SmartMark15 Posted April 25, 2017 Report Share Posted April 25, 2017 Hey all! Being from the Philippines (to my knowledge, the only Filipino member of the board), I feel the urge to take it upon myself to discuss and review local independent wrestling. It's an incredibly young scene, pretty much in the most infant of stages. The largest promotion in the country is Philippine Wrestling Revolution (PWR) and it opened in 2013. Just this past month, a second promotion called Manila Wrestling Federation (MWF) opened as well. I'll be reviewing matches here more or less at random and it'll mostly be limited to what I can find online. Here's hoping this project turns out well and hopefully you guys pick some stuff up from this newly developed sector of pro wrestling. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SmartMark15 Posted April 25, 2017 Author Report Share Posted April 25, 2017 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l1DJMmVjYFE PWR Champion "Classical" Bryan Leo vs. "The Senyorito" Jake de Leon - PWR Live 8/16/15 A little context: Leo seems to be the newly crowned champion after cashing in a Money in the Bank type deal against his opponent here tonight, Jake de Leon, at PWR Wrevolution X (the company's biggest show every year). JdL is here to try and get his title back and exact some revenge on Bryan Leo who is flanked by his stablemates in The Royal Flush. First observation right off the bat is that this was filmed when PWR still hadn't installed a proper ring. They're using a repurposed boxing ring with ropes that don't have the same torque and tension as wrestling ring. This does affect the match at times as they're unable to utilize Irish whips and rope rebounds are awkward looking at best and just bad at worst. Leo is the heel come in and I enjoyed his classic heel stoogey expressions and tactics even though it couldn't really be backed by much of his offense. The match has an awkward structure. JdL gets the early shine to get the crowd riled up but the transitions feel sudden and unearned. The two basically trade off heat segments until they approach the finishing stretch of the match. This brightest point of the match came when Leo misses a double knee strike in the corner, crashing his knees into the turnbuckle. JdL then hits a Senyorito Kick (superkick) right to the knee and that actually got a pop out of me. This led into a Figure Four on Leo whose double finges to JdL were fun at first but got increasingly cutesy the more he did it. I wish JdL had put a little more work into the hold. As it was, he just kind of sat there in position while Leo flailed around trying to get it over. I do give JdL credit for applying it on the correct leg though--one of my greatest pet peeves in pro wrestling. Leo actually did a decent job selling the knee down the final stretch of the match but that quickly devolved into a strike exchange that just came off as awkward. Whether it was the sound system or the wrestlers themselves (my money's on the latter), the strikes (throughout the whole match really) were just incredibly soft and didn't carry much impact behind them. Not even some good mat stomping to help add to the illusion. Really detracted from the match. Classic distraction finish leads to Leo winning by making JdL pass out to a Cobra Clutch. if you ask me, the low blow felt a bit insignificant given what the finish was but that's just me. One thing worthy of note though is the hot crowd. Philippine audiences are pretty starved when it comes to live wrestling (WWE visits once every 4 or 5 years), so these guys are hot for EVERYTHING. Not the ideal set up for a match, and execution tended to be sloppy. Here's hoping things get better when a proper ring is installed. **3/4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SmartMark15 Posted April 25, 2017 Author Report Share Posted April 25, 2017 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7SzSeqS4QhI John Sebastian vs. Ralph Imabayashi - PWR Vendetta 2/21/15 It might have been the worse angle or the poorer lighting, but the offense looked better in this one. Strikes seemed more snug, and Sebastian's bigger offense looked crisp enough to feel impactful. Imabayashi seemed to only know play-dead selling however and there wasn't much fighting from underneath from him. Also, despite having the gimmick of the half-Japanese puro-influenced guy, his strikes aren't nearly as convincing as Sebastian's. Sebastian, however, just totally drops almost all or most of the selling. Especially coming out of Imabayashi's Calf Crusher, Sebastian didn't show any signs of it. The finish was contrived but I at least like that it