RD: So after recovering from the 5 hour marathon of USA Pro the night before, I head out to get to NY to Hoboken to get to Bayonne. I end up showing up with about 10 minutes to spare and get on the bus. Originally, JAPW was doing a free bus, which in turn ended up being MKJ's bus tour since JAPW didn't find a bus in time. It was a step up from what I was expect which was 80 people crammed in Dani the photographer's friend's van. On the ride over, for some weird reason they show a CZW tape, which given the past between Zandig and JAPW, probably wasn't the best thing to play on a ride to a JAPW show. This was Cage of Death 4, and boy, is CZW not afraid to waste 50 minutes building up this match that I didn't particularly want to see between Zandig and Lobo. Especially, the hanging on hooks through the skin thing they did. Then after that, I had to watch a match with Rockin' Rebel. I am not feeling a desire to go to a CZW show.

PP: I wind up killing a couple of hours at the Newport Pavonia mall before making my way out to Bayonne and the Charity Hall, where MKJ's bus was making a pit-stop. Having to sit through the Rebel match on the bus plus the Zandig/Lobo festivities was especially aggravating considering all the relatively cooler highlights of Sonjay Dutt, Messiah, Pain et al the tape was showing before they got to the COD. I will say that the women singing "God Bless America" before the cage match was pretty damn funny as she switched tunes like five times during the song. I guess she was singing the Ultraviolent national anthem. The bus ride was short and sweet although it seems like MKJ's regulars have gotten a lot more toolish since the last time we took it (2002 Super 8), and this wasn't even counting the Bayonne teeny-boppers making the trip either. There was one guy on the bus who sort of looked like ECW Arena mutant Stanley if Stanley had listened to the Bleacher Bums' advice and took a bath. He apparently came all the way from Allentown, had a very odd fixation with WXW worker Sugaa and may have been an even bigger nitwit than Stanley was.

RD: Pre-show we sat on the bus and Balls Mahoney, Steve Corino and Simply Luscious did a Q&A which was pretty good. Balls told some funny stuff about SMW and driving around in New Jack's car. Corino had some funny stories about Nathan Jones in Z1. I had heard something about Nathan's past, not knowing anything about him being a bank robber.

PP: Balls was really funny talking about the Boo Bradley gimmick, although the story with him driving New Jack's car was intensely fucked up. I forget how he wound up with it, but the story ends with him getting inadvertently profiled by the local cracker police who recognize Jack's wheels (a green Corvette with "X" license plates) and approach the car with guns drawn. "OUT OF THE CAR YOU FUCKING NIGGER!" Then they realize that Balls is actually driving it... and they actually think he's this retarded guy. "Hey Boo! How'd you wind up with Jack's car?" So Balls has to immediately go into character: "Well I was just walking around and I saw Jack's car... it was so pretty and nice and shiny that I took it out for a spin!" UNREAL. To make a long story short, Balls apparently spent most of his time in SMW stoned out of his wits because it was the only way for him to cope with having to stay in character 24/7/365. Someone else asked him his thoughts about the Xanta Klaus gimmick: "My thoughts? $12,000 for 30 minutes work, and I retire undefeated." Balls got a standing ovation for that. Corino was also funny talking about Nathan Jones ("He's really sensitive") and working for Hashimoto ("He's a great boss to work for. Working with him is another story").

RD: We end up getting inside and get our tickets. We end up being front row dead center. Great seats... or are they? With the amount of JAPW guys who are not afraid to eat hot fiery death and land on the railings and such and given our position, we're prime targets for someone who hates internet writers and I expect to die... or dive onto people next to me about 8 times this evening. The show was pretty packed. it was a fair sized building and it looked like all the seats were filled. They had a nice set up with a video screen (though it looked like the sound wasn't working) and they did a ramp off the stage set up they had. They didn't do a 10 bell for the Sheik (the original, not the one JAPW uses) which was sort of odd since Ref Hanson had "the Sheik" on his tape and Balls Mahoney told us about his passing on the bus and also had it taped on his arm.

PP: The Hungarian-American Citizens Center in Woodbridge (or "HACC" as I prefer to call it) is quite the St. Louis Arena of social halls as it doesn't look like much on the outside but it's a REALLY nice place once you get inside. Probably the best room they've ever run, and it is legit packed by belltime with probably 350 people. Also a non-smoking room, which NEVER hurts. We note our positioning in the front row and I figure this may be as close as I'm ever going to get to sitting front-row at Arena Mexico what with the JAPW workers' propensity towards mortgaging their lives on every show. Turns out that George Mayfield is working the show along with Highspots Mike, so I pick up the Z1 U$A PPV from him (Prince Nana's intro needs to be seen to be appreciated, BTW) and some doo-dads from Highspots along with the new/old JAPW t-shirt. I think part of my childhood withered and died when Ray Sager announced that "Kamala is signing autographs in the back." I will also note that Green Lantern Fan upgraded to the Lantern football jersey in order to impress Lawler.

