FOR THE LOVE OF WRESTLING @ At BOWLERS EXHIBITION CENTRE)
As one half of the legendary LEGION OF DOOM used to say – “Ohhhh WHAT A RUSH!!“. Two days travelling across the other side of the town to attend my first ever ‘For The Love Of Wrestling Convention’ and I’m so glad I went, though my bank balance is far from happy today. The weekend for me started on Friday night, as PROGRESS Wrestling came to town for their second ‘For the love of Progress 2’ show. I got off at Parkway Tram Station and had ‘TNA Gutcheck’ winner Harley Hudson getting off at my stop and had me thinking ‘why is Harley here?’ I didn’t want to seem weird so I didn’t interact, but I decided I would stay in front as there were only us two walking to the event in pitch black. But I realised I must be heading the wrong way, as the sound of wheels on her luggage stopped, as I had gone the wrong way.
I arrived at the venue and it was bloody freezing! Once inside it was a touch warmer, but still freezing cold. I had a little look around the venue and saw where all the autograph stands were, and had a little browse of an old collection of vintage British Wrestling items, including a photo of Jackie Pallo, a mask that once belonged to Kendo Nagasaki, a big cut out of Big Daddy and just books of former British wrestlers from the 1970s and 80s. I also managed to catch the back end of the ‘Evening with Sean Waltman’ as they were doing it from the ring set up in the venue that would be having the live shows from there.
A few of the questions included one on the faction ‘X-Factor’ as Waltman said the purpose of it was to help Prince Albert become bigger, and I think that was true until the disaster that was the WCW Invasion. Other questions asked were, “Was there plans to have 1-2-3 KID and Psycho Sid as tag champions?”, while also “who was the biggest prankster – Curt Hennig (Mr Perfect) or Owen Hart?”. But Waltman said, “they were two different kinds of ribbers”. One question was “who was his favourite member of DX?”, and after a little thought he gave the answer ‘Chyna’ and drew a massive applause before explaining why. While she didn’t wrestle a straight match so to speak as a member of the faction, she did appear in both the ‘Corporate’ and Royal Rumble’s in 1999, but she was a massive figure in DX matches from 1997 to 1999 at ringside.
Next came the first show of the weekend, as PROGRESS took over the venue for their ‘For the Love of PROGRESS 2’ event and got underway with SoCal Val trying to whip up the crowd beforehand. The opening contest saw Eddie Dennis v BIG Damo, and the first half of the show saw the crowd being dead and I always feel bad for those in the ring, as it isn’t necessarily them or the match, it may be that people in attendance aren’t the most vocal people. The card itself looked to be one of the best I’d seen for a Progress show I’ve watched live, but the reaction for most of the night seemed to be muted. One of the most exciting matches on the card was the Grizzled Young Veterans v Lykos Gym yet the crowd just stayed silent. Even Zack Gibson who was trying his best to get the crowd to react while in Liverpool colours saw him struggle to generate much noise either. I’ll talk more on that at a later date.
One could say that being in a big open venue didn’t help with a smaller crowd, and a quiet crowd at that. That said, the second half of the show improved from a crowd reaction response, possibly due to alcohol but the action overall was great. Leaving the venue was like Ice Station Zebra, as I couldn’t feel my feet for the last hour and hour, while also gaining a headache from standing right underneath the loud sound system. I got back through the door at 0:25 am and had me heading to bed for an early start the next morning, as I set my alarm for 6.30 am Saturday morning.
So come Saturday morning, I woke up early, as I can’t say I was bright, having had a long week that started the previous week. After a bus and tram journey back to Bowlers’ it saw me queuing up for a long day in sight, as it was the opening day of the ‘FOR THE LOVE OF WRESTLING’ convention. I went into the event worried or nervous about meeting some of the wrestlers on show, as one was Trish Stratus of whom I had a crush on in my teenage years, while another one that I was a bit more worried about meeting was Scott Steiner. That said, I like to be as respectful as I can, while not coming across as a ‘massive mark’ as that term can be used as a negative slant. I think that is why I can come across quite socially awkward as I have it in my head that I am mentally weak, and boring, and struggle to say anything positive about myself.
But let’s look at the positives of the event. I rocked up at the venue and saw the addition of a collectors fair and more outlets set up in the back area, as there was so much stuff. I had eight photographs and a few autographs pre booked, being as I am, I had everything written down in terms of order and what time. That immediately went up in smoke within the first hour, as I stood in line for the Trish Stratus autograph session, and as the time ticked by I was keeping my eye out on the time, as I had booked a Photo with Rhyno at 10am. But as it passed the 9.30 am scheduled time, it got to 9:45, 9:55, while 10.00 am came and went, the guests still hadn’t come out. Eventually they all arrived at their tables, and after a bloke who had roughly 80 items all signed, it then saw those queuing up burning a figurative hole through the back of this guy who was taking the Pee!
