Welcome, one and all, to my latest OVW TV review. My reduced schedule last week means I’m week behind, so you get a double helping today! So, let’s get to it!
OVW Episode 1028
On commentary this week is Gilbert Corsey, Ted McNaler and Josh Ashcraft.
We open with some highlights from last week’s Heavyweight Title change, then cut to Gilbert and Josh. They talk about Dimes, mention the Ca$h Flo situation, and then hype up Tommy Dreamer. After that, we go to the ring.
Shiloh Jonze enters first, accompanied by DL3 and Big D. The commentary team talk about the history of the match, and how it’s a rematch five months in the making. The OVW Anarchy Champion Tommy Dreamer then enters, but he doesn’t look happy. He takes the mic and says that the last time he was in Kentucky was in 2018, and his license has not been renewed. As such, if he wrestles, he’ll be banned from wrestling in Kentucky and will cause OVW to be fined. He makes a little reference to HBK losing his smile, and then picks a replacement: Big Zo!
Shiloh Jonze vs. Big Zo for the OW Anarchy Title. There’s some talk about Shiloh being involved with the licensing issue before the bell. It being anything goes, Big D tries to jump Big Zo, and gets thrown out. DL3 goes down next, and Shiloh doesn’t fare much better. The big man holds his own against the entire Entourage 2.0, nailing some nice slams, a spinning wheel kick, and more. Tommy Dreamer gets on the apron and fakes out DL3, but the distraction allows Shiloh to hit a roll-up with his feet on the ropes. There are no rules in an Anarchy Title match, so it’s entirely fair, and we have a new champion after two minutes fifteen. For such a short match, that was really enjoyable. It told a simple story, and got the point across. ** ¾
After the match, Tommy and Zo surround the heels, and Zo manages to pull DL3’s tights down to reveal adult diapers. Shiloh then gets his tights dropped too, and we see that he’s pooped himself. That was an odd angle. I mean, sure, the faces getting something back after the loss is fine, but that just came out of the blue.
Gilbert Corsey enters the ring and calls out the OVW TV and Heavyweight champion, Dimes. He gets a decent reaction from the crowd. Gilbert congratulates him and then covers the news that ‘Shotgun’ Tony Gunn has been wrestling with a torn tendon, suffered during his match with Sami Callihan at Clast at the Bluegrass. He’ll be out for four to six months, which removes one challenger for Dimes, but there will still be more. Dimes talks up his win, and offers an open invitation to anyone in the back. Out comes Amon, using his microphone vocal effect, and laughing like crazy. Amon wants a shot at both belts.
‘The Trinidad Titan’ Justin Smooth then enters, bringing OVW Commissioner Dean Hill with him. Justin is fired up about something. Dean says that Justin found a loophole, and Dimes isn’t allowed to hold both belts. He’ll have to vacate one or the other. Of course, Dimes vacates the OVW TV Title. I’ve been kinda expecting that, as it’s unusual – though not unheard of – for a champion to hold multiple titles for any great length of time. Just demands to be included in the match with Amon, goading Dimes as it’s his fault that he lost the belt. Dimes takes the bait.
Good angle. With Gunn out, it makes sense to have Dimes take his spot in the feud with Smooth. Even with them quite rightly putting a point on Dimes’ size not stopping him from being a champion, that Smooth is so much bigger gives him a bully vibe, which always works for a heel.
Ca$h Flo and ‘The Hood Ninja’ Hy Zaya vs. King’s Ransom (OVW Southern Tag Champions). Flo and Zaya were previously both members of The Legacy of Brutality, so they have some history together leading into this. Gilbert also confirms that if the heels win, they will get a tag title shot. Ca$h starts off, using his power to take control until Maximus can make a tag. This continued the thread from last week that Ca$h is too strong for either member of King’s Ransom on their own. Hy Zaya gets some offense in too, making a change from last week’s match. The heels dominate most of the match until Ca$h gets distracted by a cleaning attendant that appears to be Sam Thompson, the rookie that lost his career to Ca$h. That allows Leonis to nail a top rope superplex for the win after five minutes. Good match here. The story that Ca$h can overpower the dominate face team is a good one, and the reappearance of Sam Thompson hopefully opens up a chance for him to get his win over the big man. As a silly note, my partner has the same shirt as Sam. ** ¾
Backstage, Entourage 2.0 bump into Thunder Kitty again. They taunt her a little and leave, but DL3 stays behind. He asks her about the nice gifts she’s been getting, and asks her out. She misunderstands and thinks he’s just trying to use her senior discount. This whole thing is almost sweet. I wonder if it’ll lead up to DL3 turning face.