MATCH 1 : CRAZY IVAN vs. "EXPLOSIVE" EDDIE THOMAS vs. CORBIN FEAR w/ Church
RD: Since they're in a new building, Ivan's "Crazy", not a "Skinhead" and does a way calmed down version of his gimmick where he calls every one white trash instead of the usual racist spiel, though he is wearing his New York State "SS" shirt. Though we're not sure if he called someone a "maggot" or "faggot" over the mic. Corbin Fear is JAPW student Roach with a new name and look. Church is his bodyguard who's sort of big and has a neat jacket with a logo with his name in a cross design on it. This match was ok, nothing really of note, except for a bunch of the guys chanting "You're not Red" at Eddie Thomas which I think is pretty unfair. I mean, it's not like Eddie's coming out trying to do all of Red's moves or mannerisms. Church got involved with a few times, in the end Ivan pinned Eddie though I forget with what. Post match, Church and Fear beat up Eddie some more and Fear gave him that weird piledriver type move EZ Money used to do.

PP: Church's vest ruled it. Ray has his shows reversed as Ivan actually did come out as "Skinhead Ivan" here whereas he was "Krazy Ivan" at the USAPW show, although for this show he completely ditched the racism and kept it clean for the kids. Apparently MKJ's regulars decided that since Eddie Thomas was wearing a red outfit, he was obviously trying to imitate Red. *rolls eyes* Ivan winds up finishing Eddie off with the SHARP Legsweep (no "Sieg Heil") while Fear somehow gets stuck on the outside.

MATCH 2 : THE SHAOLIN WRECKING CREW (Magic & Suba) vs. THE DIRTY ROTTEN SCOUNDRELZ (EC Negro & KC Blade)
RD: This is billed as a Number One contender's match. The SWC controlled early with the DRS bumping around for them. Eventually they single out Magic and work him over with double teams and bait in Suba. This was ok. Half the fun of the DRS is watching their facials on sells. They're also not afraid to die a ton in the match. Eventually, Suba gets the hot tag and stacks the DRS for the pile on Vader Bomb. When he does, Becky Bayless appears and distracts Suba. As he follows her to the back, allowing the DRS to double team Magic and Negro to pin him.

PP: DRS get off another zinger at the SWC's expense as Blade calls them the "Killer Tomatoes" along with the previously-used "Kool-Aid rejects" line. This is fun as DRS bump like pinballs early then isolate Magic with their double-teams... IMO they would've been total superstars if they'd been doing this shtick in MSW or Memphis 20 years ago as they're ridiculously charismatic as well as great workers. SWC take over and are about to put DRS away when Becky Bayless comes out (doing well to escape Billy Reil's clutches) and hyp-mo-tizes Suba with her pulchritude. "Hello boys, have a good night's rest? I missed you!" With Magic trying to call back Suba Negro rolls him up with a handful of tights and gets the pin. NEW HEROES!

MATCH 3: SIMPLY LUSCIOUS vs. APRIL HUNTER
RD : Luscious is working heel for the match, April is working face, which is weird considering Slyk's a heel and given the size difference for the two, it would probably be better to have Luscious to work face. This was really there. It wasn't as bad as the tag match at the Alpha show but it still wasn't anything you need to go out of your way. I think April has the Lita syndrome where she has a couple of spots that she hits well, but once you have her do more than outside interference it really exposes her. Luscious tries but still, this wasn't really good. April won with a powerbomb.

PP: Again, I believe April tends to work face more often since she has a bigger rack than most of her opponents, although again Kevin Walters did one of his few smart things of booking her on the heel side at their Alpha match. Now let us never mention it again. April did a couple of neato mat holds, and tried to carry Luscious as best she could. Luscious works hard but is... problematic, not that this stopped MKJ's boys from spraying man mayo all over the folks in the second row for her.

MATCH 4: DERANGED w/ Dixie vs. THE INSANE DRAGON
RD : Wasted Youth EXPLODES~! This was actually pretty fun. It seems like Deranged and Dragon have calmed down a bit from last year and aren't trying their best to kill themselves doing something really stupid, which is a good thing. They still did high spots, but it was trudged down by they trying really complex things with chairs and stuff. Dixie was at ringside and was a good second. He worked the crowd pretty good. Deranged got in an asai moonsault to the floor from the corner on Dragon at one point. Dixie I think interfered at some point and Deranged ended up winning with a running start into his sunset flip powerbomb which looked good.

