Connor McGrath
A Former WCW Hardcore and Tag Team Champion makes a guest appearance and we get a clash between two up and comers. Plus the conclusion of Bill Apter’s interview with WWE Hall of Famer George “The Animal” Steele.
Summer Salutations out to you in internet land! Let’s cut to the chase and get right to (the recap of) the action!
We start with Part III of Bill Apter’s interview with George “The Animal” Steele (via Skype) from a few months ago. It begins mid-story with Steele talking about the last time he talked to Vince McMahon Sr and his last match with Bob Backlund. The Animal then segues into a recap of his babyface turn and thanks Vince Jr for extending his career by making him a lovable lunkhead. Apter and Steele close out the interview with reminisces about “Macho Man” Randy Savage and Miss Elizabeth. Except the final question turns into five more minutes of random discussion. Apter tells a rambling story about The Animal being nice to his dad and then more recently, his son, who is the promotional director of a minor league baseball team. Steele puts over the greatness of minor league baseball. Animal and Apter close out by going back into kayfabe.
Crowbar Vs Mike Donovan
The stars are out tonight! Former WCW Hardcore Champ Crowbar in the house. Crowbar jumps Donovan at the bell.One of the announcers keeps alternating between calling Crowbar “Crowbar” and “Devon Storm”. Crowbar’s gotten a stupid chest tattoo since I saw him last. It also looks like he’s wearing Vampiro’s tights. I’m not sure who is supposed to be the face of heel. Maybe Crowbar is face on the aspect of “Hey! This guy’s been on TV before.” But Donovan tries to get the fans to clap along so maybe he’s the face. Anyways, this is some very slow, very dull brawling. Crowbar finally puts this match out of its misery by making Donovan tap out to a modified dragon sleeper (!?). Crowbar quickly shuffles backstage, not making eye contact with anybody. This match…was not good. D It’s too bad because I always liked Crowbar in the later years of WCW but he seemed incredibly unmotivated and was in “look, let’s just not get hurt and get this match over with” mode. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a wrestler who looked more like he didn’t want to be there than Crowbar. And Apollo has wrestled a bunch of times here. This match kind of made me slightly depressed actually. Let’s move on…
Kyle “The Beast” Winant Vs Bandito Jr
Kyle “The Beast” Winant has Rhino’s gimmick, Tazmaniac era Taz’s tights, and Seth Rollins’ haircut. Bandito is a fake luchador. This is more of less an extended squash with Bandito’s attempts at comebacks getting overpowered by Winant’s brute power. I got to say I kind of dig Winant but I’ve always been a mark for this type of gimmick. Well, forget what I just said because Bandito fired back with a huge comeback and finished Winant with a impressive/dumb looking DDT off the top turnbuckle. Both guys were obviously green as grass but showed glimmers of potential. Yeah, the match was a minute or two too long but not bad on the whole and a hell of a lot better than the ho hum first match. C+
The show closes with an advertisement for Wrestling On Fire’s return to Maine with shows at a couple of local fairs in August and September. I’ll try my damndest to do a recap of Wrestling On Fire LIVE but n0 guarantees.
To no surprise, this was kind of a placeholder show. I assumed that we wouldn’t see anything from last weekend’s TV taping and I was correct. No storylines were really put forward and even the announcers seemed to be going through the motions. I wouldn’t be surprised if we never saw any of these wrestlers again on Wrestling On Fire, though I certainly wouldn’t mind seeing more of Winant or Bandito since they actually at least seemed to be happy to be there. As always with this promotion, it’s always one step forward and two steps back. After last week’s show, where they actually seemed to be building storylines and characters, we had another show where it was just random wrestling matches presented without context or any sort of meaning. Hey, at least, the Apter and Steele segment was kind of entertaining.
Well, that ends another edition of Connor is Watching Wrestling On Fire! Come back, next week as I recap some hard hitting, small time indy action! That is the show isn’t preempted by an infomercial again!
