Recapped: 11/16/2017
This is a show on the Powerbomb.TV service – the first RIOT show on that service, though not the first RIOT show – so you’ll need to be a subscriber to watch it. (They’ll give you a short free trial service for anyone, and there’s many promotion-specific codes that’ll give you a longer free trial if you’d google around.)
The show is completely and only the live presentation. They have a few different camera angles, but no match announcers and no on screen graphics telling listing who is who. The ring announcer comes thru pretty clearly, so I was able to tell who is who pretty easily. Still, many of these guys I’ve barely if ever seen, and may be unfamiliar. I figure the most useful thing I can do here is identify who’s who.
Below is the time each match starts. (Powerbomb is eventually going to make it possible to link to timestamps, but it wasn’t working last time I checked. You should be able to scroll around.)
00:00:20 Hell Raider vs Black Raider (10:18, ok)
– Hell Raider is the bigger of the two occasional tag team partners. Black Raider has the Venom match. They both appear to be less experienced wrestlers.
00:13:55 Sayrus vs Low Rider (11:29, ok)
– Low Rider comes out in a suit, doing a one off parody of a musician before changing into his gear at ringside. Sayrus is in black and neon green (and is not the Syrus who recently was in Michinoku Pro.)
00:35:05 Psicótico vs Muerte Extreme, Hooligan Byron in a hardcore rules match (20:11, ok)
– Muerte Extreme has white facepaint. Psicotico is the masked wrestler of the three. Byron is the third guy out, adding himself to a match he wasn’t scheduled in.
01:01:24 Erick Ortiz vs Black Terry (11:58, good)
– Black Terry is the older man of the two, wearing his traditional black and yellow gear. Ortiz is also wearing black and yellow, but some silver.
01:18:35 Arez vs Kratoz, Dralion, Sammy Guevara, Fuego Del Sol (Oklahoma) (9:02, great)
– This is the “Please Don’t Dive” Invitational, a name play off the “Please Don’t Die” chant. They are allowed to dive. Dralion is in a dark blue/yellow with a green shirt. Kratos has a silver, black and yellow mask. Fuego Del Sol is in black and orange (flames, of course). This is his debut here; he’s actually an Oklahoma guy. Arez is unmasked, in blue/silver shorts with blue pants underneath. Sammy Guevera is unmasked, in black shorts, and is the one attempting to celebrate his birthday.
01:40:23 Fly Warrior vs Shane Strickland in a POWERBOMB.TV CHAMP quarterfinal (18:28, good)
– Fly Warrior is the masked one of the two, wearing black. Strickland is in green. This is a one off for both, a match being brought in so RIOT (& Mexico) can be part of the title tournament.
What Happened:
RIOT is not a big What Happened promotion, but the important things going forward are Low Rider wants a match with Black Terry (which he’ll get on the next show), and Sammy Guevera still wants to face Jack Evans (which was supposed to happen at a previous show, only Jack was hurt.)
Review:
You should go out of your way to watch the semimain. I’m avoiding using GIFs of that match because I think you’ll enjoy it more if you don’t see it coming. A five way match has to be tough to put together, but they had lots of action in the time they went – the only really problem here is it felt like they could’ve done more than nine minutes of material. The finish was the right finish given the prematch setup, but I was left wanting a little more when it was done. They took the normal scramble format and tweaked it a little bit: instead of getting Big Indie Move #21, they mixed in some fancy lucha submissions. It made it feel a bit more something that was part of lucha libre and not just emulating elsewhere. Sammy stuck out as the future major league star of the bunch; he’s got an extra level of polish and sharpiness compared to a guy like Arez, who’s very good but doesn’t draw attention to himself as well. Fuego del Sol seemed very fast and not overwhelmed. The crowd signing Happy Birthday at the end was very cool, and the crowd was into the rest of the show.
There are good matches on the rest of the show. Black Terry/Erik Ortiz is a usual good match in the “Terry versus someone much younger” style. Ortiz was solid, but between this and the match I saw live, it’s hard to put a finger on what makes him different. The slam into the corner looked big.
The main event was interesting. I’d seen the match when Powerbomb streamed it on Facebook months ago, but it was worth watching twice. I don’t think the crowd was all that into Shane Strickland at the start and he didn’t seem all that comfortable at first – let’s all agree to stop chanting New Day at every black wrestler in Mexico – but he and Fly Warrior found a groove as the match went on. For all the kicks and other flashy offense they both can do, the turning point was Strickland’s small joint manipulation submission hold. That’s stuff is still pretty novel in Mexico and Strickland’s nicely added to what he does this year.
The other matches were fine. Black Raider/Hell Raider were two young kids trying very hard and pulling of a couple crazy sports, which is all you could ask. Crowd enjoyed chanting Raider for both of them. Low Rider/Syrus felt like it ended pretty suddenly and there was more going on before the match, but the crowd was into it. The three way is not my style, but it’s probably a good idea to have different styles. Bryon being added really helped the match, because the crowd really got behind him. That match turned out to be really long, and didn’t seem to have enough going on to justify 20 minutes.