PP: Ray with an early candidate for "understatement of the year" as this match was AMAZINGLY great compared to their series from 2001. They still did a lot of highspots but they also mixed in lots of matwork and they didn't feel the need to break out the plunder. Maybe Azrael's injury knocked some sense into them. Anyhow, they keep the proceedings in-ring for the most part while Dixie carries things on the floor. He can tell us "DON'T CLAP!" all he wants... he still fucking rules.

MATCH 5: TONY LAZARO vs. JAY LETHAL for the JAPW TV TITLE
RD: Lazaro was one of my biggest fears of the evening because I think he's found a way to implale himself on the railings on about 5 of the last shows I've seen him on. Fortunately, he doesn't feel the need to die this evening. This was a fun match. They did some mat work. I think this is the match were the crowd started picking up on Hanson yelling "TWO!" on near falls, to the point he'd count and the whole crowd was going "TWOOOOOOOOOO!". Lazaro even played into it with arguing the count "That was three!" "TWOOOOOOO!" "THREE!" "TWOOOOOOOOOO!" Lethal ended up getting win with a new move. He hooked Lazaro into something similiar to Atlantis' finisher that Tajiri uses from time to time, sort of a crossbow move where he's standing and he's got Lazaro perpandicular to his and they're back to back with him and he's holding his head and legs. Lethal's got him in the hold and falls to the side dropping Lazaro on his head and picks up the pin.

PP: The announcer had been pimping the pizza all night so I decided to take my pizza break now. It was entirely servicable. I also find Buck Woodward over by the Mayfield table and we talk about his Japan trip as well as Danny Demanto's chances of surviving a meeting with Homicide after KO'ing one of his students. "...and Slim just left town" is the ruling opinion. Lethal's Atlantida Driver was totally nutzoid.

MATCH 6: SLYK WAGNER BROWN w/ April Hunter vs. STEVE CORINO
RD : 1! 2! 3! PIZZA! I actually watched part of this match in the back of the room while eating pizza. It turned out to be a good time because either soda or water or something I think was thrown at Slyk while I was out of my seat and it would have hit me most likely. This was kind of back and forth, with April interfering a bit before Simply Luscious came out and got in Corino's corner. Slyk either kicked out of or countered out of the Old School Expulsion. Corino kicked out of the Full Nelson Buster. Corino ended up hitting I think a Northern Lights Bomb for the win.

PP: Slyk did his usual gimmick of teasing a handshake with one of the fans only to squirt him with his water bottle. The fan was pissed off at him, and I noticed that Slyk had deposited the bottle on the floor a couple of feet away, so I stretched through the guardrail, grabbed the bottle and gave it to the fan, joking that he should seek revenge. Slyk came back around and I expected the fan to maybe squirt him back... what I didn't expect was for him to remove the squirt top and try to splash Slyk. Of course the water just poured out of the bottle and all over Ray's (empty) chair. Seeing the spectacular failure of this, the fan REPEATS it the next time Slyk moseys by resulting in a big "THROW HIM OUT!" chant. Sadly, he stuck around. Regarding the match proper, Corino works face for a change and doesn't have to expend too much effort as the fans are cheering all of the ECW workers. Just as well he had an easy night what with having to work on a broken hand. Corino is about to hit the Expulsion on Slyk when April comes out and distracts him, allowing Slyk to counter out of it. This leads MKJ's group (and I'm lumping Water Bottle Boy in with them whether or not he actually rode the bus) to start a "Make the save, Colby" chant before Luscious comes out. They also start a "We Want Luscious" chant; my counter-chant of "You're All Virgins" is predictably no-sold. Corino goes over with the Northern Lights Bomb.

MATCH 7: DIXIE w/ Deranged vs. AERIAL ASSASIN RAIN for the JAPW Light Heavyweight Title
RD: Rain came out I'm guessing amature style tights as they had "HAWKS" on them. I'm not sure but I'm guessing that's the Hudson Catholic team. This time it was Deranged to rudo it up as a second. This was pretty good from what I can remember before all the other wrestling, work and a cold kicked in. Rain would get a few runs at getting Dixie in trouble, then Deranged would interfere. At one point, Insane Dragon showed up on the outside. They did a ref bump spot where I think Rain was setting up for his piggy back stunner, but Hanson gets bumped. Deranged runs in, so does Dragon. Dragon takes out Deranged with a face breaker move out of a powerbomb set up and helps Rain. Rain ends up hitting a top rope 450 onto Dixie to win the title. Post match, Jay Lethal came out and challenged Rain to a title v. title match.

