Perspective
Apr 21, 2020 16:07:44 GMT -5
The Papa John's Pizza Man, “The RevolutiDaddy” Wesley, and 13 more like this
Post by Spencer Adams on Apr 21, 2020 16:07:44 GMT -5
Part 1: Arrival
Madison Square Garden. Tens of thousands of screaming fans gathered around in line outside of arguably the king of all wrestling venues. This is where you start to feel it, with a roller bag in tow and arms extended outward as you pass like a zombie hoard. The person waiting out front with a mic and a camera crew was synonymous with the area, but not someone I was expecting to greet us coming in like a red carpet reporter.
Spike Lee: KOS! Glad to see you here tonight, young man! It wouldn’t be the road to Evolution without an inaugural main eventer!
His demeanor was electric, but also cool and collected. His cameraman pivoted around to catch our fronts, Spike proudly displaying his signature matching Knicks jersey and beanie.
Spike Lee: There’s nothing bigger in the sport than tonight and the weeks that will follow. Obviously, a terrific showing from you in last years with a solid top ten finish and an important elimination over former friend Lincoln Keuchly. How do you follow up a performance like that in what is quickly shaping up to be the most talent packed rumble to date for Action Wrestling?
KOS: With a win.
Spike Lee: You’re feeling good then?
KOS: Never felt better, Spike.
Spike Lee: A lot of people are still concerned after what transpired back at Battlefield. Do you see that being an issue?
KOS: You saw what happened at Higher Ground, right?
Spike Lee: I did.
KOS: Looked good, right?
Spike Lee: Yes, indeed!
KOS: That’s all you need to know.
Spike Lee: Happy to hear it and good luck out there tonight, Mr. Adams.
KOS: Pleasure.
Saying it feels...sincere. I feel refreshed, especially by the welcoming party behind the guard rails and their own enthusiasm that backs those four familiar words. What were they again?...
Part 2: Perspective 1/2
Pacing through the twists and turns of the greater backstage area, I wield the mic in my right hand, taking time in my stride as the man wielding the camera walks backwards away from me and I stare ahead into his lens.
PEER
One of those big names, of course, is “King of Slabs” Spencer Adams, a pillar to year one’s main event scene and the most tenured member of the active roster who shocked the world by upsetting Wade Moor in the main event of the show of shows. For some reason, it’s hard to throw that out there without the urge to immediately delegitimize the praise. As good as KOS has been, it feels easy to add asterisks and jump to the “but” when talking about the big accomplishments that have defined his time in the company.
Especially when you look at more recent history and see such a rollercoaster trajectory, so up and down with the winning and losing sides of important championship matches and annual events. You can’t help but ask yourself whether or not KOS is still capable of reaching and maintaining that year one standard on his own merit or if his best days in the business are behind him and with that kind of shadow hanging overhead, dismissive eyes start to look elsewhere in search of this match’s top threats.
It’s on all of our minds already, so let’s just call it how it is. Spencer Adams can’t hack it in the main event. I mean, didn’t he already admit it himself by opting to use that anytime anyplace championship match to go hang out with the hacks of the tag division instead of chasing the world title like anyone with half a brain in the same situation as him would’ve done? It was a perfect display of his own lack of confidence among a top tier that grows more intense with each passing week. KOS has fallen from grace, because that heat is too much to handle, isn’t it? Running from the challenge, waving the white flag of spiritual surrender and inviting fresh meat to bash his brains in like a Price is Right host whose kink is getting knocked the fuck out willingly. KOS will land in the middle tonight and be forced to watch as the more capable own the moment and actually rise to the occasion.
SPECTATOR
First off, we owe a big thank you to Action Wrestling for their efforts in keeping us entertained during such trying times for the low price of 9.99. It seems like just yesterday that those greedy bastards over at WCF were charging us fifty bucks every year just to watch the entire roster get absolutely fucking buried in favor of one guy. In Action Wrestling, we get to see tons of star making moments in just one night and whether it’s an AW newcomer outperforming all expectations against a field of veterans or a superstar breaking an elimination or ironman record, we know that we’re in for a treat here.