was foreshadowed early on in the match. Decent, fun match. **1/2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SmartMark15 Posted April 25, 2017 Author Report Share Posted April 25, 2017 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yuG4UHkooUQ Peter Versoza vs. Ralph Imabayashi - PWR Live 8/16/15 Best of the three matches I've seen so far. I enjoyed Imabayashi much more in this match. His facials improved and while his kicks still felt a bit soft, his other strikes looked decent enough. His selling improved too. Put a little more charisma into it and there was a clearer progression of pain and wear and tear. And yes, I did start popping a bit for his "slap me I dare you" Shibata-lite segment. He's no Shibata, but even Shibata-lite works for me. At times Versoza looked a bit lost. Like when waiting for the first big transition where Imabayashi kicks and knees his way to the advantage, he just kind of stood there to absorb the offense. His bumps were kind of sloppy as well at points. But yeah, I thought it flowed much better than most of the others. The bigger transitions came off better as well. I actually thought the finish was kind of clever actually. You never really see a resthold get transitioned into a finisher like that and it made for a nice surprise. *** Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SmartMark15 Posted April 25, 2017 Author Report Share Posted April 25, 2017 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8U_pURDjQOE PWR Champion Ralph Imabayashi vs. Peter Versoza - PWR Quezon Province Invasion 2/5/16 A nothing much that isn't helped by a provincial crowd who most like don't have a strong reference point when it comes to pro wrestling. The weak strikes don't help keep the crowd engaged and some things come off sloppy too. Bonus points for kayfabe-breaking portions by the cameramen. Basically a nothing-house-show match. I'm wondering if the crowd would have had a stronger response to more theatrical crowd work spots. *1/2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cap Posted April 25, 2017 Report Share Posted April 25, 2017 Nice! Thanks for doing this. No time now, but i look forward to checking some of this out soon. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tenese Sarwieh Posted April 25, 2017 Report Share Posted April 25, 2017 Cool, will definitely check these out. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SmartMark15 Posted April 28, 2017 Author Report Share Posted April 28, 2017 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kN1H_a3Yskg&t=498s PWR Champion Ralph Imabayashi vs. The Apocalypse - PWR Road to Vendetta 1/31/16 Yay! A real ring! Right off the bat, we can see how green The Apocalypse is. Even hitting his own finisher, it comes off awkward and not that impactful. Imabayashi's strikes seem real soft in this match as well. There's an attempt at armwork at the start that seems to promise a potentially good match but Imabayashi kind of forgets to sell it. Announcers try to compensate and say that Imabayashi's failed Sonic Crushers are due to the arm but it just doesn't feel right. Apocalypse's Taker/Kane/Abyss gimmick doesn't come off that great when his strikes are so soft and he has some of the ugliest side slams in the biz. ** Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SmartMark15 Posted April 28, 2017 Author Report Share Posted April 28, 2017 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wMYEUhageJ8 Chris Panzer vs. Miguel Rosales - PWR Terminus 12/19/15 This was decent! Significantly fewer blown spots (that dropped fallaway slam is egregious though) and some pretty good selling from Panzer. The strikes are still soft but but some of them don't actually look half bad in here. Yeah, Rosales is just cosplaying Goldberg and Lesnar but the Germans were decent and safe at the very least. Panzer sold the beating well and he fought from underneath well enough. Nothing to set the world on fire, but a fun little match here. *** Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SmartMark15 Posted May 6, 2017 Author Report Share Posted May 6, 2017 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-tBUuZa19-4&t=5s Jake de Leon vs. Billy Suede - PWR WrevolutionX 4/30/17 From this year's WrevolutionX, their biggest show of the year, this is easily the best match of the ones I've seen so far. Simple story of plucky babyface up against the arrogant heel. They do some simple fun stuff to get the match going. Some good strikes and chops to get things going. A few interesting sequences like the counter into the Cross Armbreaker were fun. But I gotta say, that finishing stretch was really