PP: Big ups to the anonymous poster on the JAPW MB who helped me remember Dixie's new music (Crystal Method's "Name of The Game;" this was driving me nuts as I'd forgotten what he came out to). Deranged is hysterical working Dixie's corner. At one point Rain ejects Dixie and hits a dive to the floor; Deranged tries to get over to help Dixie but there's a huge mass of cameramen on that side taking pictures, so he has to literally sprint all the way around the ring to get over to Dixie. This eventually leads to a big "You Suck Dixie" chant directed at him, and even with his back turned to us you can tell he's laughing his ass off at it as he focuses back on the match. Rain continues to improve as he's calmed down considerably from this point several months ago, although it was rather disconcerting to see fresh blade scars on his forehead.

MATCH 8: KAMALA vs. JERRY "THE KING" LAWLER
RD: Kamala came out to his old music, I was disappointed he didn't have the mask though. I was also we didn't get the big Memphis tv promo introduction for him. This was an amazingly fun match considering the match up. Jerry knows how to play a crowd, and a lot of the greatness of this match was Lawler's facials and selling of stuff. There's also a great bit where Kamala misses Lawler in the corner and then turns to Hanson and goes... "Hey ref!" causing just about all of us to lose it. This was simple but fun. Lawler took two big bumps to the floor, one on our side and then one out onto the ramp, with Kamala teasing a dive onto it, but then just doing the belly slaps. Lawler eventually dropped Kamala with a series of punches before putting him away with the fist drop off the top rope. A good time was had by all, I think the crowd played well into this too, including "Kamala" and "You're a man" chants.

PP: Man alive was this a big batch of goofy fun. Kamala comes out first and right away you can tell how jazzed he is to be performing in front of a crowd as hot as this one is. Lawler comes out next but he doesn't do his usual lap around the crowd I guess since Kamala's "too dangerous" to turn his back on. Frank was promising a "Memphis-style Brawl" for this... while it didn't come close to living up to that billing it was still the greatest legends' match ever as both guys had the crowd eating out of their hands. Kamala yelling "HEY REF!" was such an absurdly great moment... I pictured him thinking "D'OH! Ugandan, Ugandan, Ugandan..." immediately afterwards. Again, they just did basic stuff but it all worked 200% to perfection with this crowd. A million billion stars.

MATCH 9: MAFIA w/ Johnny D vs. THE SOLUTION (Papadon & Havok) vs. THE DIRTY ROTTEN SCOUNDRELZ (EC Negro & KC Blade) in a Tables match for the JAPW TAG TEAM TITLES
RD: Originally this was supposed the Hit Squad v. The Solution, but Monsta Mack is out with a broken foot, so the Hit Squad had been stripped of the belts and it was going to be The Solution v. DRS. Then Mafia came out and said he wasn't going to give up the belts without a fight, so they turned it into a 3 way, I think complete with Johnny D slipping Hanson a bribe envelope. Boy, the DRS really cemented the fact they are willing to die in this as EC Negro took some hideous bumps in this. He took a spear to his back through a table. Later on, he took a bump off the ropes when he hit his back on the post and fell to the floor. This also sort of fell victim to the random rules to a match as people were trying to figure out why Hanson was counting pins in the match as assuming it was table rules, all you had to do was put someone through a table, but that wasn't the case. It was also one fall. There was one really hideous bump where the DRS did a combination of a Death Valley Driver and a Tornado DDT on Papadon onto a table where the table didn't break. Mafia ended up getting the win with a small package on Havok. I can see them not wanting to switch the belts and the 3 way sort of covered it as since it was a 1 fall 3 way, it wasn't just both sides eliminating Mafia and then going for the belts between themselves. Though I hope they don't do the one man title defenses until Monsta comes back.

PP: At first it seemed like Monsta's foot injury was going to throw a huge monkey-wrench into the booking here as there was no real reason for a tables stip in a Solution/DRS match... but then Mafia came out and inserted himself into the match. Hanson is hysterical selling the "bribe" from Johnny. The DRS really weren't afraid to burst into flames here as Blade got speared through a table STOMACH-first and Negro later gets launched out of the ring and almost gets impaled on the ringpost. Mafia wins via the aforementioned rollup on Havok, which I thought was fine. I mean if Mafia's working by himself then there's no way in hell he'd be able to hit his finisher without someone getting in there to break the pin... OTOH if you have to have Mafia win then you might as well have him go over via flash pin. OTOH, they've already announced that he's defending the titles against DRS this weekend by himself so who knows where they're going with this now.