This year, we get to see talent like Cormack MacNeill, Jason O’Neal, and Crow McMorris, competitors that even one year ago you could never imagine competing in an AW ring. We get to see champions from AW as well as every other major company in recent memory fighting to get back to the promised land. We will see a level of overall competition that we’ve yet to see in professional wrestling. We find ourselves in a grim timeline and Action Wrestling is here to make it all a little bit easier to deal with and if there’s one competitor that embodies that and champions this exact type of optimism and positive energy, it’s him.
King of Slabs, Spencer Adams, the former everything and first and only Action Wrestling triple crown winner, Mr. Two and Zip at Evolution. Is there anybody on paper who is more poised than Spencer to outlast sixty plus of the best? To this point, he’s outlasted everything and everyone. Even when the chips were down, KOS has managed to get back up and head straight back into it all. The ability to embrace the madness and learn to thrive among it should be seen as an advantage given madness is the one thing that defines Havoc Rumble. Sure, there’s reason to doubt the headspace given recent events, but if there’s one thing that Spencer has shown us through the years, it’s that he knows how to take those question marks and turn them to periods.
KOS
That’s the thing too, isn’t it? Part of being a standard bearer is providing answers to all of the questions about you by going out there and performing like every match is going to be your last. My whole career has been me facing mountains both personally and professionally that seem too tall to climb from the outside looking in, but I face them head on and do my damndest and more often than not, the result works in my favor. Showing myself that I’m able to do that is what keeps myself and a lot of others going.
While we’re talking about that mountain, allow me to address that elephant in the room when it comes to my place on the Action Wrestling food chain. KOS started to punch down when he ventured away from the world title, right? I mean, it was RIGHT there and the decision should’ve been an obvious one, especially in a main event scene that’s so content with passing it back and forth on a damn near weekly basis. I could’ve held the US and world title at the same time, so why didn’t I?
A lot of people in that locker room are content just reaching the top and many wish that they could get even a whiff of the world title to begin with. What people fail to appreciate in their blind drive for a world championship is ALL of Action Wrestling. See, because Action Wrestling is about a hell of a lot more than that. We spend so much time hearing and talking about how AW houses the best of the best from top to bottom, but when people allow themselves to miss out on the opportunity to experience competition in full and in a match like this, it leaves them blinded.
I feel confident in talking my shit, because I went to war with Jacqui M, Shadowlove, and Abbi Stein for the US title. I’ve fought my Carter Shaws and my Kennedy Matthews. I have the experience to back up that shit talk. I chose to use my title shot on the tag team championships against FemDom and fought my fucking heart out against the The Adler Twins, because these competitions are important. People say that I’ve fallen from main event glory, but what I bring to the Havoc Rumble is something that they don’t have and that’s perspective. Do you know what helps me stay in that chase and helps me maintain the level of output that I do between the ropes? It’s seeing the hunger in others who are still trying to reach the top. It’s easy to talk about the target on your back when you’re the one with the gold, but staring down at the people trying to hunt you is a different beast altogether. My decision was a conscious one with THIS moment right here in mind, because tonight, I see EVERYTHING.
Part 3: Listen up
Nate Burleson: Ladies and gentlemen, we are one hour away from the biggest match EVER! Literally! We know that at LEAST sixty competitors will step into the ring with in hopes of going to the main event of Evolution, but only ONE will walk out of here victorious and walk into Evo3 to challenge Alex Richards! The fans are excited! I’M excited! How are you feeling tonight, Jenna?
Jenna Bauer: I mean, you said it, right? Tonight is the night! Someone’s career is about to be made! Honestly, this could mean a hall of fame spot for the winner when it’s all said and done!
Nate Burleson: Right, so who are you feeling? Who stands out in this match?
I crank the volume on the locker room monitor up higher, drowning out the background noise coming from the hallway traffic outside.
Jenna Bauer: I mean, isn’t it obvious? Three letters, Nate! F-P-V! He’s held the most world titles of anyone in AW so far and you know, in a match where everyone is hitting hard and the action goes at the pace that it does, that headshot is going to come in handy.
