ROH Chicago Ridge, IL 6/24/2006

On Saturday June 26, 2006 I photographed my first Ring Of Honor card in over a year. I missed 3 shows in the last year becaues for weddings, babies and something else I can't remember. These ROH events are always fun to photograph.
The official card stared off with tag team action as the Irish Airborne beat Shane Hagadorn and Trik Davis. My first time seeing Irish Airborne and Hagadorn.
Up next was Jimmy Jacobs w/Lacey vs Rodrick Strong. In the photo here you can see fans holding up their cell phones as they sway to Jimmy's entrance music as if they were holding up their lighters to Freebird. If you want to hear the song or view the video go to Jimmy's myspace group. What a great song.
In the match Jimmy lost to Roderick Strong after a bunch of back breakers.
WOW, that's a lot of toilet paper. I had read how the ROH fans has been throwing but man that was a lot of toilet paper as seen in this next photo.So after all this toilet paper was thrown for Jimmy Rave and CK III they lost to the now much bigger Briscoe brothers.
Somoa Joe beat Delirious.
After Somoa Joe got the win he was attacked by some wrestlers from CZW, The Necro Butcher and Claudio Castagnoli. BJ Whitmer and Adam Pierce came out to even up the odds and they were followed by another CZW wrestler, Nater Webb. Ace Steel ran out to make it a 6 man hardcore match. The CZW team won after The Necro Butcher place the barb wire crown on BJ and he went down for the 3 count. This was one match that was scary to be around ring side.
Nigal McGinnis retained his ROH pure wrestling title against Homocide as they were both counted out after the 20 count by the ref. The fans were not happy with that ending.
The first co-main event of the card was Austin Aries VS KENTA. This was my second time photographing a KENTA match as the first was at Korekuen Hall in Tokyo against Kenta Kobashi. KENTA beat Aries with my favorite finishing move, Go to Sleep.
Three years ago on June 28th, 2003 Austin Aries wrestled Shawn Daivari in South St. Paul in the RAIN! Even in the rain Aries got up on the top rope and did this move. He also did a 360 splash from the top.
The other co-main event was for the ROH world title as champion Bryan Danielson beat Colt Cabana with a small package.

NIW 6/9/2006 Crystal, MN

From the Crystal Ballroom in Crystal, MN Northern Impact Wrestling presented a night of wrestling on June 9th, 2006. NIW had a double shot this weekend as they get ready for the NIW Impact Invitational a the end of the month.
The card started off with a 3 way between Ryan Cruz, Malikite and Trent Jones. Ryan Cruz proved to be the better man in this contest as he pinned Malikite.
In the second match of the night Pete Huge of the Junk Squad took on Venom. The big man started off by eating a hot dog and drinking a beer but it was not enough to beat the more experenced Huge as he went down for the 3 count after the G-Spot for real.
In tag team action the Featured Attraction beat The Bad Man and Benjamin Sailer. Go buy Sailers new t-shirt.
After the match The Big Gunns, Tommy Gunn and Big Daddy Hoofer, came out to challenge the Featured Attraction to a match the next night in Amery, WI. This was The Big Gunns first appearance in NIW.
Darin Corbin got a shot at the NIW IMPACT championship title as he wrestled the champ The Prophet. I camera was being a real jerk during this match but after playing with it for a while I was able to get back to ring side to take some photos of this great match. The Prophet retained the title.
Cody O'Neill picked up a win over Arik Cannon. I think he had a little help from the ring ropes but I'm not sure. It would be interesting to know what the win/lose record is between these two.
The main event was a tag team match between Junk Squad members Chris Jordan & Horace the Psycopath and Kid Krazy & Rain. Kid Krazy tried to take on Jordan and Horace all by himself as he didn't want Rain to get in the ring and wrestle these two Junk Squad members. But eventually Rain tagged but she probly wishes she didn't now. I've heard that she recieved some injuries from this match. The match ended when Jordan pinned Rain while Krazy was hand cuffed to the ring post.
Check out Vol 8 of The Wrestler/Inside Wrestling as I have 2 photos of Egotistical Fantastico in the mag.

