Wrestling's original reality star comes home, or one afternoon in Walford

On the road to... Central Empire Wrestling: Road to Bridge City Tour
Sunday, October 21, 2018, Walford, Iowa


Despite Cedar Rapids being the second largest city in Iowa, we have a strange lack of independent wrestling nearby. We might get a spot show from one of the Iowa indies now and then, but even then, it's often in the surrounding environs. SCW runs their Hawkamania events every few months in Iowa City, a half hour drive, for example. And the Oskaloosa-based CEW runs Wild Hog Saloon in Walford, a town about fifteen minutes from Cedar Rapids. It is very strange to me that there's an indie that runs in a town of just over 10,000 like CEW but there isn't one in a city a dozen times larger.

But CEW was kind enough to come nearby to Walford, although since I was visiting family and friends for the Pro Wrestling Revolver show the day before, I actually left that morning from their home base of Oskaloosa to see the company near my home. I'm familiar with a couple of the CWE talents from appearances (under different names) in NWL and because several are Black and Brave graduates that also regularly work SCW.

The opening match pit the clearly unloved Brandon Wallace, a CWE regular I know nothing about, against Xander Killen, a two year pro from the aforementioned Black and Brave and SCW. It was a rather basic opener with both men doing some great work to warm up the crowd. It was also fascinating to me to see Xander Killen play the babyface role and do it rather well. He's generally one of the biggest assholes in SCW, one that loves to trade insults with fans, so I was taken aback when he came out to cheers. But he seems to fill the good guy role admirably, though I think he would probably agree he falls more naturally into the heel role.

Another pair of CEW regulars, the tag champions D & T Dynasty, took on a much less veteran team but a pair I knew from SCW: Joeasa and Deonn "Iceberg" Rusman. The heels from Black & Brave are just a great looking pair, but their teamwork wasn't nearly as strong as the wily veterans. I do see huge upsides to both Joeasa and Rusman though. Iceberg especially looks like a million bucks. He continues to grow match by match he could have a huge future in a lot of promotions worldwide.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by JT Energy aka The 6 ⭐️ Booty (@djclicknplay) on Oct 21, 2018 at 11:03pm PDT

The "Battle of the Booties" closed out the first half of the show as two hard-butted combatants fought it out in the ring. "Supafli" J Fowler is another CEW veteran and Oskaloosa native. His opponent JT Energy is arguably the best breakout talent from Black & Brave so far. He's mastered his heel work admirably and has shown an ability to fly about the ring. The low ceiling at the event made flying pretty much an impossibility, but Fowler and Energy definitely put on the most high action battle and the clear match of the day. Energy stole a win with a roll up after interference by his Yum Bucks partner Jaden Roller, but don't let his heel tactics hide the fact that he's a star to watch in the next couple years.

The semi-main event featured Curt Gannon, a Kansas City son working as the "Suplex Cyclone". Considering he's built like Taz makes the gimmick make sense. He went against Shawn Nautilus, a native of my own birthplace, West Union, Iowa, and a veteran around the state. He happens to be huge, standing over six and a half feet, so that doesn't hurt. But he's also a pretty solid big man, whether he's working as the straight up evil and angry Nautilus here or the affable Cousin Gator as part of the tag team stable Guns & Beer, which is how I saw him in SCW. Gannon looked like a solid competitor, but sadly this was built to be a show of power by Nautilus. Shawn pretty much ripped him apart before scoring the pin.

Rory Fox targets Jaden Roller's main weakness: his powerful pigtails.
Image credit: Rory Fox on Twitter.

Rory Fox first made a name for himself on an episode of MTV True-Life entitled "I'm a pro wrestler" years before even Tough Enough. Since that time he's worked all across the Midwest, made appearances as a jobber on WWE and pretty much lived the life of a veteran indie wrestler. He's also a native son of Walford, so CEW's visits to the city are homecomings for him. Fox main evented the show against Jaden Roller, accompanied to the ring by his Yum Bucks colleague Energy. Both men are CEW regulars, which made it a bit harder for me to get into this one, even though I knew Fox from an appearance or two on NWL television. They put on a pretty decent match, but without being a regular fan of the company I didn't have the connection to make it feel like a really great main event. I feel a bit bad marking this as the weakest showing of the show, but for me, it just didn't have the fire of the first half of the card.

Overall though, it was a pretty solid two hours of entertainment. One more match might have made me feel like I got my money's worth a bit more, but that's really nitpicking. The show was a solid mix of longtime Iowa talents, CEW regulars and young up-and-comers getting a chance to show their skills to new audiences. That's honestly what great local indie wrestling should be.

CWE next runs their Oskaloosa home base on November 3rd, followed by the planned super show Bridge City Slam in Ottumwa on January 5th. For more on the company, check out their website or social media.