Nate Burleson: You know, call me crazy, but I’m liking the way KOS is looking. A lot of people are gonna see recent events as dejection, but that was calculated. The match he just had against Carter Shaw at Higher Ground was an absolute slugfest and that performance? That looked like momentum to me. What KOS did in that match was make a statement and that statement was that he is coming here tonight to win it all and he’s going to make people remember what made him a day one star in this company.
He’s right too. This is the moment I’ve been waiting for, my moment and while me closing out Evolution holding all of the pieces to a triple crown at the same time might not be the reality of it, much of the end result still looks the same and is still in reach.
KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK
They want you back on stream if you’re ready!
KOS: I’ll be out in a minute, just finishing up!
I reach for my bag and begin to ruffle through for wrist tape, finding a fresh roll sunk to the bottom underneath post-show attire. As I go to pull it out, my hand brushes against a small piece of harder material tucked neatly underneath the lip of the bag.
I give it a good tug and feel adhesive tearing apart from the fabric. I turn my hand over and stare down at a piece of black plastic positioned between my fingers. It’s surface is mostly smooth except for its endpoint, a small bit of weaved metal covering an otherwise flat surface. Something that would’ve caused my stomach to drop just a year or two ago only fuels the fire more. There was no mystery, because I knew the source. I hold the netted end to my mouth as the corners of my mouth curl upward.
I shove the mic into the lining of my trunks and pull up the end of the tape, quickly wrapping it around both hands before tearing it off with my teeth and tossing the roll back in the bag. I stand up and swing open the door into the backstage area.
Part 4: Perspective 2/2
VERSUS
Havoc Rumble is THE opportunity and this is the time of the year where everyone with those big, bright eyes comes out to fight for the right to headline for real. Everybody wants to forge their own legend and tonight is the chance to speed up timelines and step over personal and divisional confines. The moment seems so freeing for these people, but reality can play out a lot different than what’s in your head and there’s a reason that the other three hundred and sixty-four days happen the way they do.
For the Cruiserweights, they’ll promote this like it’s their moment to show the world that Cruiserweights aren’t to be taken lightly, but we know that light is what they are. Not just in size, but in appeal and staying power. Some can say the promotion got promoted with it’s own show, but let’s not forget who opens up for who and which show has a one hour block. Skrue, Kuze, and Rain don’t exactly spend Monday nights on top and just barely squeezed their way in before things became more final, because in order to sell an event as the biggest ever, you need bodies and in these three competitors, bodies is what you get.
Then come the sort of hopefuls who are just trying to find footing, entering this match and hoping to avoid lacing up a pair of clown shoes. People like Jacqui M, the competitor who spends so much time verbally shitting on herself that we really don’t have to or Damian Kaine who finds himself back in the business fresh off the heels of failed cable dramas that absolutely nobody watched, a stinging reality that lines up perfectly with every match he’s ever competed in. There’s people like the soon to be Mr. and Mrs. Vayden, the less concerned with doing anything meaningful in this contest and more concerned with trying to ink a reality deal with “E!” than anything else because deep down they know that their best case scenario here is an Adam Young title reign.
Out of the bunch, we have two standouts in Keeton and QDT. While this is Keeton’s first big venture into main roster competition coming off the heels of his first time holding an AW championship, that’s not the case for Quixote. It doesn’t seem like that long ago that QDT decided to step up to the plate and duke it out against the likes of hall of famer Wade Moor before being put firmly in his fucking place. QDT wasn’t just knocked down a rung or two on that proverbial ladder, he was thrown from the top of it and barred contractually from a stage like this. While the motivation to rewrite history will be there, we all share in the memory of that result just like we all share in the memory of Keeton getting dunked on by the least expected member of the leftovers gang he tried to brush under the rug. Sometimes, it’s worth asking yourself if this feels like now or never for a reason.
We’ve also got Carter Shaw, Noris Cranley, James Nightingale, and Graham Baker in the mix. These are the sort of people we look to with the most curiosity, the relatively new and mildly proven competitors with the chips on their shoulders who are perhaps most poised to surprise all of us. After all, they’ve been able to immediately garner praise for seemingly high ceilings and untapped potential and history shows that an impressive performance here can take you a long way both in terms of further crowd reaction and your fate in the weeks and months that follow.