Neo Pro West St Paul 6/3/2006

Neo Pro wrestling brought indy pro wrestling back to the West St Paul armory. If I'm correct the last time they had pro wrestling in the building that Steel Domain Wrestling (SDW) built was on Easter Sunday 2004 for that Lucha show I wrote about here back on April 11th . Neo Pro brought their Neo Rumble match to thise venue which is a 40+ man 2 ring battle royal rumble style. The other five matches were able to use both rings as well.
The card started off hot with a 3 way dance, or maybe it was a triple threat match, I'm not sure but it was for the Neo Pro cruiserweight title which was held by Kamikazi Klecker. Kid Krazy and Aaron Corbin were the other two in this match and it was Kid Krazy who ended the match with a pin on Klecker. Kid Krazy has more copies of his dvd availible on his myspace so click here to go order one.
The next match of the night was Tony DeNucci Vs Mason Quinn. It's been awhile since Quinn has been in a MN ring. He came to the ring with his old manager AJ Fontana but his manager wasn't enough to beat DeNucci. There was a Mecury 1 title match between the champion Skull Crusher and the challenger Cooter. No photos from this match.
The O'Neill twins defended their Neo Pro tag titles against the Young Stars, Shimdog and Joey Envy. They Young stars have been a tag team on and off for about 4 years so the name may not fit them anymore. The O'Neill twins held on to their belts in the end by giving Shimdog a double spanish fly.
Magnus Maximus was suppose to take on the Neo Pro champion The Black Stallion but the Stallion was injured so commish Dolan made a match with Magnus against John Johnson. Magnus won this match with a boston crab.
I have no idea how many wrestlers were actually in this Neo Rumble but it was a lot. The winner of the rumble was Magnus Maximus and he gets a title shot at any of 4 titles from the 4 different promotions involved in this card which incluced Neo Pro, FLWA, AWF and Mercury 1.
It was nice to see a good turn out for this card.

3XW Des Moines, IA 5/20/2006

I made a trip down to Des Moines, IA for the monthy 3XW card. They had to move the event to a new location because the old place, $1 Fitness had to move out of their building. The new location was the Des Moines Central Campus High School. I like this type of venue rather then an armory.
The 3XW cruiserweight title was defended in the opening match as Arik Cannon but the belt on the line against Jaysin Strife. As the match began Matty Fitness put himself in the match to make it a 3 way. Matty picked the right match to put himself into as he ended put putting Cannon down for the 3 count after Cannon eliminated Strife. New 3XW cruiserweight champion-Matty Fitness.
Brain Ash beat Tony Sly.
The 3XW tag team champions Devin Carter & Casanova were set to defend their titles against Benjamin Sailer and a mystery partner. Sailers regular partner Nate Bash was in Belle Plain, MN defending his MPW cruiserweight title so Sailer brought in Kid Krazy. Like the cruiser weight title match that started the event some wrestlers wanted into the match. First The Northstar Express came out to get into the action then Tony Scarpone and his cousin Mikey came out to make it a 4 team elimination tag title match. The first team eliminated was The Northstar Express. Then Sailer pinned Mikey. As Sailer & Krazy celebrated they were low blowed by the champs and rolled up for the pin. Carter & Casanova are still the champs.
Gage Octane beat In the second 3 way match of the night Jeremy Wyatt beat Babyface and Vin Cross as he pinned Babyface. Yes that's right, his name is Babyface. Here were two more wrestlers that I photographed for the first time, Babyface and Wyatt who are both from the central states as well.
Egotistical Fantastico retained the 3XW heavyweight title by beating Austin Bayless. A new faction was formed at the beginning of the night as one of the 3XW promoters, Dave Anderson seen at the bottom right of this photo in the blue shirt, joined with Brian Ash, Gage Octane and rookie Austin Bayless. They called themselfs the Blue Chippers and demanded that they get a title shot with EGO. Commissoner Todd Countryman gave them a title shot but with Bayless getting the match against EGO. Even with the aid of Octane and Ash Bayless was not able to get the win and EGO held on to his belt.
Next month 3XW has Jerry Lynn coming in to take on Gage Octane. Lynn was active in the Minneapolis area back when I started taking photos. Here is one of my photos of Lynn Vs Horace the Psycopath from Aldrich Arena St. Paul, MN 7/24/93. These two had some great matchs back then and it would be great to see them in a match again. This image is from a scan of a film print, man, I love digital.

NIW 5/7/2006 Amery, WI

Northern Impact Wrestling returned to the Northstar Event Center in Amery, WI on May 7th, 2006. I had fun on the hour + drive to Amery as Frosty Ann-Thraxx and I stopped along the way to take photos with statues.
Here's Ann-Thraxx putting the 3XW womans belt on the new champ, Lady Liberty.
The first match on the card was a gauntlet tag match for the NIW tag team titles. The first team out was The Featured Attraction, To Gloccs and Vinnie Devine. The next team to come out was Malikite...ummm with no partner. The Featured Attraction won.
Next team out was 101 Proof, Venom & Bret O'Brian. They beat The Featured Attraction to move on to the tag team champs.
The NIW tag team champs Dano Tep & Trent Jones w/Ann-Thraxx held on to their belts in the last match of the gauntlet.
The second match of the card was a triple threat for the the NIW Impact championship. The champion The Prophet retained the title against Arik Cannon and The Punisher Rob James. But it took both The Prophet and The Punisher to pin Cannon.
In his first singles match since his return to wrestling Horace the Psychopath beat Kid Krazy, with a little help from his Junk Squad team mates.
Ben Sailer had a rematch with the NIW champion Al B.C. Sailer had Al tapping out but The Boss was distracting the ref. This gave Al the chance to hit Sailer with the title belt and to put on a sleeper hold.
The feud between the Junk Squad and The Northstar Express continued as they battled in a no holds barred match. Once again the Junk Squad used their handcuffs, this time they cuffed Dairn Corbin as they finished off Ryan Cruz. At the end of the match the whole locker room cleared out and the big man Venom did a dive on to everyone.

