IWA Mid-South "March Massacre" 3/2/07
By: Magnus Donaldson
 

Remember to send me feedback to donaldson_magnus@yahoo.co.uk.
Also feel free to e-mail me with requests for shows you would like me to review.

IWA returned with this event on March 2nd 2007 in Plainfield. I bought this event for one match alone:
 Mike Quackenbush vs. Claudio Castagnoli, a rematch from the Ted Petty Invitational. There are however a few other interesting matches
 on this event that I look forward to watching.

Your commentators for this event are Ben Jordan and the other spots rotates between Sal and Vito Thomaselli, Mike Quackenbush,
 Nate Webb (why wasn't he wrestling?), Tasty Travis (a referee), Brandon Thomaselli

Jack Thriller cuts a promo before the first match running down the people of Indiana and his opponents

Match 1: Jack Thriller vs. Zach McGuire vs. Chris Hybrid
I have seen Thriller wrestle before, but I've never seen the other two. Zach McGuire is deaf apparently, so I wonder how much this hinders
 him in the ring. This match was decent,. but sloppy in places and the crowd was completely dead. These three just aren't quite there yet,
 they lack experience but they'll get better with time. The best move of the match would have to be Thriller hitting a Banshee Clothesline on
 McGuire who was holding Hybrid who got German Suplexed. Thriller makes Hybrid tap to the Figure 4 Leg Lock to win the match- *3/4

Match 2: 8-Man Lucha Tag - CJ Otis, Hillbilly Jed, Indiana Kidd Jr & Jeff Brooks vs. Diehard Dustin Lee, Vortekz, OMG & Jimmy Shalwin
I've seen some of these guys before and some I haven't, so it may be hard for me to keep track of who's who. I thought this was a lot of fun,
 it topped my expectations which weren't that high to begin with. The match did have some problems, as there were some botched spots and
 sloppiness at times, but the match also had some good high flying wrestling, and power as well from Otis and Hillbilly Jed, although it had little
 mat wrestling and was basically a spotfest. CJ Otis would win the match for his team with the Burning Hammer. Very decent lucha tag match- **1/2

Match 3: IWA Light Heavyweight Title Match- 'The Trendsetter' Josh Abercrombie (c) vs. 'The Impact Bully' Brandon Thomaselli
These two have wrestled a lot in the past as well as teaming together, so I expect that this should be good. This actually ended up being heel vs. heel,
 but the dynamic seemed to work, and Josh adapted to playing the face in peril role. And the match was very good, with great matwork and
 some high flying in there as well, and the two seemed quite evenly matched. Josh slightly slipped on the pinfall to win the match, as he bridged
 while Brandon was on the ground to get three- ***

After the match, Brandon Thomaselli shakes hands with Josh Abercrombie, but turns on him and leaves.
 Nate Webb (Josh's partner in the Trailer Park Boys team) comes to help him.

Chuck Taylor cuts a pre-match promo (for some reason Chuck's voice reminds me of The Rock's), throwing insults around about the crowd,
 then issuing an open challenge to two wrestlers to challenge him for his belt. Ricochet is first to answer the challenge,
 then Billy Roc comes out to be the second wrestler in this match.

Then before the match starts Chuck Taylor cuts another promo saying he hates Ricochet more than the fat kids in the crowd and says Billy Roc
 has been ducking him for a year, so he will beat both of them.

Match 4: IWA Heavyweight Title Match- Chuck Taylor (c) vs. Billy Roc vs. Ricochet
Another good match, I enjoyed this one and it topped my expectations. Taylor has improved a lot in the ring and he wrestled a slower,
 technical style with lots of cheating compared to Roc who used a mix of high flying and technical wrestling, while Ricochet was going for all out
 high flying with some innovate offense, and generally there was a lot of innovative moves here. Ricochet botched a few things near the end that
 hurt the ending, but Taylor got the win with the Omega Driver to retain the title- ***1/4

Chuck Taylor cuts a third promo after the match, saying he did what he said he was going to do, and then challenges Low-Ki to a Street Fight.
 Taylor's heel promo's are excellent.

Jim Fannin cuts a promo towards Jimmy Jacobs, saying he's had increased the bounty on his head for putting the IWA Title in the trash,
 then says The Barbarian will be coming to the IWA to take him out.

Match 5: The Iron Saints (Sal and Vito Thomaselli) vs. The Basham Brothers (Doug and Danny Basham)
This is my first time seeing The Basham Brothers wrestle outside of the WWE, so I have no real idea what to expect, but I heard great things about
 Doug in OVW so I'm looking forward to seeing what he can do. A good match, nothing overly special but still good. The Bashams are good wrestlers,
 although to me they still wrestle pretty much the same way they did on TV, and I didn't see enough of Doug to see how good he is. The Thomaselli's
 were practically dwarfed by the two of them though. So a good, mat based Sports Entertainment style of match. Vito pinned Doug with
 the Californication after Doug was pulled down from the top rope- **3/4

After the match Danny beats up the Thomaselli's for cheating him out of a win.

Match 6: Barbed Wire Bat Match - Ian Rotten vs. Freakshow
This simply isn't my thing, so I don't plan to review it since I can't give a good account of this style of match- no rating

Match 7: 'Lightning' Mike Quackenbush vs. 'Double C' Claudio Castagnoli
The reason I bought this DVD, as these two have had classic matches around the independent scene and I expect no different here.
 This was yet another great match between these two men, as while they did wrestle this slightly slower than their earlier match, they had more time
 so were able to build more, and as a result I was able to enjoy this just as much, if not more than their previous encounter. They did some insane
 stuff as you would expect, too much to mention, but if you liked their first encounter then you'll love this one. Claudio got the win here once again
 with a backslide with a bridge Match of the night- ****

Match 8: Four Corners Of Pain Match- Drake Younger vs. Insane Lane
Again, this sort of match just isn't my thing, and I don't plan to review it, so please buy the DVD and watch for yourself- no rating

Overall this show is solid, and the match that you should buy this DVD for is the Mike Quackenbush-Claudio Castagnoli match,
 as they had yet another great match. Besides that, there's not a lot else that stands out as must see, but there are two good matches
 in Abercrombie-Thomaselli and Roc-Taylor-Ricochet. Mild thumbs up for this event.