[2000-05-06-LIWF-Unfinished Business] Homicide vs Papa Don (Ladder)

[soup23]

Long Island Wrestling Federation. My God. The unfinished business graphic is as carny as you can get. John “the Sure Thing” Shane cuts a promo and it is indyrific but effective to a degree. This arena looks like a glorified garage. Despite his objections, Shane does get handcuffed to Sluggah. A half baked match with some good ideas but way way too long. Papa Don is a pretty fun character in short doses but he hasn’t figured out how to make a match compelling throughout besides setting up his next spot. Homicide is also someone that I adore but can be prone to meandering at times. As a result, this felt like any generic 2000’s ladder match you have seen that even ends in a big schmozz full of run ins and Homicide winning in anticlimactic fashion. Sluggah always had pretty dreadful execution that didn’t look menacing at all for someone that was presented as a monster. **1/4

[Tim Evans]

This looks like it took place in someone's garage and is backyard wrestling with professional guys. Chad is right that this seemed very generic by my god was it long. They would do spots that looked brutal but then just kept going and going to the next spot. The ladder eventually breaks so they have to turn it upside down to climb. The finish made no sense with everyone running in. Homicide's second looks like Swoll from No Limit Soldiers if he was in jail for 6 months. Not very good.

[GSR]

LIWF stands for Long Island Wrestling Federation and we get an interview that looks straight out of 1995 ECW with the way it’s shot on the street. ‘King of the Ladder matches’ Papa Don says that he’s going to take Homicide’s ‘All Borough’ title and make him his bitch! While John Shane (the number one manager in the LIWF!) stumbles over his words but will be handcuffed to the 6’8” Slugger to prevent him from interfering in the match, something that he’s not too keen about.

 

This is a low rent fed and Slugger looks like a reject out of the No Limit Soldiers with those fatigues he’s wearing. Papa’s got some nice sounding chops. He makes the cover after a neckbreaker and the referee starts to count, but stops at two and points out that you can only win by retrieving the belt that’s above the ring (that looks like a genuine spot to confirm the rules to the crowd as opposed to him forgetting). Papa’s not happy he stopped counting and shoves the official who shoves him back. They’ve clearly been watching their Earl Hebner spots as Don bumps for him! Homicide repeatedly rolls out the way of a trio of falling headbutts and then hits a succession of elbows from the canvas, middle and top turnbuckles. He gets a two count as someone from the crowd shouts “it’s a ladder match ref!” Exploder suplex by Papa and he goes outside to collect the ladder. After putting them on the apron he stops to say something to one of the fans, that’s long enough for Homicide to get back to his feet and dropkick the ladder into him when he turns around. He places the ladder in the corner across the bottom ropes, but what he had planned we’ll never know as Papa with a drop toe hold on the charging Homicide sending him crashing head first into them. Clothesline over the top to the outside. He rests the ladders on the top rope, runs up them, but comes up short on his dive completely missing his opponent. Homicide with a quick thinking suplex on the metal ramp way to try and put a stop to those “you f*cked up” chants. Back inside and Papa slams Homicide onto the ladder before coming off the top with a big splash. He starts to climb the ladder, slowly, but a Homicide top rope flying clothesline puts a stop to that. Now it’s his turn to try and grab that belt, however as he’s climbing Papa gets underneath and powerbombs him off the ladder. Don has another go at retrieving the title, but stops half way up and dives at Homicide who catches him with an ‘Ace Crusher’ in a very unnatural looking spot. He props the ladder up in the corner and powerslams Papa into it. Homicide collects a second ladder from underneath the ring and this one is about twice the size of the original. An ugly looking collision sees the two of them run into each other. Papa throws a chair at Homicide (presumably for some kind of ‘Van Daminator’) but then turns to the crowd and when he turns around, Homicide throws it back at him and kicks it in his face after he’s caught it. Don blocks a suplex onto the ladder and counters with a Russian legsweep onto it instead. A superplex while stood on the bent ladder doesn’t come off as it collapses whilst he’s climbing. Diving headbutt off the top, but Papa hurts his own head in the process. There’s not much in the way of selling here as Papa is right back up after being squashed under a Homicide senton onto the ladder, replying with a ‘death valley driver’. He sets those ladders up and they go all the way to the roof of the building by the look of it. STF by Homicide, Papa taps but no submissions here! Crazy assed cannonball through the middle and top ropes putting Don through a table that he’d propped against the wall and laid him on. A bunch of randoms then show up and attack Slugger. They get the keys to the handcuffs off the ring announcer, free ‘the Sure Thing’ and cuff Slugger to the bottom rope, beating on him in the process. For some reason they leave Homicide be, ‘Cop Killa’ and he climbs the ladder to grab the ‘All Borough’ title belt. Now the match is over the randoms jump on Homicide until Slugger somehow frees himself and makes the save, dishing out a trio of poor looking chokeslams culminating with one on Johnny boy. Da Hit Squad, Low Ki and a bunch of others are out to celebrate with Homicide, and as the randoms leave it turns out one is Julius Smokes. Yeah, yeah, yeah! Yeah, yeah, yeah!

 

I said after the West Side Playaz/Massaro & Frantz tag that there is an issue where these indie promotions feel as though they have to go long, and here is another prime example of that. This goes around 28 minutes for the match itself and probably should’ve been around half that at the most. It didn’t flow well at all, there was little in the way of selling after a big move and this was way too co-operative between the wrestlers. You had Papa on more than one occasion blatantly time wasting to make sure Homicide was ready for the next spot (when he placed the ladders on the apron, the Van Daminator, the blatant slow climbing) and that Ace Crusher was ludicrous. The ending was flat out weird with ‘the Sure Thing’s’ men attacking Slugger to free Shane from him, but then just letting Homicide to go on his merry way, collect the belt and retain the title.

[Robert S]

The early ladder spots here were pretty good and smart usage of the ladder. However as longer this got the worse it and, well, random it got.

The Ace Crusher spot was reused like 100 times for Randy Orton finishes. I am sure if Michael Cole would watch this match he would shout "RKO out of nowhere" just because he could not help himself.

[Moonsault Marvin]

When they forgot it was a ladder match the second time, I knew this match didn't have a chance. If they would have ended it after 10 minutes, it would have been better, but they kept going. They broke the ladder, and the spare ladder was a tall straight ladder they couldn't really use for spots and the referee had to hold it for them to climb. Two guys came out to interfere, but they just got the manager out of handcuffs instead of attacking Homicide. What was the manager going to do that they couldn't? A mess of a match.

 

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