MATCH 10: BALLS MAHONEY vs. HOMICIDE in a Street Fight for the JAPW HEAVYWEIGHT TITLE
RD: Balls ended up filling up under the ring with some chairs and stuff. I'm pretty sure Homicide came in with a garbage can. Homicide also had a new song for his theme music. At one point, a plastic spork, yup, you read that right a spork, half spoon, half fork, a SPORK, is used to gouge Balls in the head and he bleeds a bunch. The spork ends up getting knocked in the crowd, when it gets thrown back in, Hanson picks it up and looks at it with a disgusted look when he sees all the blood on it. They did a brawling segment on the floor, Homicide was looking for chairs. Since I had an extra next to me, which was wet from earlier, I ofter it to him. "Uh, Mr. Homicide, sir. Do you need this?" But he passed. Balls got some near falls on a frog splash and a top rope leg drop and also nut cracker suite onto a pile of chairs and stuff. They end up pulling out a barbed wire board which first got caught on the apron cover. I think Homicide did a swinging DDT onto the board and Balls lost a big hunk of his hair on one of the barbs. The finish was Homicide hitting a superplex onto the barbed wire board and then following up the pin with a jacknife hold. Post match, Slyk Wagner Brown runs in and jumps Homicide and he ends up getting powerbombed onto a barbed wire board across some chairs to end the show.

PP: I hit the facilities as Balls is making his entrance, only to return a couple of minutes later as Balls and Homicide are slugging away at each other on the floor. Perhaps not the brightest move on my part, granted... Anyhow, this was really good for a garbage match as both guys had their working boots on. Balls in particular was working at a million miles an hour, including a MOONSAULT off the top rope at one point. I thought it was amusing that Balls would juice for a spork shot considering how tender the skin on his forehead has to be by now. He might as well have juiced from the spotlights shining on him too brightly. At some point during the match Hanson remembers to pull out Johnny D's envelope only to reveal that the "bribe" was actually a flyer advertising the show. "D'OH!" Towards the end of the match Homicide goes over to our side for chairs leading to Ray and I both doing the "Mr. Homicide, Sir" shtick. He finally pulls out the barbed-wire board (after everyone on our side had seen it earlier and was yelling at various workers to use it during the show) only for Balls to take it and superplex him onto it, cutting open Homicide's shoulder and resulting in Balls losing a gigantic clump of his own hair in the barbs. Balls goes for the pin but Homicide kicks out at "TWOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" Balls: "THREE!" Crowd: "TWOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" Balls: "SHIT!" Homicide eventually comes back with the tornado DDT on Balls onto the board and jackknifes him for the pin to retain the title. Homicide continues to work over Balls which leads Slyk to head in and help Balls double on Homicide. I thought Corino might run in to even things up but I guess it was not meant to be. Hanson tries to break things up and gets the business end of a Nutcracker Suite for his troubles.

POSTSHOW
RD: We head back on the bus, surprisingly, they got Lawler to pop in and say "Hi" before heading out as from what I've gathered, Lawler usually books himself early on a show so he can get out while the main event is running. We also had a bunch of underage girls get into arguments with Deranged. Ah, the joys of indy wrestling. Overall, it was a good show. The venue seems nice. They teased having a "Funking" surprise, so I guess they're going to use Terry, or maybe Jimmy Jack or Adam Windsor. I ended up rolling in about 2am for the second night in a row. Oh well, at least the show next Saturday will be early.

PP: This was a really strong show for JAPW, one of the best I've ever seen from them. They really hit a home run with the new building, and booking Funk is a smart move seeing how many ECW marks there were in the crowd. OTOH, Ray Sager quit the company afterwards, which was quite... odd. So it's anyone's guess what direction the booking goes in after he was the booker for their boom period. FWIW, I get the feeling that the girl arguing with Deranged may have been part of an angle JAPW is shooting as their website mentioned something about Deranged getting into an argument with some girl after the show and them turning it into a match for this weekend with Dixie/Deranged vs. Dragon/Lazaro. MKJ gets in a cute line about the girls fighting, comparing it to a Degrassi High episode. We get back to the Hall at 12:30, hit the Sev (I grab the new "dnL" soda... mmmmm, caffeinated 7-Up) and head home. I get in at 2:15 and take the obligatory spear from the dog for my troubles.