Steve's View #108
By Steve
*Note* While my history of XPW
was originally going to be three parts, due to length I've decided
to make it a four part series.
In part 3 of my history of XPW we
will be taking a look at XPW from roughly August 1st, 2002 until
the present.
Former XPW champion, Messiah (William
Welch), who left XPW on bad terms when he was fired from the promotion,
reportedly for having an affair with Rob Black's significant other,
Lizzy Borden, was in his apartment in Canyon County on Thursday,
August 1st, 2002 playing video games. His roommate had just left
to walk her dog when two men entered the apartment.
Messiah thinking the two men, described
as African-Americans, both in their mid-20s, about 6 feet tall
and weighing 230 to 250 pounds, were friends of his roommate greeted
them when they entered. They then began to attack him and cut
off his thumb with garden shears. They then tried duct taped his
hands together and tried to cut off his other thumb.
Fighting back, and making a fist
so that the attackers could not get to his thumb, the Messiah
was then hit over the head with a fish tank. Dazed from the fish
tank the attackers reportedly attempted to pull Messiah's pants
down, possibly to cut off his penis. Unable to get the pants off
they began trying to stab Messiah in the area around the groin,
stabbing his leg in the process. Messiah was fighting back too
much for them to be successful so they continued to hit him with
furniture to knock him out. Being unsuccessful in that and most
likely due to the amount of commotion being made, the attackers
then left the scene, taking the thumb with them. It is believed
Messiah broke one of the attacker's arms in the process.
Nothing else was taken from the
home, and authorities believed that the attackers were specifically
there to assault him. From day one the police have said that they
believed the attack was possibly related to pro-wrestling, and
of course that lead everyone in one direction. Towards XPW and
Rob Black.
While it was clear who Messiah thought
was behind the attack, the idea that Rob Black was somehow connected
was cemented in a lot of people's minds when the Fox TV show "America's
Most Wanted" aired a segment on the attack on September 21st,
2002, and the idea that Rob Black and XPW were involved was one
of the focal points of the show. A camera crew from "America's
Most Wanted" even showed up at Extreme Associates' (XPW's
parent company) offices, only to find the doors locked and no
one answering.
It should be noted however that
to this date Rob Black, or anyone else involved with XPW have
never been questioned or officially named as a suspect in the
case.
Aside from those problems XPW had
other problems going on. The announcement that XPW was going to
be running in Philadelphia was a very unpopular move among the
established promotions in Philadelphia, namely CZW (Combat Zone
Wrestling), 3PW (Pro Pain Pro-Wrestling), and later ROH (Ring
of Honor).
When XPW first announced they'd
be running at Viking Hall in Philadelphia, PA, one of the first
problems they ran up against was getting a license.
Up until this point XPW had run
all of their shows in Southern California where pro-wrestling
events are for the most part deregulated and no special license
is required to run an event. However in the state of Pennsylvania
pro-wrestling is governed by the state athletic commission and
license and surety bond is required to run a show. In the days
after the announcement that XPW would be running in Philadelphia,
upon checking with the Pennsylvania state athletic commission,
XPW did not have a license to run nor had they posted the necessary
$10,000.00 surety bond. Once word was out that XPW had yet to
get a license to run their events, the Pennsylvania state athletic
commission started receiving countless letters and phone calls
complaining about XPW, and asking them not to license XPW.
Around this same time Shane Douglas
went on a radio show, and when asked about CZW and their bashing
of XPW, and the belief by some that CZW is helping to organize
the protests against XPW, Douglas responded by saying "You
can't lay claim to Philadelphia by only drawing 200 people",
a comment that in retrospect came back to haunt him.
XPW staff, including Kevin Kleinrock
made several trips out to Philadelphia in early August, hoping
to get the license issue taken care of, and to also arrange for
XPW to be shown on television in Philadelphia, as well as several
other deals to help promote XPW's first show.
