ON THE ROAD: WWE (03/26/16 – Richmond Coliseum)
DEATH VALLEY DRIVER VIDEO REVIEW ROAD REPORT- WORLD WRESTLING ENTERTAINMENT- RICHMOND COLISEUM- RICHMOND, VA- 3/26/2016! KEVIN OWENS IS AWESOME! THE NEW DAY DELIGHTS THE CHILDREN! THE WWE OWNS THE FUTURE BECAUSE EVERY CHILD IN CENTRAL VIRGINIA WAS AT THE RICHMOND COLISEUM LAST NIGHT!
Your Road Reporters- NAME- AGE- FAVORITE WRESTLER- CURRENT VIDEO GAME PLAYED.
DR: DEAN- 49 years- Dick Murdoch- Solitaire.io
AR: Annabelle- 16 years- The Undertaker- Witcher III
RR: Rodney- 13 years- He does not know- Dishonored
ER: Eric- 11 years- L. A. PARK- NBA 2K16
PREMATCH: I rocked with my mighty rock band- British Sterling from 1 to 3 and then picked up Annabelle from work- as I am very proud of daughter for being the only 16 year old on earth to get off their ass and get a job. We came home, I took a nap because I am a thousand and then I woke up at 5:50 and we ate some barbecued pork and/or chicken, piled into the van and headed off to the Coliseum to not be drunk at a Richmond Coliseum wrestling match twice in a row. (In other words, I’ve seen two wrestling matches at the Richmond Coliseum since I quit drinking 15ish years ago.) Walking up to the line to get in, one notices that there is an assload of people here. Of the giant wad of people, like 40% of the crowd was kids under 10. It was also like wrestling has always been in Virginia, the great melting pot- Black and White, young and old, rich and poor- all gathered in fellowship together to watch some folks beat the hell out of other folks. Professional Wrestling: some of the Glue to make the New South cohesive. Our seats are on the lower level and we have really beautiful site-lines. As everybody files in, I’m guessing it might have been sold out. They could have sold some seats up in the upper level GA seats and I guess they could have opened up a lot of slightly obstructed seats behind the jumbotron if they had to, but is was a lot more than the last time I went- the night after Alberto Del Rio debuted. On to the action!
AJ STYLES vs TYLER BREEZE:
DR: I don’t think I’ve seen AJ Styles since the first time I ever saw him- at NWA 2000 in 1999ish where he knocked himself out flying into the corner upside down. He was a hoot live, not doing anything too crazy because it was house show but his two missile dropkick forearms were really spectacular. It wasn’t a normal opening match because AJ Styles was in it and thus it was allowed to get a lot hotter a regular opening match, though it was basically a competitive squash. To the point that Styles doesn’t have to whip out the Styles Clash to win. Eric thinks the finish was a toprope forearm. Annabelle says she remember Breeze trying to get a “dirty pin” in the middle match and that’s what she remembers most.
ER: I liked it but I don’t think they let Tyler Breeze get in enough offense.
RR: Uh, very energetic. I remember nothing.
AR: Tyler Breeze had the manbun, the jawline and the abs. He looked better live than when I looked him up online and he was making the doucheface.
THE ASCENSION (CONNOR and VICTOR) vs THE HYPE BROTHERS (MOJO and ZACK):
DR: The Ascension were hated by the Children Of The Tri-Cities Area and the fact that they got on THE STICK~! and called Richmond a dump thoroughly enraged them. It was pretty great. The Hype Brothers were annoyingly positive- so I was digging their Dynamic Dudes vibe. The match was your basic Southern tag and the Ascension were good on beating a suitable amount of heat onto Mojo- who had really nice comebacks and got the crowd into his attempts to tag the man who was Zack Ryder. I ask Eric if he remember the finish. He says Victor got pinned by one of them. So yeah, nothing that would be branded into your memory.
ER: I liked this because of Mojo. I like how the crowd gave him the same reaction even though his punches were really bad. Screw the Ascension because their music was too loud.
