Riley Thomas posted: " The Waukesha County Expo Center. Or, for one night, the GLCW Dome Official poster for the event. Blizzard Brawl 2021 happened on December 3rd, 2021 in Waukesha, Wisconsin, in the "GLCW Dome", the Waukesha County Expo Center. The center is a prett"
As you can see, it was an action-packed show. So many tickets were sold, we were told at 3:30 the box office would open for us to get wristbands. These would allow us in the doors at supposedly 4:30 PM for VIPs. Instead, we waited until nearly 4 PM for the box office to open, which was fine, things behind the scenes I'm sure had to take place and didn't get done in time, no big deal. We then moved over and got in line to get in. First come first serve for the seats, which was cool. I ran in and snagged row 2 seat on the aisle so I wasn't as cramped as I was in the middle of the row at Logan's Square and had move to move around. The next seat would be taken later that night by Ref Aubrey, but that comes later.
After wandering around for a while, meeting Mr. Pec-Tacular and the true OVW Women's Champion Haily J, who I was happy to inform Sierra, who stole her belt, had lost her AAW title to Skye Blue. Hailey said, "Good! She deserves to lose, and I like Skye Blue!".
The most Pec-Tacular autograph with the OVW TRUE Women's Champion
I was able to have a brief chat with Ref Aubrey about her podcast and was able to find out that her friend who is a producer, is the one that suggested 45 minutes. It's an absolutely perfect time because it's short, but long enough to cram a lot of information into that you won't forget. It also keeps your attention for the perfect amount of time. If you haven't listened to her podcast, I can't recommend it enough. It's a short rundown, and usually Tony Khan is on it, along with wrestlers. You can find it on all podcast sites, and it's called AEW Unrestricted. It comes in video form as well. I also ran into @cameraguygimmik on Twitter (Go follow him, he's awesome and takes the most amazing photos, some of which you'll see below.) and-hah, the OVW's good Reverend-hah, and gave him-hah, a HAMEN-hah!
After buying an overpriced bottle of water, I sat back down to watch the show. First up was a battle royal in memory of Haystacks Ross
In what I would call a solid battle royal, stars like Mr. Milwaukee, Koda, and more were involved. The match itself had a few great spots, including Koda eliminating himself and allowing Xavier Mustafa to win. It was a good match, and I think the big man would have enjoyed it. It was a very technical battle royal, more like what mid 80s wrestling was about, mixed with a few high spots. A solid match, I thought.
The next match and the official opening bout was Joey Avalon vs Shannon Moore. You will likely remember Moore from his WWE days. Shannon Moore proved that even at 42, the man still has it. He wasn't QUITE the daredevil he was in WWE, opting more to protect his body and be more careful with his opponent well being, something that impressed me. Moore used to be reckless in the ring, but now he's evolved into a fantastic all-around wrestler who can not only play the aerial game, but he can play the ground game as well. Joey Avalon picked up the W in this one, but I think the true star was Moore, proving age is just a number, he's still got it.
Koda came out in the next segment, with THE REVEREND-HAH, who apparently was now the host-hah, of the show-hah. The Reverend told Koda that since he wanted to make wrestling great again, the good Reverend had just the opponent for Koda.
When the music hit, I flipped. My favorite AAW wrestler, Russ Jones, made his entrance to chants of RUSS, RUSS, RUSS! In a 5-star squash match, Russ Jones quickly made Koda regret his life choices to become a wrestler and did what Russ Jones did best. He flung Koda around like a rag doll, and I hope Koda was wearing depends because when he saw New Age Rampage Russ Jones come out, I think his pants got about four pounds heavier if you get my drift. Russ Jones was a surprise, as he wasn't booked and wasn't seen before the match, but man, did he make a lasting impression on Koda. So happy Russ Jones is getting the exposure he needs. If you've never seen this man wrestle, I highly suggest his match at AAW Windy City Classic XVI. You can get it on Fite, and I won't spoil the opponent, but he gave Russ a run for his money.
The next match was Joe Doering vs Cash Flo. I didn't get to see much of the match because of a phone call, but Joe Doering won Both performers were fantastic, and from what I saw an all around solid matchup.
Next, I had a special treat. The matchup was The Gunn Club with CBS 58's Mike Curov vs The Express and Kevin Fertig. Before this matchup, I heard a voice behind me go "Is this seat taken?" and someone said yeah someone was there. I turned around to offer the seat next to me that had been open the entire time, and standing there was Ref Aubrey. So she sat next to me during the matchup. I didn't really talk to her because 1) I was intimidated as hell, and 2) I know she rarely gets to see shows, so I let her enjoy the Gunn Bros picking up the W. Mike Curov was actually pretty impressive, I was quite surprised, given he's a TV personality. But he had obviously prepared for the match and was much more built than I had thought he would be. It was a nice change from the usual celebrity matches you see that they're skinny and have no clue what they're doing. Mike obviously knew and had practiced quite a bit, even his few moves looked great.
