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NWA The Usual Suspects (November 16, 2024)
NWA Exodus Pro Midwest
Hello everyone, so after seven episodes of NWA Powerrr, I opted to take a little detour from the main show and have a look at one of the NWA’s territory showcases on YouTube, so with that, we’re heading over to NWA Exodus Pro Midwest (otherwise known as Exodus Pro Wrestling) for their special showcase: The Usual Suspects. I have no idea what to expect other than knowing that it’s three hours long, and I might take all day to write this. We’re in Cleveland, Ohio, which I would not call “Midwest”, but whatever.
Our first match tonight is the NWA Exodus Tag Team Championships with defending champions Major League (J-Rocc & Rex Brody) defending their titles against the team of TME (Duke Davis and Gannon Jones). I think that’s their names, because there was no overlay that displayed their names, so I had to do a lot of guessing. It’s an open challenge for the titles so after a false-appearance by the Alienated Youth tag team, TME comes out and there’s an immediate brawl to the outside. Davis & Jones kick the crap out of J-Rocc and kayfabe injure him to the point where he has to be taken backstage. So now it’s Rex Brody flying solo. Gannon toys with the smaller Brody before tagging in Duke, who continues the punishment on Jones. Duke puts a foot on Brody for the pin, but Brody kicks out at two, which does not make Duke happy. TME just beat the hell out of Brody, who goes for a few comeback spots but is continually cut off without his partner there to help him.
Suddenly from behind the curtain, we see J-Rocc crawling his way back to the ring and trying to get to the apron while in kayfabe agony. Gannon Jones attempts a top-rope moonsault but misses, and Rex Brody gets the chance to hit the hot tag to Rocc, and this little crowd goes mild. J-Rocc runs wild while holding his hurt back. Duke Davis accidentally lariats Gannon Jones, which allows J-Rocc to try and roll-up Davis, but Davis kicks out. Davis then misses a big boot and goes over the top rope. Brody tags in and he and J-Rocc try to pull a press over the top rope to the floor maneuver, but Rocc’s back is too hurt to lift up Brody. So instead, Brody pulls the ropes which allows J-Rocc to hit a suicide dive. Brody then follows this up with a plancha to the outside. J-Rocc hits a superplex on Davis, and while Brody is trying a top-rope maneuver, his leg gets held by Gannon. This allows Davis enough time to recover to spear Brody in mid-air. TME hit their finishers and it’s all over, they are the new NWA Exodus Tag Team Champions. That was a match.
[He fell to the floor like a sack of potatoes.]
Our next matchup will be Hayden Backlund vs. Trevor Murdoch. The background of this match is allegedly that Backlund challenged Trevor Murdoch, so this is the match we get. Alright, I suppose. Hayden Backlund is actually the nephew of Bob Backlund, according to the announcers, so it’ll be interesting to see if he takes after his uncle. Hayden starts off the match ultra-confident while Murdoch seems laser-focused. It’s mostly just a lot of playing to the crowd in the early going, with Murdoch dominating on what little offense there is against the smaller Backlund. I’m begging for something to happen here, but I’m not getting anything.
A lot of chest-slaps, forearms, and outside brawling. Backlund focuses on the left leg of Murdoch, using stomps, stretches, and other forms of attack, while Murdoch powers through a lot of the pain with brawling of his own. Murdoch goes to the top-rope and hits a very botched leaping bulldog, he wins. This was a blah match, for sure. Two matches down, and I have another two hours and twenty minutes to go.
[An ugly looking bulldog.]
Third match up, and it’s a Strap Match between Ashton Day and Sebastian. This is apparently the third match between these two. Maybe there’s some hope of a decent match? They start jaw-jacking at each other to kick things off, beginning in a tug of war, and slapping one another with the strap. They trade offense early on but Sebastian takes over in the midst of it and wraps the strap around the ring-post to trap Ashton Day and smack him around. Though Day kicks out of a pin attempt, Sebastian continues the punishment. Ashton Day tries to make a few comebacks, but is cut off continually. This match is slow, kind of plodding, and I know they’re working towards the finish but let’s have a little more action, please.
[That’s what I call leaving one hanging.]
Eventually we get Sebastian hanging Ashton Day over the ropes with the strap, as if hanging him up, then tosses him over and back into the ring. It’s at this point I notice these commentators are extremely soft-spoken when there’s not a whole lot going on. Ashton starts coming back with a bunch of shoulder tackles on Sebastian, and then there’s an exchange of punches. Ashton hits a shining wizard on Sebastian and then hits a pretty cool top-rope senton cutter for the win. That was yet another match where I was let down. It’s really at this point I understand that this is truly a low-level indy.
