XXXVII_MPFW

It's time for MPFW No. 37 as I bring you full coverage of CHIKARA's "King of Trios 2009"!!! Out of all of the King of Trios tournaments so far, this is my favorite field of teams yet. Also included within this weekend is the Rey de Voladores tournament, which is a genius idea. Let's get right to the good stuff! Here is the list of teams participating in King of Trios 2009 (in the order the teams were announced):

1. The Masters of a Thousand Holds - Mike Quackenbush, Jorge Rivera, Johnny Saint
2. The Osirian Portal - Amasis, Escorpion Egipcio, Ophidian
3. Incoherence - Hallowicked, Frightmare, Delirious
4. Team Pro Wrestling Guerilla - Nick Jackson, El Generico, Matt Jackson
5. The Future Is Now - Lince Dorado, Jimmy "Equinox" Olsen, Helios
6. The Deathmatch Kings - Necro Butcher, Toby Klein, Brain Damage
7. The F1RST Family - Darin Corbin, Arik Cannon, Ryan Cruz
8. Da Soul Touchaz - Willie "Da Bomb" Richardson, Trauma, Marshe Rockett
9. Team Combat Zone Wrestling - Beef Wellington, Pinkie Sanchez, Greg Excellent
10. The Cold Front - Al Snow, Glacier, ??? (Iceberg was unable to make it, so there will be a replacement)
11. Team Uppercut - Claudio Castagnoli, Dave Taylor, Bryan Danielson
12. Team Epic War - Tony Kozina, Austin Aries, Ryan Drago
13. F.I.S.T. - Gran Akuma, Chuck Taylor, Icarus
14. The Roughnecks - Brodie Lee, Eddie Kingston, Grizzly Redwood
15. The UnStable - Vin Gerard, STIGMA, Colin Delaney
16. Team DDT - Kota Ibushi, KUDO, Michael Nakazawa

CHIKARA "King of Trios 2009 Night 1" live review

The F1RST Family def. Team Epic War
Great to see Arik Cannon and The North Star Express back in CHIKARA. Austin Aries in this match is probably one of my highlights of this weekend. He was incredibly entertaining throughout the entire match, even channeling Tatanka at one point. The crowd was really into this match. Arik Cannon hit the back drop driver on one of the Epic War guys, followed by Cruz Control for the pin. The F1RST Family advances to the quarterfinals.

The Osirian Portal def. Team Pro Wrestling Guerilla
This is the first I've seen of Escorpion Egipcio, and he's OK. This is also the first time I've seen The Young Bucks in action and they are awesome. El Generico, Ophidian and Amasis are still great as always. Ophidian got the pin on Generico in my favorite match of the night. The Osirian Portal advances.

Team Uppercut def. The Roughnecks
Getting to see Bryan Danielson in a CHIKARA ring is awesome. Crowd started a "You're gonna get your flippin' head kicked in" chant (one of the words had to be modified to be family friendly) and Danielson loved it. Kingston got caught in a circle of uppercuts near the beginning. Dave Taylor was going to a top-rope move, but his teammates talked him out of it. Poor Grizzly Redwood was on the receiving end of an extremely long big swing by Claudio. The crowd counted to 100, but I highly doubt it was 100 rotations. Danielson then put Grizzly in the Cattle Mutilation for the win. Team Uppercut advances.

Da Soul Touchaz def. Team Combat Zone Wrestling
The crowd has been Rick Rolled since Team CZW came out to Rick Astley's "Never Gonna Give You Up". At the beginning of the match, Beef Wellington gets on the mic and starts rapping "Ice Ice Baby". Pinkie Sanchez is pretty entertaining and I wouldn't mind seeing more of him. It's once again great to see Da Soul Touchaz. Willie Richardson did a tope con hilo which was amazing. Soul Touchaz pick up the win and advance when Richardson hit the Droppin' Da Bomb leg drop on Beef.

Intermission time. Got a photo with The Young Bucks (there is a link at the end of this blog which goes to all of my photos from King of Trios), and that's pretty much all I did during intermission.

F.I.S.T. def. The Deathmatch Kings
Perfect match for everyone who wants to see the members of F.I.S.T. get punched in the face over and over. Match starts with brawling around ringside and gets back into the ring when Gran Akuma challenges Necro Butcher to a punch-off. F.I.S.T. advances when Chuck Taylor nails Toby Klein with the Omega Driver.

