium like stage and the fans managed to not be so crazy.

 

The next match had the tall task of getting the fans attention back without being this super heated that works the fans up into a frenzy, and the next match worked the crowd into a frenzy but not with a match that got the fans hating a heel or anything. It was quite an ROH type indy match between Eddie Edwards and Isys Ephex. One of the most found memories from a show still. The stip was there must be a winner and that's not really a lovely stip but it was a flat out sweet match. There was a moment that made my friend go "OH SHIT" louder than everyone with Isys being on the guardrail and Eddie suicide diving him off and both men going into the chairs in the front row. Main event was SWB who was now the champion(something I was happy about after my first show) who went against Jimmy "Jam" Olsen from Upstate. Was a good match but didn't capture me like those other two big moments from the show. I remember the finish being weird yet awesome with SWB winning, not with his finisher, but a powerbomb onto the guardrail that looked like it killed Jimmy "Jam". Jimmy was a great little heel in 2CW who would later become champion but got took out rather easy here.

 

There we have my 2nd 2CW/indy show and it was certainly an experience that has totally stuck in my memory. Oh and the show was called 2CWATHON if anyone was interested.

[Exposer]

Great post concrete. I have some stories of my own of fans getting a little too involved and crazy shit happening. By all means, continue with these big write-ups. I'm enjoying them.

[tim]

Tangentially related, I've had two friends who've lived next to Steve Corino for some time. One in 5th grade but one of my best friends recently, who is also a wrestling fan (though really only keeps up with thats going on nowadays as opposed to actively watching) and Corino used to take him and his brother to ROH shows free a lot. It's just weird that I've liked Corino since I watched him in ECW as a kid, have had two close friends live literally next to him for extended periods and yet I've never met him myself.

[concrete1992]

I really like the whole idea of this thread and sharing these stories and experiences of this tinier setting. I'm enjoying doing this write-ups going show-by-show. Seems like there was always something that I'd like to note on these shows that made them a great part of my personal history with wrestling.

[MikeCampbell]

Concrete didn't quite tell the whole story, he got about 80% of it though. There was an issue with Brodie and the fan before the chair incident, where he took a swing at Brodie. Brodie had been egging on the crowd, so he let it slide, but then the guy overplayed his hand at life and got knocked the fuck out. Jack Trades and I were joking about it, that out of everyone in that match to try to pick a fight with (Marcos, Cloudy, Loca) he picks Brodie. The incident actually forced 2CW to turn him babyface, because everyone LOVED him for doing that. They booked him to run in and lay out Springate in October, and he got a standing ovation. The whole thing actually kept 2CW out of the arena for eight months, because the American Legion was worried about someone doing something even more stupid and a lawsuit coming about.

 

Sidenote: If the Legion's bar didn't hand alcohol to anyone with a pulse and a dollar, then they wouldn't have issues like this.

[concrete1992]

Continuing on. This story isn't as an exciting time next up:

 

The next show I went to, this time with a new friend who was a minor wrestling fan was the 2nd night of a tag tournament to crown the 1st ever 2CW Tag Team Champions. I was excited to see the first ever crowning of this company's tag champs that I'd consider myself a fan of at this time. Still am. I had no idea of the results of the prior night but was very much pulling for Steenerico to make it to the 2nd round since at the time they were certainly one of my favorite teams on the independent scene. Before the show got started they busted out a projector and showed a highlight video and results of Night 1 of the tournament. Didn't take long for me to get met with the news that they didn't make it through. Instant sadness. I wanted to feel optimistic so I built my teenage self back up and got ready for the show. I was a little bitch.

 

In the very first match I saw El Generico live. His opponent was Loca Vida who had faced off with AJ Styles a couple months prior. Right off these guys were going to steal the show, right? NOPE! Don't know what they were going for but it was not enjoyable. Remember it solely because of my disappointment. During KOT '11, Generico would do me right. Overall it was an OK show with the first semi-final being between the Killer Steves and the not too long living Alumni Club (they portrayed jocks/football players) and OOMPH! Ended in Double DQ which may have been the best way for it to go because that made the other semi-final THE final with Jigsaw and Delirious going against Up in Smoke(Cheech&Cloudy) to become the first ever 2CW Tag Team Champions. The crowd that evening were OK but during this match they became the Binghamton I knew and love. Both teams put on a fantastic match with Jiglerious coming off as uber masked babyfaces that were amplified by the fantastic heel work of Cloudy and Cheech. In the end 2CW ended the show with the regular Up in Smoke winning the titles and getting booed out of the ring. Afterwards though Jiglerious got a standing ovation and Delirious brought a child into the ring and lifted him on his shoulders. Really great feeling leaving the match.

 

Leaving the show, while not the greatest, I knew I watched a significant moment in a tiny promotion's life. At the time they were a little over 4 years old and coming up in April next year they will be on 9 years. Indy shows man. Even when you are seeing a part of the history of a small promotion that probably won't ever be more than a blip in wrestling history, if that, you feel like it is something special. Maybe that's just me being sentimental about this promotion.