I also had another surprise after this match, as during a brief break before the GOOD REVEREND-HAH was talking, I made a quick bathroom run. There was 1 set of bathrooms for everyone, including the talent not in the show. As I walked through the doorway to where the bathrooms were located for everyone, a very large man walked by me. I looked up, and I was in the presence of Impact Champion Moose. I told him that Josh deserved the belt, and he was a jerk for taking it from him. He just smiled and said "Oh well." and kept walking. Big jerk. No I'm kidding, I didn't dare speak to him less be thrown across the arena. (Jokes aside, I do enjoy his character).
Next up was one of the championship matches of the night. Val Venis vs the GLCW champion Backwoods Brown. Val Venis has not aged that gracefully, and his moves in the ring, while not bad for a 50-year-old man who has thrown his body around for years and years, just did not match my nostalgia. I think that's a big part of my criticism of this match, the last time I saw Val in the ring was his WWE run, where he was young and in shape. I think that the nostalgia played a large part in me being so critical of the match, as I couldn't get past the man I knew in WWE for some reason and wrap my head around that being 20 years ago. Val wasn't really that bad looking back, but it was just so hard to separate him from the way he was vs the way he is now, and that played a large part in me being "Meh" about this matchup. The GLCW belt did not change hands that night.
Next up was the 8 man tag match. Dustin Jackson, Lucious Lawerence, TW3, and….Hornswaggle. I kid you not. They took on the team of Drew Hernandez, The Darkcloudz, and were joined by Tony Gunn. The most memorable part of this match was Hornswaggle biting someone's ass, followed by one of his partners doing the same. It was an interesting matchup, and while it was sort of nice to see Swaggle in the ring, it just didn't work I didn't feel. He seemed very out of place.
The third to last was a very strange and confusing tag match that turned into an even more confusing 6 woman match. I'll be honest, I'm a massive Hailey J fan, and seeing her and Serena Deeb accompanied by Rayvin Raddix, who is seriously underrated, take on the team of Sierra, the false OVW champion, and ODB, who looked, acted, and moved, just like I remembered her in TNA. ODB was impressive as hell and delivered on everything. This woman was unstoppable then, and now. However, at some point during the match, I'm not sure exactly how this came about, but things got really strange. Ref Linda pulled off her ref shirt and declared herself a wrestler, and forced Rayvin to wrestle as well, making it a 6 woman tag match. Hailey and her team noped out, saying it was unfair, which it was, and confusing. But the…second ref? Started counting, forcing them back into the ring, where they ultimately lost what turned into a very bizarre 6 woman match. While I was happy to see Rayvin in the ring, it wasn't done right at all, and really overshadowed Serena and Hailey's match. Us fans were left very confused as well as to what the heck was going on.
The REAL Main Event was Mr Pec-Tacular himself, THEE face of THEE new OVW, THEE OVW FIRST EVER Champion, and THEE most Pec-Tacular wrestler out there, Jessie "Mr. Pec-Tacular" Godderz vs some guy from some Fanny Pack party named Kal Herro or something. You can tell who I rooted for. It was definitely my wishing Jessie luck early in the day that helped him pick up the W, with special referee Earl Hebner. But there was some controversy in the Waukesha Screwjob. You see, early in the match, Hebner was taken out. Now Earl isn't a spring chicken as he once was, the poor man is in his 70s, so when he gets hit, he's gonna take a while to recover! He got hit really hard by that villain Herro who intentionally took Hebner down to get in his own ref. During this time, he cheap shotted Jessie with a foreign object and pinned him for the 3 counts. However, Earl was having none of it. He got up and told the ref he didn't know who the hell he was, but he could "Get the hell out of my ring, I'm the referee, not you." With that, Jessie was able to do the most Pec-Tacular pin there was, for a Pec-Tacular 3 count, with Mr. Pec-Tacular himself picking up the win. The fans booed, and there were rumblings that I may or may not have started about a Waukesha Screwjob. What I was referring to, however, was them cheating Mr. Pec-Tacular out of the belt, or attempting. Thank god for Earl Hebner though, without him, we would have never gotten the true victory!
The most PEC-TACULAR champion, PEC-TACULAR Ref, and a Fanny Pack guy. (c)CameraGuyGimmik
The so-called Main Event was Jake "WHATS MY NAME?" Something and Rohit vs EC3 and Adam Scherer. To be perfectly honest? This match was so incredibly disappointing. I'm sorry but I have to be very critical here. Jake and Rohit held most of the match against EC3, but once Adam tagged in, the match only lasted about five more minutes and was an utter squash. I was really hoping this would be a long, solid all around match, as Rohit and Something have both shown they can go long matches, Jake and Josh Alexander went nearly 60 minutes. EC3 and Adam have had lengthy matches as well. But once Adam was tagged in it was basically over. Sorry, but, it was not a good match, at all.
What happened after, however, was. I'm sure everyone knows about the Waukesha Christmas Parade attack. EC3 and Adam both agreed to donate all their autograph signing profits to the victims. Together they raised about $900. Sure it doesn't sound like much, but consider the line was so long, at one point they had to re-route it so we could start the show. So who knows if everyone in line got to get autographs or not. They didn't have to donate a penny, but they chose to, and that was amazing.
Overall, Blizzard Brawl was one of the best shows I've ever been to, and I will be at Blizzard Brawl 2022! Here's to next year!
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