[2000-10-21-NWA Wildside-Fright Night] Shank vs Terry Knight (Chain)

[soup23]

Another good match to end the night. Shank reads us some poetry from a toilet paper roll and he really gets into the prison guard character. Bailey is evicted from ringside and he pitches a huge shit fit. The action here was stiff and intense and even though the dragging to each corner became goofy and didn't fit the intensity of the rest of the match, they were able to hold it together based on solid punches they were slamming each other with. Weird finish as the police runs down to apprehend Shank. Overall this Fright Night was a fine show but hopefully just the tip of the iceberg of what NWA Wildside has to offer throughout the decade. *** (5.9)

[GSR]

Shank has a poem for Knight that he reads off a roll of toilet paper because he wrote it while on the throne in his cell!  Given the content of said poem, I wouldn’t be surprised if Jeff G. Bailey had a hand in penning it for him.  Knight paces up and down at the side of the ring, almost as if he’s psyching himself up in readiness for this chain match.  Before it gets underway Al Getz leaves his position at the commentary desk and heads to ringside.  He informs Bailey he’s fining him a total of $9,000 for various misdemeanors and is also banning him from ringside for this match.  Jeff doesn’t take too kindly to that, although when Getz threatens him that if he’s not out of here by the time he reaches the count of ten he’ll hold him down and let the whole front row kick his ass, he decides to do as he’s told.  Four corners rules are in operation, meaning that you have to touch all four turnbuckles consecutively to win.  There’s nothing fancy going on here, just plenty of punches and plenty of use of the chain.  Knight is the first to bleed after having the chain ground into his forehead.  The action spills to the floor where Knight places a chair over Shank’s face and stomps it.  That doesn’t do too much damage mind and Shank shortly after is choking Knight around the ring post with the chain.  When they return to the ring, as is par for the course with these rules, we get plenty of wrestler (a) touching three corners but stopped by wrestler (b) before he touches the fourth, rinse, repeat.  I like how Knight later wraps the chain around his own knee so it makes the knees he delivers to the mid-section and jaw of Shank that more vicious.  He also goes after the arm that Shank broke in the Cellblock match, something I think he should’ve focused on more than he actually did.  More back and forth between the two as Knight then puts Shank over his shoulders and makes his way around all four corners, touching the turnbuckles as he goes.  What Knight doesn’t realise though is at the same time Shank is also touching them.  He gets three quarters of the way around when Shank frees himself and clocks Knight.  He’s now literally inches away from picking up the win when Jeff G. Bailey returns accompanied by two policemen.  The officers arrest Shank and Knight touches that fourth turnbuckle, even though the momentum which the commentators had just been talking about was clearly broken, to steal the victory.

Shit ending and I’m starting to wonder if Shank’s gimmick is that he just gets arrested towards the end of each match as I’ve only seen him twice and that’s what happened on both occasions.  It did get repetitive at times in the middle but there was a nastiness about the match, especially the way that they would use that chain.  As said in the write up I would like to have seen more focus on that previously broken arm because I think they could’ve told a very good story around it under these kind of stipulations.

[Tim Evans]

Add that Shank promo to the long list of things that would never fly today. That was almost Jeff G Bailey esque. Hell, I wouldn't be surprised fi he wrote it. I thought the match was ok but a little too long for a Shank match. I've heard a lot of the Shank legend but haven't seen much of him. He really shouldn't talk. I thought this was one of the better Terry Knight matches. He takes a beating. At the end of the day, the awful finish and the "keep untangling the chain" that occurs in most chain matches hurt this.