RD: Things have been sort of chaotic lately with the DVDVR 500 coming out, my birthday and then a less then well planned move of my department on the Friday before the show. I end up meeting up with Pete at the 7-Eleven in Bayonne and we head off to the show. They redid the configuration of the building and basically did a flip of their locker room and their ring location. We end up B.S.ing with Buck Woodward for a while, discussing the 500 while I ubergeek it up by using my Blackberry wireless email device to keep up to date with the last few hours of debating on the listings of people. Since Mike Johnson from 1bob was there, I decide to really geek it up by scooping them sending live results to Rippa who I know is online doing work. I figure this will get us subscriptions our members only section. I'm sure when Dean gets the Ryuma Go porn, that membership area will be jumping. We notice that American Dragon is at the show and sitting at RF's booth. Pre-show, Fat Frank does the crowd warm up and announces some of the future dates. December will have a show at Woodbridge I think on Dec 13th, which will have Jerry Lawler vs. Kamala. Pete and I do the "Kamala... 6 foot 10.... 400 pounds..." promo from Memphis in honor of this announcement.

PP: “Kamala. 6 foot, 10 inches tall. 380 pounds. Kamala.” That promo rules. The extended BS session with the Con’s inner chamber is more fun than usual as Buck is psyched to see the 500 come out. I pass Buck and Ray the Chamber of 500 quotes and mention ominously that I have a copy of the 500 in my bag. Sadly Buck doesn’t force our hand by going for the bag. The new setup is interesting as we were trying to figure out where the boys were going to change until Buck tells us that the Hall has a basement. A converted A&P with a basement… go fig. Ray forgets the big story that the Hall has gotten their bathroom up to code. Yes, they’ve added a hand-drier and a bar of soap. I get my money’s worth the second Tony Lazaro shows up singing Biz Markie’s “Just A Friend” as he heads to the back. “Yoooouuuuuuuu… you got what I neeeeeeeeeeeeeeed…”

MATCH #1 : THE SHAOLIN WRECKING CREW (Magic & Suba) vs. THE DIRTY ROTTEN
SCOUNDRELZ (KC Blade & EC Negro)
RD: The DRS heel it up when they come out and cut a promo on the crowd and SWC, calling them a pair of "Koolaid Mascots". I know look forward to the SWC smashing through a wall on a future show and yelling "OH YEAH!". This is ok, the DRS are way undersized to do a bunch of their stuff to a team as big as the SWC. Blade wails on Suba with a clothesline, which Suba no sells, but given the sound that it made when Blade hit him, if he's about to no sell that, more power to him. Suba ends up spending most of the time in the ring and the DRS get some heat on him as they do some double teams and fake tags on him. They hit get him in a double cross face at one point and are able to hit him with their spiked spinebuster move. Eventually Magic gets tagged in, Suba fights with Negro on the floor and Magic hits the Hell Smasher on KC Blade for the win.

PP: Paul Turner comes out to ref this match, which leads to someone in the crowd yelling “Turner beats his wife!” and in turn leads to me drenching the poor clod sitting in front of me with a Vanilla Coke spit-take. DRS have remixed their usual theme (C-Murder’s “Down 4 My N’s”) with the “Jesus Christ Superstar” overture. Cool as hell. Blade’s clothesline on Suba is a must-see as he just nukes Suba with it yet Suba doesn’t even move from the impact. Unreal. This was OK but DRS really need to get some smaller guys to work with. Since they’ve started working the A-shows they’ve just been fed to the SWC and the Solution… c’mon. Team Thomas and the Mid-Card Express are right there.

MATCH #2 : TEAM THOMAS ("Explosive" Eddie & "Chiller" Miles Thomas) vs. THE SOLUTION (Papadon & Havok)
RD: Eddie spends most of the time in the mat playing punching bag and getting in hope spots. The Solution have some good team moves, but are hampered by the building. Eddie gets beat up a bunch, eventually makes the tag to Miles who briefly goes on offense before the Solution eventually put them both away with a powerbomb for each, followed by a lift up into another powerbomb after the bell. Post match, the Solution call out the Hit Squad saying that they're there for the belts. I'm guessing they're pushing them out of that 3 way feud with the DRS and SWC. This was more or less a squash to try to get heat on the Solution. Eddie Thomas is still looking promising, but Miles is sort of the Stevie Ray to his Booker T. Eddie ends up doing a lot of the face in peril stuff. I kind of liked the Eddie & Tony Lazaro team a little better as both seemed to be at about the same level, but both guys are still young and Miles does have room and time to improve.