Then after that match we get an interview with… Mike from State Farm? Huh? This has got to be an advertisement. Oh, it’s a mix. This guy’s allegedly a State Farm rep and also is aspiring to be a pro wrestler. Being trained by EC3 and Rex Brody, because of course. So anyways, the next match is Brandon Beretta vs. Miles Jacobs; let’s just get this over with. So the tale of the match is that Jacobs is the big man face, while Beretta is the straight-laced, no-nonsense heel amateur wrestler. Beretta pretty much pulls a bunch of ground-based wrestling moves on Miles, who eventually powers out of it. Miles hits a bionic elbow on Beretta which leads into a couple of shoulder tackles to the corner. Beretta manages to get out of it himself, and takes back control; out of nowhere, Beretta hits an awesome Fisherman Suplex for the win, and honestly, solid stuff. Short, sweet, and to the point; I’ll take it! But then after the match we get Mike from State Farm challenging Beretta, and I guess that’s a match that’ll happen in the future. Good thing I’ll probably never see it.
[A very nice Fisherman Suplex.]
Okay so our next matchup is a six-man tag team match: Manbun Jesus, Sam Beale, and Lord Crewe vs. Carson Drake and the Slimeballz. Apparently this match is presented by Aron Stevens and is known as a “To The Victor Goes The Spoils” match, basically meaning the winners of this match will receive both an NWA United States Tag Team Championship match and an Exodus Pro Midwest Tag Team Championship match at their leisure. So that’s kind of a cool stipulation. Aron Stevens comes out and just kinda talks shit with the fans; he doesn’t exactly say a whole lot, just reiterates what the match is about.
So before the match begins, the two guys in panda suits that came out with Manbun Jesus, Sam Beale, and Lord Crewe are forced to backstage, just as those three get ambushed by the Slimeballz and Drake; this match begins chaotically, and it’s largely a brawl. Manbun Jesus hits an over the rope senton to all three opponents on the outside, and now it’s Sage against Beale to start things off. Jesus gets tagged in, and Tommy Rant gets tagged in too. Rant dominates Jesus, before Drake gets tagged in; Jesus counters Drake and takes control for himself. It’s a pretty back and forth match so far.
Lord Crewe gets in, and makes a bee-line for Drake, who tags in Tommy Rant. Crewe’s a big dude and this match so far is just a lot of tagging in and out by both teams on the attack. It’s really at this point that I’m starting to regret really deciding to review this show, but I will persevere, because I have NWA Powerrr to review after this too. Manbun Jesus gets decimated by the trio as they hold him into a corner and beat the bun off his head; Jesus kicks out though. Carson Drake eventually goes in, and then kicks Jesus in the dick while the ref is distracted by keeping Crewe and Beale out of the ring. Another awesome Drake fist-drop (which might be his best move to be honest).
[“Why?! Why does he keep kicking me in the dick!?”]
Eventually Lord Crewe finally gets in the ring and he’s a house of fire! He somehow single handedly kicks everyone’s ass, especially a cool spot where he throws Sage at Tommy Rant, who saves his partner, before trying to pick him up to throw at Crewe. Suddenly though Crewe hits a sweet looking spinning kick on Rant which knocks him down. Crewe hits a powerbomb on Sage right down onto Tommy Rant. Carson Drake pretends to have a very badly hurt ankle, and while Lord Crewe is distracted, Aron Stevens hits him from behind with a briefcase because the ref wasn’t looking; of fucking course that’s how the match ends. Why am I not surprised? Decent match with a fuck finish.
So now we get a nice little twenty minute interlude for the live fans to go grab some concessions, merchandise, popcorn, what have you. I was planning on taking this time to sort of relax and take care of other things, but no, I’m not allowed that; we have ourselves a fucking “CYN Declassified” segment nearly three years after it’s last real show. What the fuck are we doing here, NWA? It’s about this guy named Leo Fox, he’s just talking about his life story. Basically he joined the military because of 9/11, went to Baghdad, subsequently got suicide-bombed, and somehow survived. He also talked about his struggle with PTSD; it turns out to be an ad for the PTSD Foundation of America. I guess I can’t be too mad, but I do question the need to call it a “CYN” segment. Ah whatever; he talks for the entirety of the intermission, I won’t comment much else on it.
Our first match following the intermission is Pretty Boy Smooth defending his NWA Exodus Midwest Championship against Leo Fox (the same man from the intermission). Pastor C-Lo comes out, who seems to be a personality of the promotion, and he starts talking trash.He introduces PBS, who comes out and then gets his lips chapped by a random woman. Out comes Leo Fox, and this is apparently his third or fourth match, according to the commentators. Something tells me this is gonna be either really good, or a total disaster. Pretty Boy Smooth is a tall guy, I swear he might be 6’7, or something. Both guys lock up, and they’re pretty evenly matched.
