I don't know why I keep doing this to myself, but I'm about to watch this year's IWA Deep South Carnage Cup. Last year some idiot let Mad Man Pondo impale his tongue with a pair of scissors, the year before some idiot let another idiot stab him in the arm with a box cutter - what delights will the 2012 Carnage Cup have in store? I can't wait to find out...
First up is a 'Spider Net Circus Death Match' between Spidar Boodrow and Bryant Woods. This year's Carnage Cup comes to you from...some field/junk-yard in butt-fuck Alabama. Bryant Woods looks like a Juggalo and has all sorts of scrap metal shit hanging from the holes in his ears. There are about 50 people in attendance, and I'm probably being generous. Oh wow, Spidar Boodrow is a sight. Jesus, what ugly ass face tattoos. They start out with a light-tube sword fight and the crowd is showered in glass, while Boodrow is left bleeding from the back his head. Boodrow then hits Woods on the forehead with a plastic bat covered in bottlecaps, the caps go flying everywhere and we get our first "holy shit" chant of the night, lol. Someone produces a soda bottle on a stick with wooden spikes skewered through it, like a deadly game of KerPlunk, and Woods gets some stuck in his forehead. They're getting through a lot of weapons here, pine-cone bat, prosthetic arm covered in barbed wire, staple gun. Woods hits Spidar with some weak-ass chairshots to the head, but Boodrow gets the chair and just fucking floors him with it, splitting open his forehead in the process. Woods pulls out some pliars and rips out Spidar's eyebrow piercing. Both guys climb up on top of the U-Haul truck parked next to the ring and Boodrow hits the 'Spidar Driver' off the truck and through the net of barbed wire and light-tubes across the ring to pick up the victory.
Next up is a 'No-Rope Barbed Wire Carpet Strip House of Pain Match' between Kody Krueger and Bill the Butcher. Both are kinda tubby long-haired dudes with a barbarian/Bruiser Brody look and they start out quick, bringing the carpet strips into play before just flinging open chairs at each other. Reckless chair shots to the kidneys from Bill, who flings Kody in to the ring through the barbed wire, before hip tossing him into a wall of barbed wire and carpet strips, which he gets hung up on. Bill charges Krueger, but he steps out of the way and the Butcher goes face first through the barbed wire and onto the gravel floor, leaving chunks of hair behind in the process. Bill recovers and dumps Kody off the ring into a carpet strip board, leaving his back bloody, but Kody gets right back in, takes out Bill's ankle and applies the most 'WTF is that shit/is that even supposed to hurt?' leg submission I've ever seen to make Bill tap. Fuck, that was just awful.
3rd match is a 'Deep Sea Death Match', which features fish hooks hanging from the barbed wire ropes. Sounds like a good idea. First out is John Rare, some scrawny guy with metalic facepaint, followed by his opponent Mad Man Pondo. This is a typical Pondo match, he walks from spot to spot, throwing Rare into chairs, cutting him open with barbed wire, stabbing him with a fork, but it gets so much worse when John Rare is on offence. Holy fuck, this guy is legitimately awful in every single way. He tries to wrap Pondo up in the barbed wire ropes and hit a neckbreaker, the result is so awful that Pondo seemed to be struggling not to laugh. Rare goes for a chair shot but Pondo just punches him in the dick and tries to end this shit as quick as humanly possible. He sets up a board with fish hooks on it across two chairs and dumps Rare on top, but the fucker kicks out at 2, so Pondo starts gouging at his forehead with the hooks before throwing him into the barbed-wire/fish hook ropes. Pondo then sets up a huge ladder, picks up Rare and makes him climb it before climbing up the other side himself, then some guy rushes the ring, hits Pondo with a light-tube, Pondo gives the weakest bump ever off the ladder into a fish hook board, Rare hits him with a fucking umbrella for some reason and pins him for the 3. WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT?
Non-tournament match next, and some ACTUAL wrestling. Holy shit. As a result, most of the crowd seems to have wandered off, waiting for some more meaningless bloodshed before they return. Also, it's raining, lol. We've got some guy named Shane Smalls taking on some guy named Jerek Tyler. They start off with some nice, but slightly awkward, chain wrestling. Tyler is botching on about the same ratio as Sin Cara here. Nice tope con hilo through the ropes from Tyler. He then tries for a suplex to the outside, but Smalls counters and goes for a Cody-style Disaster Kick but the fucking ref is standing in the exact fucking corner they need to do the spot in. Haha, holy shit. Unfortunately, instead of just KO'ing the ref, Smalls jumps down, Tyler runs into position on the apron and lets Smalls kick him in the face, lol. Tyler tries to recover on the outside, but Smalls hits him with an asai moonsault before bringing things back inside. Tyler with a big moonsault leg drop, but Smalls kicks out. Wtf, they someone managed to Irish whip each other into the same corner? Match is starting to drag now. Hilarious miscommunication for the finish, Tyler goes to hit a phoenix splash, Smalls rolls out of the way, but Tyler fucking pins him for the 3-count anyway, lol.
OK, 40 minutes in and I'm done. Fuck, IWA-DS always makes for painful viewing, but this was particularly bad.
I remember reading about Misawa's death. What a freak accident that was. I can't imagine how his opponent must've felt, too.
Yeah, Saito seemed pretty much inconsolable after it happened and at the memorial service, probably put a lot of the blame on himself, but you have to think that with all the bumps Misawa had taken over the years and with little sign of him wanting to work a safer style, it was only a matter of time before an accident happened.
