haws bah gawd 0 Report post Posted March 21, 2005 I just got back from this FANTASTIC show. It was from the Township Auditorium in Columbia, SC. Its a pretty small place, that holds between 2500-2750. It was just shy of being sold out. You could see Arn Anderson, Dean Malenko, and someone who appeared to be Ricky Steamboat, watching the matches from the stage. La Resistance did their usual interruption of the National Anthem, only to be interupted by Tajiri and Regal making their entrance to start the match. One has to wonder why the crowds chant USA USA in support of a team consisting of an Oriental guy and a British Guy. Regal and Tajiri retained after Regal's "Knee of Doom" to Conway. Great opening match. Next was Simon Dean doing his "blah blah fat people blah blah exercise" bit. His opponent turned out to be Viscera. If you've never seen Vis in person, hes THICK. Much bigger than he looks on tv. Vis can move extremely well for a man weighing nearly 500. Vis won with his rolling kick, then big splash. Hurricane vs Chris Masters was next. Hurricane got in a lot of offense, but Master's won with the Master Lock. Next was Molly vs Victoria with Val Venis as Special Referee. Average womens match, with a pretty innovative ending. Molly went up for the Molly-Go-Round, but Victoria crotched her on the ropes, turned her upside down, dragged her off the turnbuckles and dropped her with the Widow's Peak. Next was Shelton Benjamin vs Muhammed Hassan. Benjamin's mother was in the third row on the floor. Shelton made Hassan look like a million bucks. Benjamin is the future of WWE. After hitting the Dragon Whip, Davairi brock up Benjamin's attempted pin on Hassan. Shelton fought back, gave both Exploder Suplexes, grabbed the mic and said "Not In front of My Mom, you dont". Kane vs Tomko and Christian was next. Oddly enough, Tomko looked VERY good in the ring today, as compared to his televised performances. Perhaps he suffers the "fear of screwing up on camera", similar to Mordecai? Tomko accidentally hit Christian with his running big boot, Kane threw Tomko out of the ring, Chokeslammed Christian and got the win. Next was a typical heat segment with the Coach. He introduced Moolah and Mae Young as hometown superstars. Oddly, at the 12-3-04 houseshow from Augusta, GA, Moolah and Mae were billed as being from Augusta. Weird. Anyways, Coach babbled on about what legends the two ladies are. Orton then made his predictable appearance. He talked trash about the Undertaker and received NUCLEAR heel heat for it. He then went on to ask Moolah and Mae if they knew why he was called "the Legend Killer". The heat on Orton built and built because we all thought he was about to RKO one of the ladies, but he instead swerved, and RKO'ed the coach. Typical boring repetitive Orton segment. Next was Snitzky vs Chris Benoit. Benoit was his usual excellent self in the ring, bumping like a pinball for Snitzky and doing his part to carry the match. Snitzky looked pretty good, but fell victim to the Pumphandle Slam countered into the Crippler Crossface. Chris Jericho vs Edge was next. There was a fairly large "You screwed Matt" chant directed towards Edge, which he acknowledged with a couple pelvic thrusts. This was a VERY VERY good, PPV-quality match between these two. Edge attempted to use a ladder against Jericho, but it backfired, and Jericho got the win with the Walls of Jericho. Next up was a non-title HHH vs Batista match. BIG DAVE got far and away one of the loudest pops I've ever heard in person, and this was coming from an extremely small crowd. If this is any indication of what we have to look forward to at Wrestlemania, then we're in for quite a show. HHH played the pussy-heel role perfectly. Backing down from BIG DAVE at every given opportunity. BIG DAVE pretty much whooped HHH's ass from one side of the ring, to the other, with HHH getting in only a small 5-minute burst of offense in the middle of the match. HHH tried to use the ring steps, a chair, and the mic against Batista but nothing worked. Dave sold the shot from the ring steps pretty good, but soon began to fight back. The end was DAVE hitting a clothesline on HHH that echoed throughout the arena, and hit so hard, HHH spit his gum about 20 feet into the air, and it looked like every bead of sweat on his body shot off. Edge ran out, and slipped HHH the title belt. HHH hit Dave with the belt, but he kicked out at 2, blowing the roof off the place. Orton then ran out to attack Edge and drive him away from ringside. Dave then hit the Spinebuster, and Demon Bomb, and got the clean win over HHH. Shows like this is why WWE will always earn my $$$. These guys put their heart and soul into matches whether there are 2,000 people in the crowd or 40,000. I prefer houseshows over televised events because the wrestlers seem like they're just having a good time, are much more relaxed, and arent trying to be serious the whole time. I will gladly be seeing WWE again next time they come this way. If anyone has any further questions about the show, feel free to ask. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Guest Shadow Report post Posted March 21, 2005 Top Rope Widows Peak and Edge's pelvic thrusts to "YOU SCREWED MATT" is awesome. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Guest MikeSC Report post Posted March 21, 2005 I actually thought the crowd, well, sucked today. They didn't seem to react to much of anything (and, honestly, the inability to synch up chants got annoying). Also, why the hell was Viscera WRESTLING while Val Venis was REFEREEING? That made no sense. And Batista v HHH might be a good WM ME, but I felt the opening segment of the incessant "threatened count-out" spot just got old. -=Mike Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
haws bah gawd 0 Report post Posted March 21, 2005 MikeSC, were you one of the three guys holding the various "Edge Screwed Matt" signs? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Guest MikeSC Report post Posted March 21, 2005 MikeSC, were you one of the three guys holding the various "Edge Screwed Matt" signs? No. I was one of the guys in the first balcony on the left side if you're looking at the arena from the stage where Arn et al were. I think I saw Michael Hayes up there. Didn't see Dean, but I couldn't make out most of the people. I hope the audio was better where you were, because I had a hard time making out anything Coach was saying. -=Mike Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
haws bah gawd 0 Report post Posted March 21, 2005 I could barely understand jack shit of what anyone said all night. I thought it was odd the only person I could half-way understand was Orton, and all I could make out was "I'll show you why Im a legend". I was in section F carrying an Attitude-era replica belt, and wearing a Batista shirt. The audio echoed something awful under the roof of the upper balcony. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Guest MikeSC Report post Posted March 21, 2005 I could barely understand jack shit of what anyone said all night. I thought it was odd the only person I could half-way understand was Orton, and all I could make out was "I'll show you why Im a legend". I was in section F carrying an Attitude-era replica belt, and wearing a Batista shirt. The audio echoed something awful under the roof of the upper balcony. I wasn't too far from you. I had some woman two rows up who, apparently, thought every single heel on the roster "sucked". God knows she said it often enough. It just seemed that the crowd wouldn't pop for much of anything. And am I the only one who noticed that Regal has gotten himself in pretty darned good shape? -=Mike Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
haws bah gawd 0 Report post Posted March 21, 2005 Regal looked great tonight. He had a bit of a gut on him when he first returned, but is looking great now. We may have been sitting around the same woman. THis older woman was sitting directly behind me and was yelling "WOOOOOO SHELTON ORANGEBURG WOOOOOO!!!!!" for his ENTIRE match against Hassan. I'm sure we have differing gauges on crowd reactions, but I thought the place loved Dave. I'll admit though it was annoying when the crowd couldn';t pick a chant and stick with it. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Guest MikeSC Report post Posted March 21, 2005 Regal looked great tonight. He had a bit of a gut on him when he first returned, but is looking great now. We may have been sitting around the same woman. THis older woman was sitting directly behind me and was yelling "WOOOOOO SHELTON ORANGEBURG WOOOOOO!!!!!" for his ENTIRE match against Hassan. I'm sure we have differing gauges on crowd reactions, but I thought the place loved Dave. I'll admit though it was annoying when the crowd couldn';t pick a chant and stick with it. Oh, Dave got an insane pop. It was just odd that so few others did. I honestly felt bad for Jericho, who I thought the crowd almost ignored. I won't even go into the cringing over the "USA!" chants for Regal & Tajiri. And I was shocked Benoit had Snitsky carry the offense for so much of their match. -=Mike Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
