What Is It?
A promotion out of Boca Raton, Ontario in Canada, Cross Body Pro Wrestling, or CBPW as I’ll call it to save my fingers, isn’t new, but it is new to YouTube.
In its current form, that is. I was lucky enough to stumbled across their Uproar programme on its first episode and was instantly impressed.The commentary team of Veda Scott and Mike Bailey – the Speedball variety – are the right combination of excitement and world-weary and the wrestling?
Well, that’s a really good selling point.
At the end of the 2nd episode, we had a Fatal Four Way for the CBPW Heavyweight title which was a fantastically fiery fight and led to Aiden Prince winning the title by nefarious means, with the aid of CBPW Women’s champ Krystal Moon.
And CBPW went even further, in a great moment, showing the two heels talking about how they’ve wanted this gor years and then showing them in the ring together in 2017 – a small but brilliantly done moment.
And now Aiden Prince is injured. And the title will immediately be held up.
Best laid plans, eh?
But that didn’t stop CBPW episode 5 from keeping the quality right up; firstly, there’s the oddly named Otto Bahn To The Gold tournament, the winner of which gets a title shot: Any title Any time.
Altogether now, they’ve got a golden ticket, they’ve got a golden ticket…
And that tourney added meat to some already very strong bones. As CBPW said on their YouTube comments for the show;
‘We will see the FIRST semi finals match in The Otto Bahn To The Gold Tournament’
Oooh! And round 2 had…
Clay Wilson v Markus ‘Uncle Custom’ Ryan
Good work early on here, arm wringer to headlock and, erm…headlock, which was so smooth it didn’t really matter.
Now, here’s an example of what makes CBPW a little different; the lights suddenly turn blue, which doesn’t seem a change done on purpose – they could have just ignored it and hoped we didn’t notice, but not CBPW, they cut to a close up of it.
Back in the ring, a nice Wilson Neckbreaker us trumped by big boy Ryan hitting an Elbow Drop off the top. And then hubris struck, he hit mat and Wilson hit a lovely twisting DDT for the pin.
Something strange and interesting about Wilson, he talks to his opponent, but not with an ‘I’m gonna mess you up’ style, odder than that, as he said when Ryan missed the elbow ‘no water in the pool’ – a reference to wrestling commentary tropes – then returned to the fallen opponent after winning and told him ‘you walk out’, then left.
A surprising talent.
Brother Earth v Nilo Reyes w/Laurel Cassidy
Nilo is a star in the making, as Veda Scott commented, he was an underdog, but not any more, he’s over, is Nilo.
Credit; Nilo Reyes Twitter @ElNilo16
Brother Earth isn’t. But he’s making changes, gone is the robe, in favour of a baseball cap and shirt.
This match worked hard but didn’t always mesh, some special moments though. Chief among them, a Brother Earth dive off the top, caught by Nilo, who staggered and almost put him down, then righted himself and hit a superb Michinoku Driver – it had a sense of reality about it and really struck home, as did Reyes’ head on the mat when Brother Earth head scissors drove his head there.
Nilo won with the last of a series of roll ups and then asked Laurel to be his tag partner in the upcoming tournament as if he was asking her to marry him.
Yep, Reyes is one to watch.
In Other Matches
She’s bionic! Well, Alexia Nicole has a sleeve with flashing lights and whatnot, plus she really took it to her opponent Gem Scott; a Meteora, Senton, a Backstabber, but the other story of the match?
Scott kept kicking out. In the end Nicole, who showed a real sense of self belief, hit a Piledriver which settled things.
And then she settled the champ’s hash too. Moon was called out and perhaps foolishly ran out, only to suffer a Piledriver and leave with her belt held up as a sort of protection.
Grizzly Mack is here!
He’s been a ref, a ref getting involved in match action, now he’s a wrestler; actually, that’s a time-honoured wrestling tradition, isn’t it?
Well, sucks to be Chad Mills, who had a go until Mack put a boot almost through his chest to drive him down. And after a fine Full Nelson Slam, Mills was done.
CBPW had been waiting for a Mack attack, it was quick and undeniable.
And Your Main Event
It was recent CBPW Heavyweight champ Gabriel Fuerza versus Rajan Husher. Husher is ‘The Artist’ and the painting he carried to the ring certainly wasn’t of flowers in a jar or sun dappled forests, oh no.
Fuerza has something to prove and now the title is held up, it’s the time to do it. But not the time to see how Husher was after he said he landed on his knee badly; that possum-playing sonofagun, taste buckle, Fuerza!
Gabriel wasn’t down and out from that, not when he could segue from a Sunset Flip to a Boston Crab and a Handspring Cutter to a Shooting Star Press! That was even after a trip from Husher saw the ex-champ land on his head…
And the finish was pretty incontrovertible, that Fuerza Boston so high it was near his eyebrows; Husher had to tap.
Who’s betting against Fuerza regaining that strap? No hands, I see…
In The Back
Kobe Durst was upset by Robbie Cosmos last week and so wants to put that right. When he caught interviewer Jamie walked past with a mic, he grabbed him and cut a promo.
Leaving Jamie to look at the mic and mouth ‘it’s not on’…
CBPW Should Be A Staple
In your wrestling diet, certainly. 5 eps in and there’s a sense of fun, enjoyment, happiness to be there. After seeing the in ring action, you might just feel that way too…
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