PP: Hopefully the Solution are back as heels for good as it seems like they’ve alternated between face and heel at every JAPW show they’ve worked. Team Thomas get blown up real good for the third show in a row before getting put out of their misery with the stereo powerbombs for the pin. DHS/Solution should work as the Solution are a good big-man team by JAPW standards. I’ll be nice and say Miles has more room to improve than his bro does.

MATCH #3 : SKINHEAD IVAN w/ The Sheik vs. TOUGH ENOUGH PETE
RD: They again tease problems with Ivan and the Sheik as Ivan says he's going to dance and the Sheik won't let him. While they argue, TE Pete runs in and attacks them both. Boy, TE Pete is not very good. Ivan might beat TE Pete's ass enough to make the 500 some day. But today is not that day. Anyway, Ivan beats on Pete a bunch, Pete hits some bad looking offense. Ivan and the Sheik have some miscommunication spots which results in Ivan waffling the Sheik with a chair at one point. Pete countered the Zeig Heil leg sweep and hit Ivan with it. Ivan continues the trend of stiffing Pete with chops to the chest and back and eventually gets the win. We're disappointed to see that the Sheik cut his hair again, so he no longer has the Kid'n'Play chia head.

PP: You know a worker is bad when he has me rooting for his neo-Nazi opponent to kick his ass. I have Pete at 963 between Mocho Cota and Thunder when we come out with the DVDVR 1000. Ivan the Disco Skinhead finds the time to bust out some break dancing as he ties Pete up and does the Electric Boogie with the hapless MTV flame-out as a segue into the Sieg Heil legsweep. At this rate Pete is going to help Ivan onto the 500 by serving as his personal punching bag.

MATCH 4 : GHOST SHADOW vs. MIKE KRUEL w/ Allison Danger
RD: Ironically, this is the rematch from a year ago which was the first show Pete and I went to in Bayonne. Kruel still has the TV Title belt which he stole from Jay Lethal on the last show. Kruel was announced as the self proclaimed TV Champ. This was pretty fun with the mat work although the crowd wasn't totally into it. Ghost Shadow hit a really nice looking short arm scissors move that looked pretty hurty. Kruel worked the arm and did a bunch of wakigatame's out of counters. Shadow hit his corner knee move which is currently one of my favs. Kruel eventually won with the cross arm breaker. He basically dared anyone to take the belt from him post match. Fun match.

PP: I missed more of this than I care to admit, as I was busy playing Good Samaritan lending my phone to a kid so he could call his mom for a ride home. What I saw looked really good, although they seemed to jettison the whole “Ghost Shadow is turning heel” bit here. Both guys work the other’s arm until GS goes for a rana, which Kruel counters expertly with the classic “UN FOUL!” defense and rolls right into the juji where GS taps. Fun stuff.

MATCH 5 : TONY LAZARO vs. DERANGED vs. JAY LETHAL - JAPW TV TITLE
RD: Tony Lazaro comes out first and is now a heel again. Alliances switch back and forth in this as the two younger guys (Lazaro and Lethal), try to double team Deranged early, but then Deranged slapped Lazaro in the back of the head when he was gloating/posing and blamed it on Lethal who was laugh at it. I'm pretty sure we got our mandatory Lazaro toasts himself on the railing spot to. At one point, Lethal did something and it looked like Lazaro landed funny and hurt his leg. He pulled out a stool and milked this sucker for all it's worth as Hansen and Ray Saeger came out to check on him, they helped him up, the crowd applauded and then Lazaro drop kicked Lethal and Deranged. At some point in here, Deranged hit his high speed sunset flip powerbomb move off a rope running spot which was as quick and smooth as I think I've ever seen that move look. Lazaro was the first to go as Lethal put him up in a la tapatia and Deranged ended up jumping off the ropes and hitting a senton on the pile and pinned Tony. The match went on a little longer, Lethal ended up catching Deranged with his straightjacket piledriver move for the win. All and all, a good showing by all.

PP: This may have been match of the night as all three looked really good here, which partly says something for the matches tonight but speaks more for the development of these guys. I mean you would expect a disjointed mess with three guys who aren’t old enough to shave and Deranged (the wily veteran of the three with maybe 18 months experience) is hardly a ring general, yet this never broke down and it was fun as hell. Tony’s “injury” was great as he sold it like a champ right to the point where he “revived” and hit a double-clothesline on Jay and Deranged. Ref Hanson’s look of eye-rolling exasperation at Tony as he left the ring was the perfect cap on the bit. Really, the only thing that spoiled it for me was that Chris Hamrick had done a similar angle a few days earlier… with that still fresh in my mind, it was hard for me not to see through it. Nevertheless, it was done about as perfectly as it could be and this was a great match.