It is believed that at that time
they struck a deal with Rob Feinstein and his Ring of Honor promotion
to use their license to run August 31st's XPW show. In a way to
throw it back in the critic's faces, who had been reporting on
XPW's troubles getting a license (most notably Bob Magee from
pwbts.com) XPW posted a copy of their bond on their website. The
address on the bond was to one of Rob Feinstein's offices. Once
word got out that Feinstein was going to let XPW use their license
and bond, they quickly denied there was ever an agreement and
stated XPW used that address without their permission, though
that wouldn't explain how XPW got a copy of the bond if it went
to that address. To this day Ring of Honor and The Hartford (the
insurer of record) deny any such agreement was ever made, and
The Hartford stated that XPW had falsified Ring of Honor's address
on the bond, though people involved with XPW and involved in the
Philadelphia wrestling scene say a deal was in place and ROH pulled
out because of the heat that was on them.
While XPW was having problems getting
their license, their debut show's lineup was shaping up to easily
be the best lineup in company history adding Super Crazy, Brian
XL, Chris Chetti, Little Guido, and Julio Dinero to their roster.
XPW also thought they had booked the SAT, who were contacted by
Chris Hamrick and they had agreed to work the show, but ended
up taking another booking that night instead, creating a rift
between Hamrick and the SATs, who were friends.
Eventually another Pennsylvania
based promotion, HWA, agreed to let XPW use their license to run
the show and XPW's license troubles were over. XPW was then even
granted their own license.
In another blow to XPW's show, though
not one as major as everyone predicted, CZW, whose fans for the
most part the fans XPW tries to cater to, decided to run a deathmatch
tournament the same day as XPW's show just a few hours away in
Delaware. They even had a bus going to the show that would be
picking people up at Viking Hall, XPW's venue.
The day of the show came and XPW
had drawn over 700 people (XPW's official number was 940, but
people familiar with the building place that number closer to
700), which was far more than most critics thought they would
draw. The show was said to be very good by people who were their
live, and the atmosphere was said to be very positive overall.
The show itself was not without controversy though, when during
a deathmatch between Angel and Supreme, Angel went into the women's
bathroom and reportedly bled on a girl, who happened to be the
daughter of a judge who was in attendance who is a friend of Pennsylvania
State Athletic Commissioner Ron Greeley. This, along with what
the commission considers excessive violence at CZW shows, mainly
involving glass, would a few months later cause the commission
to go with a stricter enforcement of the rules and regulations
governing wrestling in Pennsylvania.
There was no denying it, XPW's debut
show in Philadelphia, "Hostile Takeover" had to be considered
a success. Despite all the factors going against them, they managed
to draw much better than anticipated, and reviews of the show
were largely positive. XPW did however change their game plan
in Philadelphia a little bit, as they now began to go after wrestlers
that were working for other local promotions and trying to make
them exclusive to XPW in the area, which is a tactic that may
have hurt XPW more than it helped them. Rather than give XPW a
fair chance, fans began to see XPW as a promotion that was out
to kill their favorite local promotion, an idea that seemed to
be reinforced by some of the promotions.
XPW began contacting many wrestlers
who worked for 3PW, CZW, and ROH attempting to get them to jump
promotions, with Steve Corino, the Backseat Boyz (Trent Acid &
Johnny Kashmere), and Dusty Rhodes some of the names they most
wanted. However, none agreed to jump, though Boogalou, who had
been working for ROH did.
The idea of independent wrestlers
being able to jump from one promotion to another is somewhat silly,
as for the most part no wrestlers are under contract and are free
to go where they please. There was a lot of fan outrage at this
(not XPW fans of course), but I think people fail to realize that
if it wasn't wrestling, you don't really get mad when someone
gets a job offer for more money if they take it.
When XPW was first being formed
in 1999 they had several meetings with UIWA, which was another
Southern California independent promotion. At one point they got
a good portion of UIWA's roster (most famously Supreme and Kaos)
to agree to only work for XPW, which directly impacted a show
that the UIWA already had booked. This created a feud in Southern
California between the two promotions, though mostly one sided
as XPW ignored UIWA, and even during the ECW "Heatwave"
pay-per-view, Doc Marlee who worked for UIWA (may have even owned
it at this point) went around pointing out XPW people to Atlas
security. It was no real surprise that XPW would attempt to get
wrestlers from other rosters in Philadelphia, and while there
is nothing wrong with making someone a better offer, in several
cases they went about it in a bad way.
