EVOLVE 1: IBUSHI VS. RICHARDS

January 16, 2010

Not unlike the early days of ROH, EVOLVE is an attempt to redefine what pro wrestling is all about. In this case it involves treating pro wrestling like it’s a legit sport, with great emphasis on win/loss records and personal conduct. “If it is not tolerated in the real sports world, it won't go unpunished in EVOLVE.”

Chuck Taylor . . . has to earn a roster spot and, in the process, winds up showing why he deserved one from the get-go.

Johnny Gargano . . . takes a man-sized beating but proves the old adage about brains and brawn to be on the money.

Davey Richards . . . works Kota Ibushi’s arm like he owns it and Ibushi is simply borrowing for the duration of his life.

BOBBY FISH vs. KYLE O’REILLY

Well, I can take two positives away from the first ever EVOLVE match: Fish wasn’t as bland as he was when I saw him in 2CW, and they both show some nice intensity to get over how much a win in the fed means to them. Beyond that, there isn’t a whole lot to see here. There’s several “Japanese style” (whatever that’s supposed to mean) exchanges of chest kicks, and you can count the number of offensive spots that mean something on one hand. Kyle misses a charge and goes shoulder first into the post and Fish follows up with a Benoit-like headbutt for a near fall, that was fine. They follow that with Kyle going back on offense with kicks and then planting Fish with three rolling butterfly suplexes which Fish kicks out of at one. Fish takes a tornado DDT and the counters to a Falcon Arrow for a near fall, he powerbombs Kyle into the turnbuckle and Kyle comes right back with another tornado DDT and a brainbuster to win.

CHUCK TAYLOR vs. CHEECH

It’s funny that these two had to have a qualifying match to get onto the EVOLVE roster, while Fish and O’Reilly were able to have spots locked up. It’s not readily apparent, until Taylor grabs Cheech’s tights, that either of them is supposed to be a heel. The match is rather honestly contested and their counters and transitions show that both men are getting ahead in the match by working smarter. Cheech gets a quick near fall from tripping Taylor up and quickly hitting a slingshot senton, while Taylor hits Sole Food by countering Cheech’s Fisherman’s buster and escapes Cheech’s powerbomb to hit the Awful Waffle and win his roster spot.

The only thing that one could really argue was blown off is Taylor’s running corner kick, which is hardly a match breaker, and even then, Cheech puts it over for a second and spears Taylor while he’s posing, so it looks like Taylor walked into the spear by not following up right away. Cheech didn’t learn the lesson though, because a second later he hooked up Taylor for the fisherman’s buster and stopped to play to the crowd and Taylor made him eat the Sole Food. That’s the kind of smart work that’s all over this match, and isn’t conspicuously missing from the opener.

RICOCHET vs. ARIK CANNON

Although this is short, this manages to be smartly worked. The story is fairly simple, Ricochet uses his flying and Cannon wants to ground him, but both of them do a good job in the telling the story. As expected, Ricochet takes to the air and uses his speed to get ahead early on. Cannon stops him with an Exploder in the corner, as overdone as suplexes and powerbombs in the corner have become, this is a case where it works. Cannon tries to follow up, but Ricochet is still too strong, and Cannon makes the mistake of burning through his big moves too quickly when the brainbuster and Total Anarchy still aren’t enough. Ricochet returns the favor by spiking Cannon with a sort of swinging Canadian Destroyer and finishes with a 630. It’d have been nice to see them get a bit more time for Cannon to wear down Ricochet, but this was good enough on its own to make the point.

JON DAVIS/KORY CHAVIS vs. LOUIS LYNDON/FLIP KENDRICK

I guess that this could be loosely considered a tag team match, because tags don’t seem to be enforced at all. The only time that anyone is on the apron is when Davis intercepts Kendrick’s dive. It looked at first like the Dark City Fight Club were going to isolate Kendrick and build to a hot tag, but then it was established that tags were only a suggestion and, well, bye-bye structured tag match. Aeroform showed some impressive flying, but the DCFC were basically a low rent APA and weren’t good for much beyond roughneck brawling, and they hogged most of the offense. Just about the only nice things from the DCFC were Davis’ pounce, and their Project Mayhem finisher, which is essentially a super-sized powerbomb/neckbreaker combo. The first few minutes looked promising, but the lack of structure sent the potential for something special swirling down the bowl.

MERCEDES MARTINEZ vs. NIYA

This is over before it starts. The Latina Sensation guzzles Niya at the bell, and doesn’t stop until she pins Niya with the fisherman’s buster. The Three Amigas was a nice touch too.