RD: At some point in the show, I'm not sure when, they did a bit where The Sickness was going to return as they had hyped it a few of the other shows. The Sickness was Glenn Strange and Lou Diamond (bookers Ray Saeger and Fat Frank's wrestling personas). They ended up having JT Jobber and The Green Guy/Sylvester Greendexter come out as Frank and Ray and did a bunch of jokes about how fat they were and how bad of wrestlers they were.

PP: This is hysterical as JT and Green come out wearing pillowcases underneath their shirts and Green “gets stuck” trying to walk between the ring and one of the support beams. It’s almost like when Fuyuki did the Onita parody as JT has the bandages on his forehead and Green has a drawn-on tattoo on his leg similar to Strange’s. Later on “Lou” announces that he’s going to do his big move, at which point he takes the Nestea plunge while “Glenn” starts a “He’s hardcore!” chant. Too funny.

MATCH 6 : DEVASTATION INC (Stryker & Boogalou) w/ The Sheik vs. DA HIT SQUAD (Monster Mack & Mafia) w/ Johnny D - JAPW TAG TEAM TITLES
RD: Pre-match Stryker did some mic work which was pretty hilarious, to the point that he was making Boogalou crack up as he was trying to be serious. This was pretty much the Hit Squad's match as they controlled most of this. The crowd seemed pretty dead for it and it really feels like they need to do something new with the Hit Squad. Mafia looks to be really losing a lot of weight. During a fight on the floor, Johnny D ended up spraying the Sheik with a fire extinguisher, which was sort of a bad idea as a bunch of people ended up coughing for them spray. Stryker eventually got pinned after getting hit with the burning hammer. Post match, the Solution ran in and attacked the Hit Squad. They got on the mic and said that they were the new bullies in town and challenged the Hit Squad to a tables match at the Woodbridge show, which the Hit Squad accepted.

PP: “The Stryker… AND THE BOOGALOU!” Young Stryker has found his true calling as the zany Jewish Al-Qaeda sympathizer. The only problem with the gimmick is now that he’s been established as the comedy guy, it’s hard to take him seriously in a match like this where he’s challenging for a title belt. Nevertheless this is OK as Lou plays foil for Stryker while he yucks it up. Mafia’s dropped a shitload of weight since the previous Bayonne show, to the point where their being compared to the Headhunters by the Japanese mags takes on even more weight (no pun intended). Like Mafia is the diabetic Headhunter now. Post-match the Solution run in and take out DHS while the ring crew is already busy trying to sweep the fire extinguisher materials to the side.

MATCH 7: JOSH DANIELS vs. HOMICIDE w/ Low Ki - JAPW HEAVYWEIGHT TITLE
RD: This was quasi built up as an open challenge or mystery opponent as Homicide was originally supposed to face Rain, but he was out injured. I was kind of hoping for AD v. Homicide in a singles match as I don't think that's been run yet. Daniels was serviceable, but nobody knew who he was. He got "Benoit" chanted at him due to his outfit and some of his moves, which he got upset about, but there's a lot worse things to get called. Daniels countered out of the Cop Killer at one point. He some nice Germans and almost dropped Homicide on his head with a Dragon Suplex which Homicide kicked out of, but seemed to have bloodied his mouth from it. Homicide hit the shining wizard, but I think Daniels kicked out via a rope save. Eventually Homicide hit the Cop Killer for the win. After the match, the lights went out, when they came back up "The Sickness" were in the ring and Homicide threw them both out of the ring. The lights went out again, when they came up again, this time, Slyk Wagner Brown was in the ring and going after Homicide and he was knocked out of the ring, the lights went out again. The next time they came up, Balls Mahoney was there and he knocked out Homicide with a chair shot and then hyped up his match with Homicide in Woodbridge. Balls ended up taking off his shirt and he looked like he had lost a lot of weight. I actually have a desire to see that match if only so both guys could take it to the mat the whole time. I doubt they'll do it, but I'd like to see it.

PP: Pretty weird seeing Ki work the show as a second, although this may have put the kibosh on the rumors WRT Ki jumping to CZW now. I figured AD was going to be Homicide’s opponent as the sound booth had a list of everyone’s theme song for the show and AD’s was prominently displayed. Daniels looked good here although the crowd was dead since they had no idea who he was. At one point I hit the facilities and come out only to see Daniels on the floor and Homicide hitting his tope at 12 o’clock. Now I can sort of imagine what the folks sitting ringside at Arena Coliseo are thinking. Homicide eventually cashiers Daniels with the Cop Killer, at which point they do the aforementioned lights out gimmick. This was really well done, and I too have a desire to see Balls/Homicide now. I can’t see them having a mat classic, but if a back-in-shape Balls works the same kind of match he had with Devon Storm at the ICW show last June this could be really good.