Next up is the OVW TV Title Gauntlet. First match is Ashton Cove vs. Dustin Jackson. Dustin is a house on fire from the get-go, and makes short work of Ashton, pinning him with a top rope splash after only thirty seconds. Nigel Winters is out next, and Dustin drops him with a dive to the outside, then follows up with another top rope splash, giving him his second thirty second victory. Colton Cage is out next, continuing their feud. He goes straight after Lily, then sprays mace in Dustin’s face when he goes after him. The referee disqualifies Colton Cage, and Dustin Jackson is also unable to continue. With both eliminated, that just leaves two competitors: ‘The Snake’ Adam Revolver and ‘Mr. Pec-Tacular’ Jessie Godderz.
Josh is making such a big point of it being easy for Revolver before Jessie enters, that I kinda expect him to lose now. Jessie overpowers Revolver with ease, and nails a nice press slam and beautifully high dropkick. A powerslam gives him the win in under a minute. Including entrances, the match went around five and a half minutes. For what it was, it was decent though. Both Dustin Jackson and Jessie Godderz looked great, and Colton continued his feud with Jackson in an effective manner, so I can’t complain. ***
It’s main event time! Triple Threat Match for the OVW Heavyweight Title: Dimes (champion) vs. Amon vs. ‘The Trinidad Titan’ Justin Smooth. The champ jumps Smooth straight after the introductions, and starts off on top. Smooth bails while Dimes takes care of Amon, but his attempt at a sneak attack fails. It doesn’t take long for the two to start going back and forth, but when we return from a ad break, Dimes is down. Smooth keeps Amon from doing too much more than selling, and we get a double down. By the time the two bigger men are backup, Dimes has climbed to the top rope. He nails a double dropkick from the top and goes for a Change Maker, but Smooth throws him off and goes for Street Justice. Dimes ducks it and takes him down with a seated senton. Amon breaks the pin, but eats a spinning head-scissors for his trouble. Amon blocks a Change Maker attempt and nails Straight To Hell. He wastes time taunting though and Justin Smooth steals the pin – and the title – after six and a half minutes. ** ¾
The match, and the angle that set it up, essentially told two stories. One was that Justin Smooth is manipulating everyone right now. He’s been excellent in the role so far, and really grown as a performer. Meanwhile, Dimes feels like he something to prove, and as a result will recklessly take on all comers, which led to his downfall here. My hope is that this leads to Dimes getting some growth as a character, and Smooth gets to shine at the top. Did that happen? Let’s check out the next episode and find out!
OVW Episode 1029
On commentary this week is Gilbert Corsey, Josh Ashcraft, and Ted McNaler.
The show opens with Dustin Jackson in the ring, and boy is he angry. Commissioner Dean Hill comes out and tries to get him to leave, but Duston doesn’t want to leave until he gets Colton Cage He wants to end it all tonight. Dean says he’ll give him the match, but he has to understand that it’s over after that. Should either man touch the other after that, they’ll be fired. And just to make sure, it’s gonna be a Last Man Standing match. I’m happy about this. The feud has been good, but I felt like it’s been running along a little longer than it needed to.
Last Man Standing Match: Dustin Jackson vs. Colton Cage. Dustin starts off on fire, taking Colton down and throwing him to the outside. Colton starts to go for Lily, then uses the distraction to get back on top. The action remains on the outside for a little while, then Colton throws Dustin back into the ring and brings a chair into play. He spends some time targeting Dustin’s face, which plays into the storyline and Dustin still needing the protective mask. A table comes into play, and the pair do a good job of building up that it would be devastating to go through it. We get a callback to last week with Colton trying to mace Dustin, but ending up taking the spray himself. That allows Dustin to move the table to the middle of the ring and lay Colton on top. Dustin nails a big splash from the top and the table collapses but doesn’t break. The commentary team play up on that being worse than it actually breaking, but Dustin sets it up again anyway. He powerbombs Colton onto it, and again, it doesn’t break. It does, however, get the ten count and the victory for Dustin Jackson after almost eight minutes. While perhaps a little short for a feud ending bout, the action was good. It played into the overall story with the facemask and the mace, and in the end, the face won. Even with the table not playing ball, it’ still worth a good *** ¼