RR: I found it insulting that they insulted Virginia but then it became a really fun match,
AR: The Illuminati is a lie.
THE MIZ vs JACK SWAGGER
DR: The Miz points out a couple celebrating their tenth anniversary in the front and then does a really great Rick Rude “you Richmond Beer-belly Rednecks get out of the way so your ladies can see a REAL MAN” impression and I feel good that showed my son the Rick Rude/Jake the Snake feud so he knew what was going on, Jack Swagger is the first of waaay too many wrestlers who call out a catch phrase 14 times a match. I’m old and hate that kind of shit, but the wee children screamed “THE PEOPLE!” after he said, “WE!” so don’t listen to grampa here. I’m trying to remember anything from any of these matches other than the Kevin Owens/Sami Zayn or Charlotte/ Natalya match. Well, I remember a lot of the New Day match. But the majority was perfectly fine, not very stiff vanilla wrestling. The Miz can work stiff and have a match I really dig- as I really dug the series with AJ Styles when Styles came in- but here it is totally mailed in. The Miz works 180 matches a year so I would assume this is what you get when the cameras aren’t rolling, so that would probably affect my decision to spend 100 dollars on tickets again, as they only seem to take it up a notch when the cameras are rolling. Thus, I would think twice about a house show again. Except my kids had a good time so I will probably go again and just bitch about this again. Eric and I cannot remember exactly the Miz won. We know he cheated. And he won
ER: I remember Jack Swagger’s ankle lock. I don’t remember much else. It was good (he seems non-commital).
AR: He came out in a sweat shirt and workout pants but when he took them off, I said, “Damn.” I was too tired to remember anything of the actual match. I remember the Miz ran around a lot.
RR: (Rod has gone to bed, He said to just say “No blood? No Rod.” for the rest of the matches.
BECKY LYNCH/ SASHA BANKS vs NAOMI/ TAMINA STUKA:
DR: Man, I remember Naomi’s shoes. And that’s about it. I remember it was perfectly fine. I like the Caged Heat from WOW vibe by Tamina.
ER: You had twerking by Naomi. I remember Sasha Banks winning with the Bank Statement and Becky Lynch had the other in a hold so they wouldn’t break up the pin.
AR: You could tell their hair was all faded. They must have been on tour for a while.
KOFI KINGSTON/ XAVIER WOODS vs BUBBA RAY DUDLEY/ DEVON DUDLEY vs JIMMY USO/ JAY USO:
DR: This was a miracle match for me. I hate three ways and I loathe comedy matches but I couldn’t help but love this. Because this match plus 3000 little kids equal metric tonne of goofy fun. I laughed at Xavier Woods’ preposterous reaction to being slapped on the back by the Usos and I laughed at Bubba Ray taking a truly fabulously elaborate catapult of Kofi Kingston into Bubba’s testicles by an Uso. Hell, I even dug the finish, as the Usos hit an Uso Splash on Devon but (Eric thinks) Xavier tags the Uso underhandedly and makes the pin, Thus the New Day wins the match but the Usos REALLY won the match. I mean, it’s retarded. I guess since you don’t want either of these two teams to lose because how weird the New Day’s heat is- in that they were still total heels and yet they were completely loved by the crowd, and the Usos are totally over as straight up babyfaces. This was the match crowd dug the most. And I dug even though I hate shit like this. What is wrong with me. Eric and Annabelle had differing opinions.
ER: Okay. So it was kinda slow until the New Day got in. I got really excited because I didn’t know the New Day were going to be there, then I heard Big E talking and them coming down the stage, and when Kofi Kingston was in there twerking around, that was fun. I like when Xavier got hit on the back by the Usos and Kofi and then got on the mic and was yelling at everybody and tried to leave. I liked the ending- I like how the New Day didn’t have to do anything but fall on him. (He liked the tease of the double Uso Tope ConHhilo and then hit it.) I didn’t like how Bubba faked taking out the table. I wanted him to bring a table and smash someone through it, I didn’t like them playing the Usos music at the end, because they didn’t win. And the Usos did the “U” “Sos” thing too many times.