Fox gets control of the match early while they’re locked up, but neither guy goes to the ground in the first few minutes of the match; that is until Smooth puts a chokehold on Fox and throws him to the ground. Smooth now maintains control of this match, and puts some strikes, slaps, chops, and throws onto him. Pastor C-Lo calls out to PBS, and Smooth puts Fox into a Full Nelson. Fox refuses to lose like this, and breaks out of it. It’s where his comeback begins, hitting a shoulder tackle on Smooth, and then another slam on him. Smooth counters Fox though and hits a spinning reverse slam for the win. That was a fine match, at least.
[That looks like gimmick infringement, brother!]
After the match though, “El Jaguar” Dante Casanova comes out to staredown PBS and Pastor C-Lo, which seems like the lead-in to our next match. It’s a gauntlet match where Dante must face off against a group of wrestlers paid for by Pastor C-Lo, and if he wins, he gets an NWA Midwest Championship title shot. The first opponent is Ashton Adonis. Pastor C-Lo claims Adonis is from Limbo, which tells me Dante Casanova will have to face like nine opponents. Dante hits it off dominantly at first, wasting no time in just getting to the task at hand. Adonis attacks the leg and neck of Casanova.
Casanova hits a couple of sledgehammer clubs to Ashton, and even a claw to the head, before a big elbow to the back of the head, and Adonis is eliminated. Next is the Circle of Lust: Handsome Harley. Again, Casanova just puts in the work and he hits a couple of big belly-to-belly suplexes on Harley. Harley counters and goes after the leg that Ashton targeted earlier. Casanova gets a comeback going after an Indian Deathlock by Harley, and eventually Harley goes down to the same thing.
[Fore!]
Next comes the Circle of Wrath: Donovan Cecil. Both men get right into it, and Cecil just overpowers Casanova. He crushes Casanova with power moves and hard slams; the story now is that Casanova’s leg is injured from the other two guys. Cecil hits an ol’ top rope Vader slam onto Casanova, who kicks out. Next is a big bear hug, which reveals that Casanova has a nasty looking gash on his back. It’s pretty gnarly looking. Donovan Cecil goes to the top rope for a big swanton bomb on Casanova; he of course dodges, which opens up just enough time on the hurt Cecil for Dante to hit his finisher and eliminate the big man!
Pastor C-Lo is angry, and declares that he has one dollar left in his pocket (oh yeah, it’s another ongoing story of the match that Pastor had an insurance check from Mike from State Farm for fifteen thousand dollars), and so Casanova’s last opponent is Pretty Boy Smooth, who wrestled in the last match! Things have gotten interesting; both guys start brawling on the outside, PBS throws Casanova off the stage and down onto the wood flooring of the ballroom they’re in. Casanova’s leg is hurt; and Smooth takes advantage of it, while Dante continually tries to make some comebacks, but is cut off. The match suddenly ends when Pastor C-Lo hits Casanova with his book, right in front of the ref. So it’s a DQ victory for Dante Casanova, as PBS goes and beats him up in the post-match. Despite the lame finish, it was a pretty good gauntlet match and I actually like Dante Casanova’s performance. Probably my favorite match of the night so far.
[Beware the power of the punch!]
After the match though we’re introduced to “The Bard of Exodus Pro” Gaston LaRoux, who is dressed like a pretty stereotypical medieval fantasy bard. He comes out to introduce “The Caesar of Exodus Pro” Christiano Argento. You’d think this guy was custom built to get over with me: Julius Caesar and Dario Argento. God dammit, how could you, Exodus Pro? The guy even has the Roman laurels on his head, and a beautiful woman by his side. A couple of guys in togas come out with a trophy, and a guy hidden underneath a blanket. I don’t care, this is over with me already, and I’ve never seen the guy wrestle yet. Gaston goes to sing a little ditty for Argento; who takes the mic afterwards. He mostly self-aggrandises himself to the crowd, and talks about how he is so great across the world.
[Hail Caesar!]
Gaston LaRoux presents Argento with three gifts: a trophy, a wine that was allegedly favored by Nero, and the third is a man who I guess betrayed Argento? Or something like that, I’m not really sure; one of the commentators gets upset about it, who is angry about Argento grabbing his “towel-boy”. Brandon Day runs into the ring despite the numbers disadvantage, and takes several of the toga-men out. Everyone flees the ring and Day saves Towel Boy; I guess that’s his name, for real. These indy companies, I swear.
Alright, we get to our next match, and hell yeah, it’s the NWA Exodus Women’s Championship with Tiffany Nieves facing off against Maya World. I like Tiffany’s work, and I expect this to be a really solid match. Coming out as guest commentator is Kylie Page, who uh- has an extremely tight fighting shirt, and no bra. I wasn’t even actively trying to look it just uh- was right up front; a really unimportant detail, either way. Let’s please get to the match. Tiffany defends her title against World. Both girls lock up first, and it starts off with rolls, technical moves, and a few arm locks, head scissors, and rollups. Maya World is the bigger wrestler of the two, so has a slight power advantage over Tiffany. It’ll remain to be seen whether that works to her advantage.