MPW Minneapolis, MN 4/25/2006

From the house that Prince built Midwest Pro Wrestling held their monthly card on this last Tuesday night in April 2006. I didn't photograph all the matches as I was not sure if I was going to go to the card on this night so I didn't charge up all my flash battery's.
In the opening match Craven Knyte (yes, that was spelt right) beat Zero Kincade.
Once again Rain was set to wrestle Jessica Dalton, aka O.D.B. To make things interesting Dalton decided to make this a looser never wrestles at First Ave ever again. The crowd booed this stipulation because they didn't want to see either of these two ladies leave First Ave. But the crowd had to say good bye to Dalton as she fell victim to the raindrop and a 3 count from Rain.
In tag team action Mitch Paradise brought out a partner who had the hots for The Junk Squad, Tommy 'Spiderbaby' Saturday. The Junk Squad beat Paradise and Saturday as they handcuffed Paradise and double teamed Saturday.
Animal Sam beat Arik Cannon.

Two years ago today 4/24/2004 ROH in Chicago, IL

Ring of Honor made their Chicago Ridge, IL debut on this day two years ago. In this photo you can see Matt Sydal do a shooting star press on to a group of wrestlers. This was my second ROH card that I photographed as the night before they were in St. Paul, MN for their Midwest debut.

NIW Crystal, MN 4/23/2006

Northern Impact Wrestling debuted in yet another venue for the second night in a row as they brought their ring to the Crystal Ballroom in Crystal, MN. Once again there was a low ceiling but it didn't seem to take anything away from the matches.
Nate Bash beat Malikite in the opening match.
The Punisher Rob James beat The Professional Benjamin Sailer. The crowd really loved it when Sailer kicked James in his big ass.
Tep & Jones & Thraxx beat Venom & O'Brian & Rain when once again The Boss interfered causing Rain to get pinned.
Commish Frosty made a match between partners Vinnie Devine and Tu-Gloccs. The two didn't want to wrestle each other but they did untill Vinnie was counted out.
In a respect match Ryan Cruz beat his tag team partner Darin Corbin. It was good to see these two get back together at the end and patch up their differences.
Horace the Psychopath was in his first match in 15 months as he joined the Junk Squad to take on Kid Krazy, The Prophet and Arik Cannon. In this photo Horace is back to his old ways of biting his opponents as he is taking a bite out of Prophets forehead. The team of Krazy/Prophet/Cannon won the match by DQ as handcuffs were once again used.

NIW Bloomington, MN 4/22/2006 the

Northern Impact Wrestling debuted in Bloomington, MN at the VFW. I really like this location for 2 reasons. 1. It's in a bingo hall. 2. It's only a few miles from my home. One bad thing about this bingo hall is the low ceiling but it's better then the VFW in Forest Lake.
In the opening match The Badman beat The Punisher Rob James. James even tried to blind The Badman with some of his powdered protein mix.
NIW owner Frosty came out to interview Horace the Psychopath who was scheduled to make his return to the ring after a 15 month absence. The last time Horace was in the ring was as a commissioner for Neo Pro. Horace said that he came to NIW for the fresh blood of all the young wrestlers there but he didn't say who was #3 on his list. #'s 1 and 2 on his list do not wrestle for NIW.
El Bandito de Plata won by count out when The Big Bad Booty Daddy's singlet was stuck under a chair that was being sat on by a fan. One of the oddest finishes to a match I've ever seen.
Al B.C. held on to his NIW title a little longer as he beat Rain with a little help from The Boss who has not been seen since Nora Greenwald pulled his pants down and Rob Page gave him a stone cold stunner on 1/08/2006.
Tep & Jones retained their NIW tag titles against 101 proof Venom & Bret O'Brian.
The Junk Squad added a member to there team as they took on The Prophet and Kid Krazy. The Prophet was hand cuffed to the ring post and NIW commish Frost got on the mic and asked for some one from the back to come out to be krazys partner. O'Brian answered the call but was met with chair to the head from Chris Jordan. Horace came out to get the tag from Krazy but he attacked Krazy and danced with the Junk Squad.