AR: It was just frustrating to watch, There was so much waiting around. There was no wrestling. There was just shitty acting and everything about it was terrible. I think the New Day is total bullshit. Who were the old guys and why were they in it? The part with the guy getting frustrated at getting hit in the back was stupid. I came here to watch wrestling, not watch 8 guys wearing tights prancing around being stupid.
ER: Okay. 1) Did you not look at the finish? That was wrestling! 2.) They are trying to fill in time. You don’t want the Brian Saxton (I have no idea- DR) talking to fill in the 20 minutes, 3.) I think they know kids are going to be there and every kid likes to watch an old guy get hit in the nuts. Every kid wants to go and have a good time. You can’t just have six guys go out there and bleed a bunch and expect kids to like it. And if you watch any other New Day matches, you know they are one of the best teams in the WWE, Big E is one of the best because he is fat, I REST MY CASE.
AR: Eric, do you think the kids in Mexico have a problem with blood? Do you think the kids in Japan have a problem? Do you think they should just rename it WWE KIDZ? Random does not equal funny. The trumpet and the horns and their outfits- its trying way too hard. It’s not entertaining. And yes I don’t watch WWE,
ER: Belle, the horns and outfits doesn’t matter. They are good wrestlers.
CHARLOTTE vs NATALYA:
DR: I thought this was really good. It was great to see Ric Flair in the Coliseum again. What I really liked was that Charlotte wrestled it like Ric Flair- if in a truncated version. She worked Natalya’s leg to set up the figure-four and they did the reversal and everything. And you had the subtext of Natalya working for the Sharpshooter because of her lineage with the Hart Foundation. Charlotte procures the Sharpshooter and Natalya counters it because THE MASTER KNOWS HOW TO APPLY THE HOLD BUT ALSO HOW TO ESCAPE THE HOLD! I love that shit. The finish came down to the Dirtiest Player In The Game helping his daughter cheat to win. This was different than the other non-New Day matches because it was the same level of house show effort and stiffness, but the psychology of the match made it memorable.
ER: I only know of Natalya from my game (WWE 2K16). I like how Natalya tried the Sharpshooter several times and only got it on her once. I like how she got (her in the Mexican Ceiling Hold). I liked when Charlotte kneed her in the face and did the Sharpshooter.
AR: I like when she picked her up by her butt. (The Mexican Ceiling Hold)
KEVIN OWENS vs SAMI ZAYN:
DR: I liked this match best. Kevin Owen brought a bit of ass beat and Sami Zayn was all athletic and shit. Owens hit his big moves and was all splatty with the sentons and the corner cannonball. Owens was really fun after he was disqualified and would say stuff like, “Let’s hear it for Sami Zayn! He won a match!” while being curled up in a ball in the corner. Then Owens would kick him. It was great.
ER: Kevin Owens is flippin awesome. I liked his cannonball. I didn’t hear everything Owens said to Zayn because I was yelling, “Put a dress on him!” I dug that Zayn got to get his finisher in at the end.
ROMAN REIGNS/ DEAN AMBROSE vs SHEAMUS/ KING BARRETT:
DR: The adults booed Roman Reigns but you could barely hear it because the children LOVE Roman Reigns. This match was your basic WWE heavyweight match, in that I remember nothing from it, but I don’t remember hating anything.
ER: Kids don’t know that Roman Reigns isn’t very good. I think the WWE have made Sheamus a joke not a wrestler. If he would wrestle more he would get farther. I really don’t remember much other than the 2 superman punches and one Dirty Deeds, I remember Reigns won with a spear.
OVERALL:
DR: I had a big time but my kids had a bigger time, so I was happy. I loved that little teeny kids were loving the pro wrestling. It bodes well for the future of wrestling.
ER: It had a lot of energy and was great.
THE RASMUSSENS.