Ca$h Flo vs. Brandon Espinosa is up next. Brandon apparently requested this one due to Ca$h blaming him for the loss to King’s Ransom a few weeks back. Brandon takes it to the big man early on, but the moment he tries to move him rather than hit him, Ca$h reminds him of his power. Espinosa is tenacious though, and every time Ca$h gets on top, he uses speed and impact moves to get back in control. He actually manages to slam his opponent too, which looked great. Ca$h catches a top rope crossbody and takes over, slowing the pace and lighting Espinosa up with chops. Just as it looks like Ca$h’s strength is going to be too much, Sam Thompson turns up again, delivering concessions to the VIP seats. That allows Espinosa a moment to recover and nail a dive to the outside. He follows up with a kick to the head and a top rope crossbody for the pin after four minutes twenty. Sam Thompson looks really happy with the result, Ca$h Flo not so much. That was a very entertaining match, with both competitors looking good throughout. *** ¼
Shiloh Jonze [OVW Anarchy Champion] vs. Nigel Winters. DL3 does the intro, hyping up how Shiloh is gonna beat Nigel Winters this week and then Sinn Bodhi next week. DL3 keeps the mic and starts cheerleading while Shiloh beats Nigel down. Shiloh takes a moment to taunt Sinn on the mic, almost leading to Nigel almost scoring the pin with a roll-up. Entourage 2.0 are wonderfully obnoxious here, and the teaming up stops Nigel from really getting much of a look-in. Shiloh continues to play his role well, and is actually one of the most effective members of the roster in my opinion. We get the expected moment of Big D being ineffective, but in the end, the Anarchy Champ wins with a top rope Superman Punch after four minutes. The match was okay, but was mostly designed to get Shiloh the character over than anything else. **
Post-match, Entourage 2.0 do a beat down, bit Big Zo runs in to make the save and the heels run away. If this leads to a rematch between Zo and Shiloh, I’d be happy enough with that. Given some time, they could have a good match.
Commissioner Dean Hill is in the ring now and mentions that the next Saturday Night Special is the 100th, and so will be a special one. They’ll be having a special match to determine the OVW Heavyweight Champion: A Super Gauntlet Match featuring nothing but competitors that have held the title before. OVW have done a great job with the Gauntlet matches, so that should be fun. Dimes enters and vents his frustrations, stating that he keeps getting thrown into Gauntlet Matches. He wants Justin Smooth one-on-one. Dean Hill offers a compromise: he can be the last entrant in the match. Justin Smooth then comes out, and he doesn’t look happy. He accuses Dean hill of disrespecting him and wanting to get the title off him. Smooth says that Dimes is a kid and the others will be old and washed up, and he’s gonna beat them all. Dimes and Smooth argue a little more, and the youngster takes a swing for the champ. Smooth moves, and he clobbers the cameraman. Smooth says that Dean Hill needs to follow the rules and suspend Dimes for laying his hands on a staff member. Dean is upset because it was clearly an accident, but sadly, Smooth is right. He suspends Dimes for two weeks, taking him out of the Super Gauntlet. This was another great angle between these two, and the build to the eventual singles match between them is heating up nicely.
The OVW TV Title Gauntlet Match is up next, and out first are William Lutz and Kyle Roberts. Kyle, a protégé of Harley Race, pulls out some nice high flying moves and solid kicks. He falls to a rope assisted roll-up after one minute thirty though, and Lutz advances. Tony Bizo, like Kyle Roberts, is making his OVW TV debut as the next competitor. He has a nice build, and immediately sets about throwing Lutz around all over the place. He takes the win with a one-handed hanging vertical suplex after one minute. Aamon is out next, and surprisingly starts off on the back foot, with Bizo using his power again. Aamon takes over with a head bite, but Bizo soon gets back on top, only to fall prey to an exposed turnbuckle. He gets another brief comeback, and scores an upset win with a pin reversal after five minutes.
‘The Snake’ Adam Revolver is out next. His manager Shannon the Dude causes a distraction, allowing him to start off on top, but Bizo’s strength again gives him an in. The veteran uses sleeperholds to wear the rookie down, and the match goes back and forth between Bizo fighting back and Revolver locking the hold in again. After two minutes, Bizo nails the one handed hanging vertical suplex again for the pin. That just leaves Drew Hernandez, who won the TV Title at the Run For The Ropes event a few days after the last episode.
Being a little bigger than the other entrants, he won’t be so easy for Tony to throw around, and he immediately takes advantage of Bizo’s fatigue. The rookie shows some fire, but Drew is too heavy for him to lift for the suplex. Drew hits a sneaky low blow and a powerbomb for the pin after two and a half minutes. The full gauntlet ran for eleven minutes. What was interesting was that both the debuting stars looked good here. I’m not a big fan of Adam Revolver though, and while Aamon is a good character, I’m not often sold on his matches. As a result, some sections dragged a little for me this week. I’ll give it ** ½
So, all in all, that was a good two weeks’ worth of shows. I’d say that 1029 was the better of the two, but both did a good job with progressing the main storylines. I’ll be interested to see what Dustin Jackson and Colton Cage move onto next too.
Matt Doyle Media 