BRAD ALLEN vs. SILAS YOUNG

This winds up looking quite a bit like the first match, which is both good and bad. Young and Allen both show the same sort of intensity and determination that was present in the opener, and in addition to that, they show it through their wrestling as well with dangerous spots like Young’s hanging DDT to the floor and Allen’s blind moonsault off the top to the floor. But, what also makes this look like the opener is that the wrestling itself doesn’t seem to mean too much. There was a nice moment early on when Allen wiped out on a big cross body press, which should have let Young take over for a bit, but, instead, they followed up by having Allen win a chop exchange and stay in control. Young’s hanging DDT should have had much more impact on the match than it did. But, it didn’t. Young rolled him in, and Allen hit a neckbreaker shortly after to regain control of things.

Where this does wind up scoring points is in establishing some character. Young had a heelish look about him coming into the match, but it’s not put out there until Allen wipes out on the moonsault to the floor. It’s hard to really even label Young a heel just for that. Wrestling history has shown that one should worry about winning first and then being a good sport afterwards. Barry Windham can attest to that. Silas just rolls in and wants the ref to count out Allen and let him win. Allen makes it back in a hair before being counted out, and Young tries to finish him off. Allen makes a comeback with a corkscrew body press, which absolutely didn’t need to be done considering the huge bump he’d taken and put over so well before, and wins by countering Young’s headstand moonsault into a Flatliner. I’m all for Allen being the inspirational babyface. It’s sure to make him one of the top babyfaces in EVOLVE if done right. But they really need to work on making their work count for more than filler between crazy spots, and making the crazy spots count as more than filler before the finish.

JIMMY JACOBS vs. KENN DOANE

Although they start off rather slow, this picks up nicely after they get warmed up. The kick and punch stuff early on is a bit mindless, as are their trading cheap shots in the corner, but once Doane goes all Finaly on Jacobs and traps him in the ring apron, this starts cooking. Doane keeps Jacobs grounded with headlocks, and not only does he do a nice job in working the hold and also in making it count by little things like demanding the ref ask Jacobs if he quits and at one point even claims that Jacobs quit, but Jacobs and Doane keep things going with some nice spots where Jacobs seems to escape, only for Doane to keep the old applied. In addition to the nice effect it has on their work, it’s also great in getting the fans riled up, and Doane makes sure to keep them angry.

Where Jacobs and Doane also succeed is where the tag match failed, the heel gets a bit of an extended run, and then the babyface gives it back to him. Jacobs escapes the headlock and starts unloading on Doane with some of his usual stuff like the spinning head scissors and the diving stomps. Doane seems to get the cheap win by countering the End Time into a spine buster and hitting a legdrop, despite Jacobs having his foot on the ropes. But wait! Tommy Dreamer is here! And he’s not going to let that happen here in EVOLVE! They restart and Jacobs gets the End Time for the real win. This isn’t a classic by any stretch, but between their work being useful for characterization as well as the fun booking, it’s easily best match of the show so far.

Tommy Dreamer takes a minute to thank everyone for coming and to put over EVOLVE. Jimmy Jacobs says thanks but no thanks and then runs him down to turn heel, two minutes after the fans were pulling tooth and nail for him. They have a quick skirmish and Dreamer lays him out.

JOHNNY GARGANO vs. CHRIS DICKINSON

Out of all the ‘unknown’ wrestlers to me on this show, Gargano looks to be the breakout. Once he and Dickinson quit tooling around with their overtly stiff strikes, Gargano shows that he can actually wrestle with a nice rolling cradle that he segues into a Rings of Saturn. There’s a nice touch of personality from Gargano when he spits at Dickinson and his reaction when Dickinson gets angry is hilarious. Aside from those things, there isn’t a whole lot to be found as the match is mostly go-go-go since they’ve only got six minutes to work with. The finish is smart though, with Dickinson wiping out on a flying knee, and Gargano taking advantage by javelin throwing him into the corner and then finishing him off with the Hertz Donut, a lifting full nelson facebuster. Much like Brad Allen, Gargano looks like someone with potential to move into a top spot in the fed.

MUNENORI SAWA vs. TJP

This is the first match that really displays the whole ‘legit sport’ concept that EVOLVE seems to be shooting for. There isn’t one moment in the match that doesn’t look like Sawa or Perkins is trying to legit win the match. However, it’s a pyrrhic victory for them, because, in the process of putting on, what might be, the defining match of EVOLVE, they abandon every other principal of match psychology and structure. The fast pace and back and forth nature of the match works, and it’s clear when Sawa enters the ring and promptly slaps Perkins that this going be something fairly intense. When Sawa doesn’t break the hold until the four count when Perkins gets a rope break, there’s a nice line on commentary that conduct like that won’t be tolerated in EVOLVE.

They don’t seem to have any real idea of what sort of match they want to have, one second they’ll be on the mat in a BattlArts fashion going for holds, and then they’ll be using pro style spots and holds. They also don’t seem to really be building up to anything, in that sense it’s not all that different from several matches on this card, their work is just more smooth. Sawa’s baseball punch isn’t bad as far as stunning Perkins to apply to Octopus hold and tap him out, but as far as actually building to the hold or finish there’s nothing aside from Sawa’s previous attempt at the hold and Perkins’ rope break. Perkins’ armbars were a nice addition, but there wasn’t anything in the match to suggest that he was either trying to wear down the arm to eventually tap him, or using the armbars to wear his arm down for something else. Almost everything comes off like a one-off rather than them trying to genuinely build up to a climax.