The Future is Now def. Team DDT
KUDO returning and Kota Ibushi in CHIKARA is awesome. Michael Nakazawa still has the oil gimmick, which is still hilarious. In one of my favorite spots of the whole weekend, Nakazawa lined up Equinox and Helios, poured oil all over them, ran, did a double stomp on Equinox, then slipped into a senton on Helios. Good match. Equinox gets Nakazawa in the CHIKARA Special allowing The Future is Now to advance.

The Masters of a Thousand Holds def. Incoherence
It's great to see Johnny Saint wrestle in the USA and was already over with the crowd. Frightmare does some neat stuff with Jorge Rivera here. By the way, Frightmare rules. Mike Quackenbush does some neat stuff with Hallowicked as well. Now for the best stuff - Johnny Saint does some incredible chain wrestling with Delirious. Saint has a counter for pretty much every wrestling hold. It's incredible to watch to see what he does. Even Quack was smiling the whole time in his corner. Saint was able to catch Delirious in some sort of clutch for a pinfall. Nice match.

The UnStable def. The Cold Front
There was a random drawing of to determine the new third member of The Cold Front. The first three names drawn were all previous characters of Al Snow - Avatar, Shinobi and Leif Cassidy. Amazing Red was selected, he wasn't there (Is he still around or is he just injured again?). Green Ant of The Colony was selected, but he wasn't there. D-Lo Brown was selected, and HE IS HERE! He is huge over with the crowd. This was a good match, but it went way too long. Colin Delaney got a backslide pin on D-Lo allowing The UnStable to advance. UnStable gets beat up by The Cold Front, including Al Snow hitting Vin with Head.

After the show I got a picture with "American Dragon" Bryan Danielson! Drove home, tired, and ready for Night 2.

The Fan Conclave

Like last year's fan conclave, you were able to meet most of the wrestlers and get photos and autographs. I got a picture with the guys from DDT. I was able to get a picture with the legendary Johnny Saint as well. I also got Claudio Castagnoli to sign my ROH shirt.

There were some competitions, like a staring contest with Gran Akuma. I somehow ended up in a push-up contest with Eddie Kingston, Ophidian and two other guys. My brother joined in, too. If you know me, I'm not athletic at all. I outlasted Eddie Kingston, so that's good. My brother almost beat Ophidian.

Next up, Mike Quackenbush held in exhibition in the ring, where he took some volunteers and showed off some holds on them. He showed how they are supposted to hurt, rather than how to apply them, which was pretty cool.

Finally, some lucky fans were able to play Rock Band with some of the CHIKARA wrestlers. Everyone who played was terrible. I didn't get to play. I would have loved to have played "Painkiller" on drums.

CHIKARA "King of Trios 2009 Night 2" live review

Back to King of Trios action. I'm getting tired of typing, so I'm just going to do eliminations, how they won, good highlights of the matches, and how good the matches were.

Player Dos def. Austin Aries, Fire Ant and Matt Jackson in a Rey de Voladores 4-Way Eliminator
Austin Aries is still incredibly entertaining. Fire Ant eliminates Matt Jackson with the Beach Break. Player Dos eliminates Fire Ant with the Frogger Splash. Player Dos wins the match with the B13 on Austin Aries. Nice opener.

F.I.S.T. def. The F1RST Family
Fun spot where referee Bryce Remsberg almost gets a pinfall on Chuck Taylor, then Bryce does a kip up. 2nd biggest pop of the night. Icarus pins Darin Corbin after the pedigree in a nice match. F.I.S.T. advances to the semi-finals.

The Submission Squad (Pierre Abernathy and Evan Gelistico) def. Davey Vega and Gary the Barn Owl
Meh.

The Future is Now def. The Osirian Portal
Lince Dorado went for a dive on Escorpion Egipcio, but somehow made it into the second row of the crowd. Helios pins Ophidian with a Death Valley bomb. OK match. Escorpion was carried to the back, probably injured from the dive. Future is Now advances.

Intermission. Nothing fun happened, so back to the second half of Night 2.

Kota Ibushi def. Jigsaw, Nick Jackson and El Generico in a Rey de Voladores 4-Way Eliminator
Best match from this weekend, and definately a MOTYC for CHIKARA. The crowd is already going nuts before the first elimination with some awesome stuff between Kota Ibushi and El Generico. Kota eliminates Generico with a DANGEROUS super reverse rana. Jigsaw eliminates Nick Jackson with the Jig 'n' Tonic. Kota pins Jigsaw with the Golden Star Splash, his corkscrew 450, and will face Player Dos in the finals of Rey de Voladores. Crowd gives a "Five star match" chant, and gives Kota Ibushi a "Please come back" chant, even though he's wrestling tomorrow.