quite well worked. As I watched, I actually was marking out and fist pumping by the time the final bell hit so that's a really, really good sign. ***1/4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SmartMark15 Posted October 19, 2018 Author Report Share Posted October 19, 2018 PWR's YouTube page have recently released two great title matches from their most recent show last month. Already reviewed the JDL-Tengu match on this forum and will write up Imabayashi-Quatro soon. Check them out. https://www.youtube.com/user/PhilWrestlingRevo Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SmartMark15 Posted December 2, 2018 Author Report Share Posted December 2, 2018 Last night was Manila Wrestling Federation's last show for the year and it featured what might just be the best match in Philippine wrestling history between Mr. Lucha and Jake de Leon. I've been told that footage will be made available soon at which point, I'll make a much more objective review based on the footage. Live though, it was a legitimate MOTYC for the world and not just locally. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SmartMark15 Posted November 28, 2019 Author Report Share Posted November 28, 2019 I began a project to watch every available match from PH wrestling. Here's the spreadsheet tracking my ranking as well as a write up I did of my initial impressions of 2014-2016. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1yfWUNfItDmW6anlrCBmjd5az7JpMorRZ0JiZMwxnRtI/edit?usp=sharing https://ko-fi.com/post/Three-Star-Matches-and-a-Sun-Observations-on-Ea-K3K218Z91 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
King of Debt Posted November 28, 2019 Report Share Posted November 28, 2019 Awwwwwwwwww man, that's the stuff. Thank you for compiling this! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SmartMark15 Posted November 29, 2019 Author Report Share Posted November 29, 2019 5 hours ago, King of Debt said: Awwwwwwwwww man, that's the stuff. Thank you for compiling this! I'm excited to do it. I'm currently in the 2017 footage which is probably the year with the most available footage in the country. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SmartMark15 Posted November 30, 2019 Author Report Share Posted November 30, 2019 https://ko-fi.com/post/Three-Star-Matches-and-a-Sun-The-Road-to-Wrevol-G2G2197K2 Part two! This time I cover the road to Wrevolution X 2017 with four full shows available on YouTube (with the exception of one match)! It's the classic Jake de Leon vs. Billy Suede match! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SmartMark15 Posted December 4, 2019 Author Report Share Posted December 4, 2019 https://www.ko-fi.com/post/Three-Star-Matches-and-a-Sun-The-Panzer-Era-T6T619JAN It's the post-Wrevo X stretch of shows as Chris Panzer reigns as PWR Championship! Jake de Leon vs. Ralph Imabayashi wrestle on all three shows and Billy Suede ascends to the top! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SmartMark15 Posted December 13, 2019 Author Report Share Posted December 13, 2019 https://ko-fi.com/post/Three-Star-Matches-and-a-Sun-Wrapping-Up-PWRs-K3K61A6NN It's the wrap up to 2017 with PWR. We say goodbye to Billy Suede, hello to Zayden Trudeau, and...A JAKE DE LEON HEEL TURN?! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SmartMark15 Posted December 18, 2019 Author Report Share Posted December 18, 2019 https://ko-fi.com/post/Top-15-Live-Matches-of-2019-PWR-MWF-WWE-Live-M4M21AH2Z I rank my 15 favorite matches from 2019 that I saw live which is mostly local stuff as well as a WWE house show and PROGRESS in Toronto! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gordi Posted December 18, 2019 Report Share Posted December 18, 2019 I don't know how or when I will ever find time to check out the stuff you are writing up here (I barely have time to keep up with AEW these days) but I wanted to express my support for you writing this up. Definitely an under-explored corner of the pro wrestling world. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SmartMark15 Posted December 19, 2019 Author Report Share Posted December 19, 2019 8 hours ago, gordi said: I don't know how or when I will ever find time to check out the stuff you are writing up here (I barely have time to keep up with AEW these days) but I wanted to express my support for you writing this up. Definitely an under-explored corner of the pro wrestling world. Thank you, man. I appreciate that a lot especially since I get a little pushback locally when they think I'm too harsh sometimes. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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