Eventually, I got to the front and met Trish, and is the ‘stereotypical’ Canadian who is really lovely, and asked if I was ‘Stratus-fied’ and completely caught me off guard and I jokingly replied, “Always”. She then stopped me and said “What no picture?” and I then replied I booked a photo with her. I then headed for the queue to get my photo with Trish, and again, such a lovely person to meet. From there I did a walk around and met Marc Mero, who honest to god, I couldn’t find a nicer and more positive person all day than he was. I told him that he was in the first WCW match I ever watched on UK TV back when I was a kid, and saw my inner geek come out and tell him of when someone shot his ‘Badd Blaster’ at him, and it jogged his memory. I then got a signed picture of him with the message written ‘Peter, you’re Badd Man!’. My biggest regret of the day was not getting a pic with him.
From there, I saw Maria Kanellis becoming free and in hindsight I feel I came across badly, though she didn’t say anything, as I was deciding which picture to get and was talking to this guy more and completely ignored her. I got a photo and an autograph, but didn’t want to get a photo that was too ‘risqué’. She was lovely, as they all were in truth and I didn’t have a bad experience with anyone at all. Well…the only bad part of the day was the absolute Sh*tshow that was queuing for photographs on Photo Booth B. There seemed to be a genuine lack of organisation on that side of things all day, as the fans seemed to effectively marshal themselves and sort out who was doing the fast track DIAMOND pass and who wasn’t.
The biggest annoyance came at midday, when I missed out on the Cobra Clutch challenge with Sgt Slaughter. I asked at the front if I could book a ticket, and was told to join the line and it would be a case of I may not get seen. But I chanced it anyhow and reached the front of the queue again, only to be told by the same woman to requeue again, but they were messing around and I thought ’SCREW THIS!’ I then walked around the collectors’ fairs and saw old consoles for sale, with a Mega Drive on sale and peaking my interest!
After that, It was time for my second biggest worry of the day when meeting ‘Big Poppa Pump’ Scott Steiner, but thankfully he was good and said in his rough voice “Hey buddy” when I met him and we posed and I thanked him like I did with everyone else and was a man of few words. After meeting Ken Shamrock at 1.30 pm, I just wandered around and looked at that Mega Drive again. I wanted to purchase an NWO shirt that I saw Steiner selling, so I walked up to his table where a local wrestler I watched at Futureshock in Ryan Bartram of ‘Meat Wagon’ fame was his table minder. We had a chat and then I asked him for a photo and got a new shirt.
Then the most wholesome moment of the day was when I met Lily Winter, who was sat minding Ken Shamrock, not that he needed it of course. But I asked her “Can I ask a cheeky question, could I get a quick photo with you, please?” I think I puzzled her at first, as she thought I meant a Shamrock photo, but then seemed really taken aback when I said, “No, with you”. I told her that I enjoyed watching in the ring and we discussed her career to date, before she said something to me that surprised me a bit. As I walked off I told her “I’ll be booing you loudly tonight” and she sweetly said, “yes boo me”.
The early afternoon saw me having photos done with Gangrel, Rhyno and Sean Waltman, with Waltman pulling me back in for a handshake. After that I got in line to meet Lita, who just like her ‘bestie’ Trish, was really lovely and was fascinated by my hoodie with a cats’ face on it. I then rambled on for a brief moment, and quickly vacated thinking what the hell was I doing?! I then got straight back in the line to see Lita again, but this time as part of a double up with Trish to complete my photos for the day, and have me done and dusted by 4.30 pm. I then caved in and paid £** for that Mega Drive console with the venue asking people to leave so they could set up the building for the Afterparty section. After waiting an half an hour, I was back inside the building for the second live wrestling show of the weekend in FutureShock Breaks Convention IV.
It saw the opening match being arguably the loudest crowd reaction of the two shows that weekend, as C.P. Reilly took on Rhyno and had a lot of crowd participation with chants of “Stand up if you hate CP!” and then “Sit Down if you hate CP!” plus also “Rhyno’s gonna Gore you”. The second match of the night saw a 1 on 1 encounter turn into a fatal 4 way match, but the build up to doing so saw the crowd just switching off and becoming like the audience the night before in quietness. Barring the six man tag match, the crowd was just silent throughout and was almost full circle to how Friday originally started. Perhaps I am being harsh, as it was a long day for many of us, and maybe people were drained a bit by then. However, the main event of the first half was the Invitational Rumble match, and saw Rhyno becoming the fourth winner of this event and saw the aftermath having him spearing C.P. Reilly…sorry GORE GORE GORE(!!) Reilly and have him laying flat out in the middle of the ring. So they did a photo op during the intermission where fans could pin Reilly, so I can now boast a record of 1-0 in FutureShock Wrestling 😀
The second half of the show saw a six man tag with Gangrel & Forbidden Planet taking on Briac Strong & North West Saviours, the fans were rocking to Gangrel and bobbing their arms with just the fore and little fingers up as Gangrel was making it seem like a heavy metal concert. Sadly, after that match the Women’s Title and the main event was wrestled to a ‘dead crowd’ despite a few of us chanting or trying to generate some noise by clapping. That said, the whole event from Friday to Saturday night for me was amazing, and I would definitely go back if it comes back in 2025.