The UnStable def. Da Soul Touchaz
Fun match. Marshe Rockett has a bright future in wrestling. UnStable cheats and gets a pin on Trauma, sending The UnStable to the semi-finals. Soul Touchaz get a "Please come back" chant, like they did last year.

Player Uno def. Twiggy to retain the ISW Championship
Nice match here. Twiggy is pretty good. Player Uno retains with the Bubble Buster 2k9.

Team Uppercut def. The Masters of a Thousand Holds
Great main event. Awesome wrestling in this match from 6 of the best wrestlers on the whole planet. A lot of great stuff in this match. Danielson targets Quack's bad back, and Quack retaliates by giving Danielson elbows to the head and the Cattle Mutilation. Saint takes an uppercut from Danielson as well. Claudio pins Quack with a Super Ricola Bomb. Nice ovation for Johnny Saint afterwards.

Going home and getting ready for Night 3.

CHIKARA "King of Trios 2009 Night 3" live review

Time for the grand finale. Right to it!

Team Uppercut def. The UnStable
Good match. Dave Taylor pinned Colin Delaney with the butterfly suplex. I'm so glad UnStable lost this match.

F.I.S.T. def. The Future is Now
OK match, nothing too special. Chuck Taylor fouled Helios while the ref wasn't looking, then hit him with the Omega Driver for the pin. The anti-Lince jerks started a "Thank you F.I.S.T." chant.

Arik Cannon def. El Generico
Really fun match. El Generico thought Arik Cannon was the Kool-Aid man at first. Cannon wins with the back drop driver followed by the Glimmering Warlock.

Mike Quackenbush and Jigsaw win the Tag Team Gauntlet
I always love the tag team gauntlet matches since they're so great. This one was fun throughout. The Young Bucks and Cheech and Cloudy were tearing it up. Quack and Jigsaw get their third point with this victory. Here are the eliminations:

-Tony Kozina and Ryan Drago def. Hallowicked and Frightmare
-The Sea Donsters def. Tony Kozina and Ryan Drago
-UltraMantis Black and Crossbones def. The Sea Donsters
-UltraMantis Black and Crossbones def. Beef Wellington and Steve "The Turtle" Weiner
-Player Uno and Create-a-Wrestler def. UltraMantis Black and Crossbones
-Mitch Ryder and Pinkie Sanchez def. Player Uno and Create-a-Wrestler
-Willie Richardson and Marshe Rockett def. Mitch Ryder and Pinkie Sanchez
-The Young Bucks def. Willie Richardson and Marshe Rockett
-Cheech and Cloudy def. The Young Bucks
-Brodie Lee and Grizzly Redwood def. Cheech and Cloudy
-Mike Quackenbush and Jigsaw def. Brodie Lee and Grizzly Redwood

During intermission, I got autographs from all of Da Soul Touchaz and an autographed Colin Delaney action figure. Back to the show.

The Osirian Portal (Amasis and Ophidian), KUDO and Michael Nakazawa def. The Colony (Fire Ant and Soldier Ant) and The North Star Express (Darin Corbin and Ryan Cruz)
Really good stuff in this match. Nice stuff all over the place. KUDO pins Darin Corbin with the double knees, while Nakazawa creates a circle of oil around him so nobody could break up the pinfall.

Eddie Kingston def. Austin Aries
Nice match up. Crowd is split the whole time. Kingston defeats Aries with the Sliding D.

Kota Ibushi def. Player Dos to win Rey de Voladores
Great match. Ibushi is so awesome to watch live. The crowd is once again going nuts. Ibushi wins with the Golden Star Splash, winning the 2009 Rey de Voladores. Huge "Please come back" chant afterwards.

F.I.S.T. def. Team Uppercut to win King of Trios 2009
Team Uppercut was entering to "The Final Countdown", but F.I.S.T. jumped them at the entrance way and we were robbed of the greatest entrance music. F.I.S.T. is working Danielson's knee throughout the match. Lots of close finishes. Chuck Taylor made Bryan Danielson tap out to a single-leg crab, and F.I.S.T. wins King of Trios 2009. Great match and MOTN, even though my ROHbot half was angered by the outcome.

Click here to see all of my photos from King of Trios 2009 weekend.

This weekend was simply phenomenal. I had such a great time and made some new friends in the process. Getting to see guys like Johnny Saint and Kota Ibushi wrestle in person was awesome. Everybody in the tournament gave it their all this weekend. Thank you CHIKARA for a great weekend that I will never forget. Start saving up your money for the DVD's. You won't regret it.

Hope you all enjoyed this one. Not sure when the next one will be since I don't know how much time I'll have in between work and school. Take care, everyone.