MATCH #8 : SLYK WAGNER BROWN vs. JERRY "THE KING" LAWLER
RD: Pre-match, someone handed out a bunch of Burger King crowns to the crowd. Slyk is without April Hunter as she was on tour with NEO or on her way there. Jerry does some mic work before the match and says how much he loves the puppies and ends up getting a bra flash from some girl in the crowd. I swore I saw someone at the merch tables, I think Mary Kate, yell that the girl was 14. Pete then pointed out that was about the right age for Jerry. Anyway, Slyk says that he takes his wrestling seriously and he hates puppies and then Jerry accuses him of being "funny". I think Jerry doing the letch character might have played out better if Slyk had April with him this time out, but it wasn't totally over the top like it was on Mondays. I was kind of hoping Jerry would have played off the Koko B Ware chants that Slyk got given that Jerry had probably worked a million matches with him in Memphis. This was OK. Jerry is determined to stay on the 500 at he hits not one, but two drop kicks in the match. Jerry kicked out of
Slyk's full nelson slam. Eventually, Jerry drops the strap and gets the win with the piledriver. Not bad, but I liked his match with Corino better. Jerry's better than his kid is right now. Scary to think he takes as many bumps right on his knees as does considering the amount of time he's been wrestling and the number of crazy bumps he took over his career.

PP: The start of this is inadvertently funny as Jeff Shapiro (JAPW’s promoter) suddenly realizes that he forgot to hand out the crowns to everyone, so he makes this mad dash into the crowd to hand them out as Slyk is making his entrance. Jerry works more of a comedy match here than he did against Corino as he’s basically doing a cross between “tough-guy Jerry” and “perv Jerry” with the puppies shtick. He does hit two old-guy dropkicks and even tries the top-rope fistdrop (while making a joke or two at the expense of the short ceiling). He also hits Slyk with the KICKWHAMSTUNNER near the finish. I’m amazed that he doesn’t wear kneepads considering that he’s probably been taking all of those bumps knees-first for something like 30 years now. Why he isn’t a walking wreck like Terry Funk is beyond me, although of course there’s no comparing the respective styles they work at their age.

MATCH 9 : LUMBERJACK MATCH : INSANE DRAGON v. DIXIE for the JAPW LIGHT HEAVYWEIGHT TITLE :

RD : Most of the crew was acting as lumberjacks. The Hit Squad and the Solution went at before everyone came out and had a pull apart. At some point, Skinhead Ivan got a strap and ended up walloping everyone who came near him on one side of the ring. I don't remember much about this match as I was kind of distracted by everything going on outside the ring and the fact Dixie appeared to be wrestling in pajama pants. Pre-match I was calling Deranged turning heel as they teased it during the summer. The end up having all the lumberjacks start brawling and end up going out to the floor. Dragon hits I think his springboard 450 and goes for the win, with the ref down, Deranged steals the ref's shirt and counts the pin. He congratulates Dragon on winning the title, but then says "Too bad it doesn't count" and then hits Dragon with a chair. I think Dixie ends up hitting the Dixie Driver and the ref counts the pin. Post match, Deranged beat him up some more and does a bunch of heel mic work. End of show.

PP: The outcome was never really in doubt as they’d been teasing Deranged’s turn long enough, although it had apparently been on the backburner for a couple of months. Shame really, as they were a fun team for a while. Of course, they’re still booked to work the Alpha Pro show tonight as a team… you have to love the NYC indies. Match proper is pretty forgettable as the focus is more on the shenanigans taking place outside the ring. At one point Deranged starts waffling Monsta Mack with his strap for some reason so Monsta just unloads on him in return. And for those of you that care, Dixie’s streak of actually using the same entrance music ends at four shows. He needs to bring back the Fear Factory music.
 

RD : Post show we take the light rail out to it's new Hoboken stop. I was hoping that since we'd be going out to Hoboken, we'd bypass the 8 million work trains which run just about every night that JAPW runs a show, but we find one waiting for us in Hoboken. The more things change, the more they stay the same. All and all, I though it was kind of an "eh" show. There were two good matches with Ghost Shadow/Kruel and the 3 way, but nothing really blew my socks off. I'm not sure if there's 2 shows next month, or just one. There's rumored to be free transportation to Woodbridge from Bayonne, so we'll probably check out that show.

PP: “HOBOKEN? OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH, I’M DYYYYYYYYYIIIIINNNIN’!!!!!” It’s NJ Transit to NYC from now on. This was right in the middle of all JAPW shows, with a couple of good matches but nothing to really write home about. This time it seemed like they were focusing more on the angles, which at least were good angles. Next show is Friday the 13th followed by the Woodbridge supershow… of course we’re going.