JLowe

I was like 16 and I sent Matilda a get well card.

Found out it’s a photoshop and got very sad

Got mine today (being in Philly meant quick delivery). Love the packaging. Looking forward to reliving it, seeing myself mark out, and hopefully convincing my wife to check out some of the Action.

I still think Jack Perry is a poor promo and a very average wrestler. But realizing this morning the amount of mainstream coverage potential from Tony being on TV tonight and tomorrow with a neck brace and getting punched in the gut by Luke Perry’s son, it’s excellent booking and I’ll see where it goes. I don’t have a lot of interest in the Best Friends fallout, and it’s taking a lot of heat from OC, one of the guys who helped carry things through the rough patches the last 18 months. Swerve-Fletcher was good stuff, not as non-stop MOVEZ as might be expected. And Fletcher isn’t some JTTS, he’s ROH TV champion, former NJPW tag champion, and has had highly competitive matches recently with Danielson, Ospreay, and in tags against BCC. They are turning Mone heel, although I don’t think the crowd is going to fully allow it. Honestly, they should have Stat cheat to help Willow retain at the PPV band say Mercedes jumped the line and didn’t deserve the spot. The best parts of the chaotic Gauntlet were Ospreay’s interactions with Jay and Archer, his work with KOR, and Komamder’s shock at getting Archer. Worst parts were Penta Hogan no selling and only running in to get his moves in, and Dante getting nothing in on anyone except Jay. Aftermath with Fletcher and Ospreay slowly turning on Callis is exciting as someone who wants Aussie Open back (and maybe Jeff Cobb please). The Undisputed angle is dead in the water at this point. Good. Mina-Anna was solid, Mina did a good carry job and it’s more proof that Anna needs an excursion badly. The Midnight Chokers Club had a field day with this match. Smart to put the technically proficient but duller than drying paint Deeb with technically proficient and character star Timeless Toni. Mox-Hobbs was fine until the weird, unfortunate injury. Not sure Mox realized how bad it was, given the tope. Jericho leaning into the online criticisms and being delusional heel might work, but he still could use a TV break. Shibata and his phone translations are great stuff. I’m probably forgetting something here.

That was such a weird, random botch too. Like that’s a move/bump,that’s been done a million times but somehow he slips on a banana peel, crashes facefirst into the buckle and gets his knee fucked up in the ropes. Or did it give while he was running towards the buckle?

Honestly if he clowned on the whole idea of the fake belt and threw it in the trash, I would mark out like crazy.

I watched Danielson-Ospreay again last night with a nice buzz, and after having read all the posts, Matt’s excellent write up, and lots of skeets. I don’t have lists, and I don’t do stars other than DEAN~! Style MILLION BILLION STARS, which is what I give this one. I thought everything was earned, they were constantly fighting against holds, trying to find counters and reversals, without it seeming too “indie”. The timing on everything was impeccable, there were story beats and callbacks throughout. The showdown at the end gave me goosebumps again. Also, Callis and Nigel were fantastic in getting everything over. I understand wanting to watch on mute due to the early intrusive crowd, but you will miss out on a master class in commentary.

Woke up, opened board, saw this, ordered.

I agree with the Brody part minus the steamrolling.

Hook throws the shittiest punches. Those weird body shots he throws are business exposing.

Given all the attention to Nyla, maybe they could have bumped the Trent-Sydal match that literally no one but Sue and Sydal’s brother care about and given Nyla a Zero Hour match, I know we’re all rightfully ready for the Acclaimed trios run to end, but can’t help but feel they’ve been cooled down because of Caster’s antics.

You could hear a pin drop after he said “next week”

Out of curiosity, I looked to see what nation Nyla was a member of, and it’s the Oneida, who don’t have a reservation in Oklahoma.

I’m a low voter on PAC and the Bucks (although been enjoying their recent heel work and shift in ring). I know it’s weird to complain about choreography and scripting in a choreographed, scripted “fight” but damn their in-ring work last night was so rote and “don’t look at the strings” stuff I’ve seen. Soft-ass forearm “strikes” done to, I don’t know, look like actual fighting to set up acrobatics that look fancy and have almost no meaningful impact? Openly walking to the location of the next spot with no concept of having a reason to be there other than it’s the next mark in the script? Awful stuff.