On October 5th, 2002 XPW ran it's
second show in Philadelphia, "Fallout". Attendance was
down to about 450 this show, though that could be attributed to
ROH running head to head with XPW in Philadelphia, and the newness
of the product wearing off. With all the changes to XPW around
this time it more and more resembled ECW, which only added to
the label XPW had as an ECW rip-off. In a radio interview Shane
Douglas even stated that he wanted XPW to "be a continuation
of ECW". What Douglas failed to realize, that in most cases
in entertainment a sequel is never as popular as the original,
and it's something fresh and new that catches the public's eye,
and thusly makes money.
Also during "Fallout"
in one of the previously mentioned going after wrestlers in the
wrong way, Douglas called up Steve Corino during the show and
asked him to come over to XPW and do a run-in in an attempt to
generate buzz. Corino happened to be working the ROH show at the
time.
XPW's next show, that took place
on November 16th, 2002 was called "Exit Sandman" and
was being hyped to be Sandman's retirement show (even though he
was advertised on other shows after this point). Attendance stayed
roughly the same as the last show, one of the reasons most likely
being no one believed the Sandman was retiring. XPW was known
for lying to it's fans in Southern California, and that was definitely
something they did not want to begin in Philadelphia with the
PR trouble they were already having at this point. So of course,
Sandman announced at the show he wasn't retiring.
Former ECW announcer Joey Styles
also made his debut in XPW at "Exit Sandman", but would
be gone by the next show for what he said were "personal
reasons".
Then it was announced XPW had an
exclusive lease on Viking Hall for the next three years. When
it was first reported on SoCalUncensored.com in September that
XPW had been negotiating to either buy, or sign an exclusive lease
on Viking Hall, various people in the Philadelphia wrestling scene
talked to the owners of Viking Hall who told them no deal had
been made, but then XPW made the official announcement (they did
make it sooner but no one took it seriously until Viking Hall
confirmed it). It was reported that XPW was paying in the neighborhood
of $10,000.00 per month to get the arena exclusively starting
in January. This would end up as one of the biggest mistakes in
XPW history, as attendance at the shows did not justify the costs,
and it guaranteed that XPW would never run shows again without
competition from one of the other local promotions.
XPW was hyping a debut that would
shock Philadelphia for their "Merry F'N X-Mas" show
on December 21st, and that debut ended up being a tag-team from
CZW, M-Dogg and Josh Prohibition. It is believed they were offered
$300.00 each per show (though XPW was paying on a sliding scale
where pay would go down each show on a tour), plus travel and
room expenses to leave CZW and join XPW without notice. XPW had
been actively trying to get the Backseat Boyz to come to XPW still,
but once they realized it wasn't going to happen M-Dogg and Josh
was their backup plan. Still, with the hype attendance for this
show dropped a little more. People in XPW tried using the excuse
that the show was close to Christmas as a reason for the drop-off,
and while that may be true ultimately it is still XPW who made
the mistake of scheduling a show so near Christmas. One positive
coming out of the show however was the strength of the undercard,
which was said to be very good.
And now the era of XPW's three year
exclusive lease on Viking Hall, that would last all of three shows,
was about to begin.
Part four will cover the beginning
of XPW's exclusive lease on Viking Hall in January up to the present
and will take a look at XPW's future.
--
Because I'll be at UPW and PCW this
weekend, my next column will more than likely be my thoughts on
those shows, part 4 of the XPW history will run in Steve's View
#110.
--
This upcoming weekend will be one
of the busiest wrestling weekends in SoCal in some time with nine
shows going on over three days. Keep checking back throughout
the weekend for updates, results, reviews, etc. and feel free
to send any reports of any shows you attend.
--
Bo Cooper will be wrestling Jimmy
Snuka at Rowdy Wrestling's May 3rd show in Tuscon, AZ.
--
SoCal Valerie will be making her
Southern California return at this weekend's PCW shows. She was
originally scheduled to return at last month's GSCW show, but
due to the war with Iraq she decided against flying.
--
UPW added KROQ's Jim "Poorman"
Trenton and his Bikini Brigade to their show this Friday.
-Steve