The timing is convenient, a perfect opportunity to push yourself up and grab that brass ring really, but this match always proves that experience matters, that a lack of status will be what does you in. This is where a prospect can make themselves really good, but not quite good enough. Those of us who know the ins and outs of situations like this will be duking it out long after someone like Shaw or Cranley is sent on their way with a polite round of extra applause and an Applebee’s gift card presented by an unshaven Jaice Wilds.
Part of what limits people like that are the dogs, those in the middle who are determined to pounce on any and every opportunity presented to them. While these people might not necessarily be the last man standing, they’ll gladly take you down with them and make it look as ugly as they can. People like the Wesley or The Adler Twins are the biggest examples. Having experienced that firsthand, I can tell you that until you have to deal with it yourself, you won’t be ready. For me, this is where I fire back. This is where I issue a proper response to those that bested me, because I understand there’s no blinking when we face off.
Can’t forget the grit and grind types either. Raging Dead, Addy A, Corey Bull, Sam Kidsgrove, and Karlie Nash. While they’ll be dismissed by others, it’s important to recognize the amount of blood, sweat, and tears that these people put in. Sticking it out and coming prepared to match energy with these people, to fight their fight and show the world what seven years on the indies can do for you on a big stage is part of how I prove that I AM the big stage. I started out as a grit and grind type and that’s something that I’ve always kept with me and when it comes down to it, mine carries just a little more weight than theirs.
Rounding out the top ten will likely be a few of mainstream wrestling’s “once were”. These are people like Joey Flash, Teo Blaze, Bonnie Blue, Kevin Bishop, Jason O’Neal, and Zombie McMorris. Just to be clear, “once were” doesn’t define these people as washed up, quite the opposite really. These are people who have reached the pinnacle outside the walls of Action Wrestling, people who make seven figures a year, because they proved that they could draw for companies like UCI or WCF and proved that they know how to become world champions. These are formidable names who can and will win this match if you don’t give them your absolute best.
In WCF and UCI, these people were the standard and to be honest, Spencer Adams wasn’t, but in Action Wrestling I continue to build the biggest resume this promotion has ever seen. While I’ve drug people up and down the ring by the collar, Jason O’Neal was MIA. While my bloodshed has led me to glory, ZMAC’s has left him dizzy and aimless. Bishop, Bonnie, and Teo? Still teetering on the edge. As for Joey Flash? He’s struggled more than anyone would’ve ever thought and lost damn near as many matches in the past handful of weeks as he has over the course of his entire career prior to his arrival. These people don’t thrive where I do, these people don’t achieve the things I do in this company and tonight I use them all as my examples.
Then...there’s the proven. Dandy DiVito, Lissie Hope, FPV, Odin Balfore, and Corey Black. We’ve shared the same peak in this company and had a taste of what it means to be IT. Dandy the dog who crawled out of the pile and up to the summit, Lissie who took the spot in this industry that Casey Holliday failed to hold onto, FPV who just broke history with three world titles all in a single season, Odin Balfore who laid out the beast that so many others have fallen victim to, and Corey Black who comes into this with the single longest reign of any champion.
It’s hard to imagine a top five without them, because we’re familiar with seeing them on top in the first place. We’re also familiar with seeing Dandy get the brakes beat off him by those that he pushes to far, familiar with Lissie Hope turning into a seventh grade emo any time she comes up short in a match that matters, with Frank losing his grip on the moment whenever someone else fills the role of challenger, and Odin Balfore slipping almost completely into the background of the world title passing game. As for Corey, we know from people like L Verez that even the most formidable of the bunch can get caught. Through all of it, every era mini era that has seen these people reign supreme, I’ve been here as a constant presence. These are future Hall of Famers and looking at my record versus current Hall of Famers like Roy Speede and Wade Moor, I like the odds here.
Then there’s you...Crow McMorris. My friend, my partner..my brother. I want you to know that I’m sincere when I tell you the same thing that I’m telling all of them. Crow, I’m here and I feel better than I ever have. I’m ready for every single thing that’s about to come my way and most importantly, I’m ready for you. That superkick that took you out and cost us the titles wasn’t intentional, but who knows...the next one might be. When it comes down to the final two, I’ll be there to stare you down and show you that I’m just...alright.