I liked Hook better when he didn’t talk...and I didn’t like him then. An all time epic dumpster fire of a segment. Claudio-Ospreay was fucking phenomenal. Also Callis was great on the announce. Cassidy-Shane matched incredibly well, definitely a surprise banger. Mariah-Deonna was solid and could’ve used some of the time given to Jericho-Hook, and also Taz focusing more on that match and not his fucking knee. That’s my immediate thoughts.

Split the door between Trevor Project and an Oklahoma trans support group, and make a special shirt that also raises money. I’d have it say Fuck Oklahoma in the trans flag colors but JR would likely disapprove.

I would say that Coach Tony should open the next Dynamite with a pre-taped segment addressing the issue, saying that Nyla is an AEW original and a former AEW WOMEN’S champion, and the state of Oklahoma can shove it because AEW is where the best wrestle. If they persist, cancel future OK shows. But not sure if Tony can pull that off, so maybe Danielson or someone of similar stature who has the mix skills.

Him and several of the other people mentioned already are working regularly for some Philly promotion, Vince could just go ahead and buy that.

I’m a high guy on the board when it comes to O’Reilly, and the description of Strong as a guy you don’t care about until you watch him do 12 different nasty backbreaker variations and freak out, is perfect. On the other hand, I’m a low guy on the board when it comes to PAC, he can do a lot of cool stuff but I don’t care for his matches. So will be interesting to see what he and Okada do.

Trios titles should be united and then scrapped, they’re totally unnecessary at this point. But that opener was the best trios match I can recall in a while. Andretti fit well as a rag doll for Brody, and Dante and Malakai really clicked. I dug Shibata-Moriarty for the most part, took a while to get going. Didn’t much care for Ogogo involvement, or him in general. I guess he’s back for All In? Garcia-Angelico was comically bad. Better to just pretend that never happened. Also, just had a much better mat and kick based match right before. Toni-AZuMi started with some great comedy bits before really heating up and becoming a pretty fantastic match. Was biting on some of the near falls. Crowd got really hot for this (apologies to them for my earlier comment about potentially not appreciating random Japanese stars). Rosa’s follow-up promo was good enough to get me excited for their match, and then Deonna’s got me looking forward to that feud as a follow-up and to the May match next week. Main event was maybe not a classic like Tony claimed but it was pretty close. Good brawling to start, then settled in to the classic format and building to the bombs. The best Hobbs match I’ve seen, he’s a great bumper so having him go in with a very skilled guy who is as big as he is, and stronger to boot, made for good stuff. Maybe a couple too many European uppercuts but Claudio did try and mix them up and was using both lefts and rights. Giant swing was of course a highlight. I bit on a Hobbs pin after the WGP. All the backstage segments were solid, as were the montages. Overall, this was a top tier Collision in my opinion. I have not watched BotB, doubt I’ll get to it anytime soon, but sounds like I’m not missing much.

Just watched Rampage, it was in the C+ range. OC-Reynolds was a perfectly fine wrestling match. I kinda wish it had been about OC being dejected and sullen and then realizing he was going to have to fight hard not to lose, instead of taking out his anger on them. The aftermath, well, I don’t know how to feel about it, because I only care about Chuck in the sense that he is in OC’s “faction”. Hirsch-Hart was not very good before the rush home. Why the fuck is Layla Hirsch, whose whole thing is being a tiny powerhouse, doing a tope suicida. I rewound a number of times and couldn’t figure out how Julia got hurt, but if it was on that dumb, botched tope, then that’s someone needing to get their ass chewed. The whole Anna Jay/AZM segment was weird and terrible. Knight-Parker was a overbooked brawl as part of a terrible, never-ending angle. Why not have Saraya and Harley actually wrestle? What are they being paid for? Main was good in the sense that it’s nice to see Jay White get back on track. The inexplicable Matt Sydal appearances continue (and again on Collision). Shrug.

I was thinking him for a minute, but he’s too flashy. Tangentially, I am a little confused by his recent spate of appearances. And Daniels for that matter as well. Both very good wrestlers and I suppose their names make them credible jobbers, but I’d rather have guys like Silver and Reynolds. Then again, they’ve decided to bring back Anthony Ogogo after 2 years where no one even remembered or cared that he was gone.

Ok, so good hand, vanilla wrestler. His Rampage comp would be maybe Kyle O’Reilly? Except he’s not a jobber. How about Alex Reynolds?

I’m going to be Pennsylvania archaeology networking (read: drinking beers at hotel bar) during Collision and possibly even BotB. Probably won’t be able to catch up until Monday.

Butcher is maybe the closest to The Gambler. I don’t remember Frankie Lancaster.