Tiffany pulls World to the outside and they start brawling to the outside. Back in the ring, Tiffany Nieves finally takes full control of the middle of the match. Tiffany throws Maya World into the turnbuckles and slams her several times. Maya World turns it around and attempts a Gory Bomb, but Tiffany is just one step ahead of her. For once, it’s a match I’m actually liking! Tiffany is a great worker, and Maya World is more than holding her own; it once again plays to the narrative that women’s wrestling in the NWA is very underrated and worth checking out. Tiffany puts Maya into a single-leg Boston crab, who counters into a Fujiwara armbar, but Nieves gets to the rope.
[Boston crabs are the most dangerous kind of crabs… next to genital crabs–]
Maya World starts her own comeback, but is stopped when both girls hit a facebuster on one another. Maya and Tiffany share punches with one another, before Maya finally hits her comeback! Tiffany kicks out though, so Maya World needs to hit a few more moves to win. The ref gets knocked out in the middle of the match; Maya has Nieves beaten, but nobody can count the pin! World goes to wake up the ref, and this leads to Tiffany Nieves rolling up Maya, which the ref does count. Tiffany Nieves retains her title, and I’m satisfied with what was a very solid match! After the match, Kylie Page and Tiffany Nieves have a face-off on the stage.
It’s time for our main event of the evening, the one match I’ve been dreading all night: The NWA World Heavyweight Championship. It’s Thom Latimer defending his title vs. EC3 and Richard Holliday. Of course I’m stuck having to watch an EC3 match on this show, because why not? I at least like Richard Holliday, I guess. Richard Holliday attacks both EC3 and Thom Latimer with the championship before the match can begin, which is not against the rules, because the bell hadn’t run yet! The ref refuses to ring the bell, for some reason, which rightfully makes Richard Holliday angry; he gets on the mic and rants on the ref for not ringing the bell. It’s a Triple Threat match anyways, which should mean No Disqualification.
So instead, The Mane Event (TME) comes out to attack Thom Latimer and EC3. Richard says to EC3, “You think you’re Over man? Your career is over!” I had a little satisfied smirk on my face when he said that, to be honest. Holliday calls Latimer a “son of a bitch” as well. EC3 gets on the mic and demands a 3-on-2 tag match. Alright, whatever, we got eight minutes left on this show. Holliday and TME accept, so it’s on. Gannon Jones starts first in the match, beating up Thom Latimer, before tagging in Duke Davis; both guys hit him with a double flapjack, and obviously the heels are running things. It makes me question if EC3 is a face in this company, because he sure as hell isn’t in mainline NWA; I guess maybe he’s a tweener. TME just continues to try beating the breaks off of Latimer, while keeping him away from EC3. Holliday goes so far as to knock EC3 off the apron so Latimer couldn’t tag him in.
[This match in a nutshell.]
Latimer is getting life drained from him, and I really dislike that he has to be the de facto Ricky Morton of the match because I hate EC3 being dominant for any amount of time. I’m ready for this match to be over already. Latimer almost gets a tag to EC3, but it’s not enough as he’s forced back into the heel corner. The heels fuck up by knocking into one another and inevitably EC3 gets tagged in where he “runs wild”. He beats up TME, and also botches a move. Richard Holliday distracts both Latimer and EC3 just long enough for TME to recover and attack them from behind. EC3 gets hit with TME’s finisher, and Holliday goes for the pin on EC3 for the win. Thank god this match is over, and thank goodness EC3 ate the pin like the loser he is. It was a match, that’s for sure, and that’s how this show ends. It took me hours to power through this, I legit started writing this at 9 in the morning, and didn’t finish until 5 PM. That should tell you how much of a struggle it was to watch this show. At least the back half was decent!
The Mane Event d. Major League (c) [NWA Exodus Pro Tag Team Championships]
3/4*
Trevor Murdoch d. Hayden Backlund
1/2*
Ashton Day d. Sebastian [Strap Match]
*
Brandon Beretta d. Miles Jacobs
*1/2
Carson Drake & The Slimeballz d. Manbun Jesus, Sam Beale, & Lord Crewe [To The Victors Go The Spoils Match]
*3/4
Pretty Boy Smooth (c) d. Leo Fox [NWA Exodus Pro Midwest Championship]
*1/4
Dante Casanova d. Ashton Adonis, Handsome Harley, Donovan Cecil, and Pretty Boy Smooth via DQ [Dante's Inferno Gauntlet Match]
**3/4
Tiffany Nieves (c) d. Maya World [NWA Exodus Pro Women's Championship]
**1/4
Richard Holliday & The Mane Event d. EC3 & Thom Latimer