MIKE QUACKENBUSH/HALLOWICKED/FIGHTMARE vs. GRAN AKUMA/ICARUS/BRODIE LEE

My tagging question from the previous tag match has been at least partially answered. EVOLVE uses Lucha tag rules, meaning that going to the floor counts as a tag. Although that doesn’t explain why both Chavis and Davis spent the bulk of the match in the ring at the same time during their match. This, on the other hand, is much more structured and winds up being quite a bit better than the other tag match. All six play their roles and have something to add to the match, the heels have some fun working over ‘Mare, Akuma and Icarus bring the attitude while Brodie is more the bully, but he’s more than wiling to bump like a pinball if need be, even for Frightmare. ‘Wicked sort of plays the big brother role, standing up to Brodie when he picks on ‘Mare, and Incoherence has some fun of their own double teaming Akuma. Quack mostly stays out of things due to his back only being about 75% (recovering from surgery) and he’s good at using his back to explain why he does so little, such as his pained expression after the swanton and the big dive, as well as when Icarus hits the DVD in the corner.

The heels working over Frightmare was fun to watch, although the momentum winds up getting leveled off when Brodie winds up knocking Frightmare off the top and to the floor, which counts as a tag, so the heels need to keep the faces at bay while they get Frightmare back in the ring. Frightmare makes the hot tag a bit later, but ‘Wicked’s tag doesn’t have the spark that it should have. After the tag the match turns into the usual well-choreographed exhibition of moves and spots, with everyone taking out someone, culminating in ‘Wicked killing Icarus with the Rydeen bomb to give Team Frightning a 1-0 record. The finish was fine from an execution standpoint, it certainly looked like it killed Icarus, but it’d have come off even better had there been more interaction between them to make the finish mean more than ‘Wicked hitting his big move at the right time. ***

DAVEY RICHARDS vs. KOTA IBUSHI

While this is an easy pick for match of the night, it’s not a great match. Most of the reason is Ibushi’s performance, when he’s on offense he’s usually far too worried about getting in the flashiness and flips and not as concerned with making his stuff make sense in the match. This starts off looking very good, Davey underestimates Ibushi’s striking and finds himself on the wrong end of several Ibushi kicks. Davey takes an opening and slams Ibushi’s arm down on the apron. Davey spends nearly half the match busting up Ibushi’s arm every way imaginable, some of his better ideas include a jumping divorce court from the second rope into a Fujiwara armbar and a modified Tequila Sunrise. I’ve compared him to Benoit before in regards to his overall intensity and demeanor, and it’s nice to also see that he’s fairly versatile as well.

Ibushi’s control segment starts off on a sour note when he catches Davey going to the top and does a cartwheel handspring and dropkicks him off. That’s not the best way to put over Davey trying to amputate his arm. Ibushi’s idea is to wear down Davey’s midsection, it’s good in theory, and it gives him a good reason to be trying to drop moonsaults, but he doesn’t need to be extra flashy while doing it. Considering the amount of trouble he was in and the fact that he’s finally building momentum, the double jump moonsault isn’t necessary, a diving foot stomp would have sufficed just as well. Overall, its Davey’s selling that does the most to show that Ibushi’s gameplan is working, rather than anything from Ibushi.

This has other issues aside from Ibushi’s lackluster performance during the body part sections. Both Ibushi and Richards go of the deep end a couple of times, taking huge spots and popping right back up like it’s nothing. Davey gets spiked with a reverse rana and pops back up to hit a lariat. Ibushi takes a superplex and jumps back up so he can Matrix to dodge a charging Davey and hit a German suplex for a near fall.

The big difference maker to the match is how Davey is able to use his wearing down of Ibushi’s arm to get him further along, which isn’t something that Ibushi able to do. A good example of this is when Richards and Ibushi are fighting for position on the top, Davey loses that battle but is able to avoid the Phoenix splash. Ibushi misses the charge and goes into the post and Davey takes advantage with a dropkick to the arm and then is able to hit his SSP for the near fall, and then transition into his Kimura for the win. The potential for a great match is clearly there, but this isn’t much more than “very good”considering their (mostly Ibushi’s) issues with selling, keeping the offense simple, and getting over the gameplan. ***1/2

Conclusion: This is certainly an interesting show. There’s only two really strong in-ring performances, but there’s plenty of solid work on the undercard, especially from Taylor/Cheech and Jacobs/Doane. Also, there’s the groundwork being laid for potential storylines down the road that make it interesting to see how they develop. So, all in all, EVOLVE 1 is definitely worth a pickup on its own merits.