[BackToBionic]

For whatever reason (maybe because it's sandwiched between 2 "hot" areas for wrestling - Atlanta and Tampa) north Florida never has lasting indies. When I was a teen (96-98ish) I'd go watch some really awful stuff at a sports bar that was a promotion I don't even remember the name of. The only one I remember lasting several years was the TWF, Thunder Wrestling Federation. I'd say they ran from 95/96 through the early 2000s at least. They were targeted to a black audience (the owner was black and a lot of the wrestlers were obviously just his buddies that he trained). 'Black Nature Boy' Scoot Andrews is without question the only "name" guy that ever had a run there. He was usually the champion. Sometimes they'd have a former star roll through. Barbarian did a few shows per year. Greg Valentine too. And this was in like 2001 so not glory days obviously.

 

The biggest thing to happen on a Jacksonville indie was New Jack stabbing that guy during a match and getting arrested, which I guess sums up my story.

[kayfabe1984]

The northern Cincinnati area has been a pretty interesting scene for a long time. The longest fed running in the area is the Northern Wrestling Federation (NWF) which I've never been a fan of. You've also got the Heartland Wrestling Association (HWA) which is now on their fourth incarnation of the company and is running shows every few months in an old movie theater about 30 minutes north of Cincinnati in Middletown, Ohio. Speaking of Middletown, it, for some reason, seems to be a hotbed of wrestling activity right now with at least three feds running out of the aforementioned abandoned movie theater and another running out of an old Ponderosa restaurant next to some railroad tracks in a real shady part of downtown.

 

I have some tales of four feds I've seen in person at venues that range from two shows at an opera house that's over 100 years old with asbestos hanging from the ceiling, to a show at a county fair featuring Greg Valentine in a completely hammered state (pun fully intended) with the ring set up next to the goat barn and the wrestlers getting into a shoot brawl by the bathrooms, and finally to a show at a dilapidated skating rink featuring Demolition, Brutus Beefcake, Greg Valentine (again), Sunny, and Dan Severn. Stories on these shows will begin later tonight ...

[fishbaugh]

I spent 1994-2010 living in Montana, so there was no local wrestling! When I moved to LA I figured there would be a ton of great local options, but I have been pretty unimpressed with the local shows I've been to. I've been to a lot of tapings for Championship Wrestling from Hollywood, but outside of Willie Mac nobody there is really any good and they moved the tapings up to Ventura or something and I'm not driving 1.5 hours each way to watch so-so wrestling. Tried going to a couple of PWG shows, but that crowd is just not for me, and their building is horrible. Some of the local lucha shows look interesting, but I just don't trust that anyone advertised will actually be there.

 

The best indy show I've been to here was the Wrestle Reunion show a couple of years back at a hotel ballroom next to LAX. NAO vs. Steiners with Foley as ref was fun, seeing Mascarita Dorada in person was a blast, and Great Sasuke flipping onto his head two feet in front of me was pretty awesome. Best part was getting to meet the Destroyer, who even in a wheelchair had a presence.

[Graham Crackers]

I just got back from the WUW show in Queens with the luchadores on it. Most of the card was made up of Johnny Rodz students and none of that stuff was any good. It wasn't stereotypical Japanese tape watching indy wrestling which was refreshing but if a match wasn't sloppy it just ended up feeling kind of flat.

 

The luchadores all appeared in the last three matches. Marcela vs Amapola was actually a pretty fun one fall sprint. Cassandro & Bufalo Azteca vs Skayde & Coco Naranja was a little disjointed. Cassandro is still a blast to see but Skayde looked off and the other guys in the match were just kind of there.

 

The crowd was mostly latino but there were more white folks than I usually see at these kind of indy lucha shows. Unfortunately a lot of said white folks weren't very respectful. I was stuck sitting next to a batch of them and anytime a wrestler spoke Spanish or an announcement was made in Spanish it seemed to make them uncomfortable. Initially I tried to accommodate them by providing rough translations but they just seemed to get angrier and angrier as the last chunk of the show progressed. Eventually they started heckling luchadores and demanding that they speak English.

 

Thankfully most of them left right before the main event. Seriously, about 1/8 of the audience left before the main event. It was for the best because the main event was filled with schtick and audience participation that would have probably gone right over their heads. The main event was Atlantis vs Ultimo Guerrero and I have to admit that I was pretty fucking excited to see Atlantis in person. The first fall was one of those annoying quick CMLL opening falls. The second and third falls on the other hand were dominated by schtick. This was definitely a case of two wrestlers taking a night off and I bet this is the kind of match they have on untelevised cards in small arenas all the time. Maybe that would bother me if I experienced that all of the time but being a part of a now much more receptive crowd made that stuff really fun to play along with. Ultimo Guerrero tore off a fan's Atlantis mask and ripped it in half and then he hid behind the same fan when Atlantis came after him. Atlantis would frequently stop and ask the crowd if he should shake Guerrero's hand or tear off his mask. Guerrero would do something shifty and Atlantis would appeal to the ref leading to the referee asking the audience what happened. I was recently annoyed by a bunch of heel ref spots on the lucha set and heel refs can be pretty annoying but it was kind of fun getting to participate in the argument about poor officiating. The finish was a double DQ after Ultimo Guerrero hit a lowblow and Atlantis quickly follows up by pulling UG's mask right off (and I got a pretty clear view of his face). They argued on the mic and Atlantis said they should have their mask vs mask match in New York City. Yeah, sure.