All In

All In
Sears Center
Chicago (Hoffman Estates), IL
Sept. 1/2018

Man, what a tremendous night of wrestling. Got back after watching All In at my sister and brother-in-law’s place, with a feeling of excitement that I haven’t felt after watching a PPV in a really long time.

As I’ve talked about before, my brother-in-law is a huge fan of ROH, PWG, the Young Bucks, and all the other big indie sensations. While watching the event last night he was telling me dead seriously that there was never a better time to be a wrestling fan than right now. Weirdly, he might have a point, especially if you enjoy the current wrestling landscape. With all these leagues and all the availability, there is an enormous amount of wrestling content to consume. It’s not like having to wait for the latest crop of Apter mags each month. You can watch leagues and wrestlers from across the world perform in high level matches through many different means.

All In definitely felt like a celebration of all things independent wrestling. It was an awesomely enjoyable PPV, and four hours just flew by. There was so much to offer, so many different stars and styles, that it was damn entertaining from start to finish. I’m really curious to read up on the IWC’s opinion of this event. It was a unique PPV in that it felt like a big party, rather than focused on serious feuds and storytelling. There weren’t any enormous surprises (with one amazing exception) or intense rivalries, but it sure was memorable. It was an awesome atmosphere and it felt like a true alternative to the WWE product and style.

I was really impressed with the setup and production values. Given that it was an independent show, the production was top notch. They had a cool entrance, great lighting, great camera work – it all added to a big time atmosphere.

Most of the matches were not necessarily feud based, but they did a good job adding story elements and explaining the history of the competitors. The announce team did a phenomenal job all night. They had more of that classic sportscaster feel, explaining the motivation of the wrestlers, the moves, the conditioning, background info, accomplishments etc. It added so much value to the show and made you care about guys you never really heard of before.

1) Matt Cross defeated MJF 9:23

A pretty basic match to kick off the show. I noticed the pacing was designed to build and build to the big matches, so that’s probably why they opened with this. Both of these guys are well travelled indie stars and had a solid match. Good wrestling was the overall theme of the night, and all the matches were given time. I liked Cross better, so I’m happy he came out on top.

Sean F’N Mooney was our backstage interviewer! Man it was great to see him. I loved him on WWE Unreleased, and it’s like he hasn’t missed a day in the business. He interviews Nick Aldis about his match later on with Cody. Just seeing Mooney added so much more to this already awesome PPV.

2) Christopher Daniels defeated Stephen Amell (Jerry Lynn is the guest referee) 12:30

This actually had some kind of crazy backstory to it that I won’t bother to get into. Amell is the star of Arrow (which I’ve never seen) and competed at SummerSlam a couple years ago. Despite only wrestling two matches, he joined the Bullet Club and then got into this feud with ROH/TNA veteran Daniels. This match was a lot better than it had any right to be. Amell is obviously green in the ring, but he did his best to hang in there and keep up with Daniels. He even got in some good moves and the crowd didn’t turn on him. Interestingly, the crowd didn’t hijack the show at any point, just watched, reacted, chanted, and showed their appreciation for the matches and wrestlers. The theme of the night was teased finishes and last second kickouts, and it sure looked like Amell might win this, but it was Daniels emerging victorious in the end. Both guys shook hands and hugged after the match, and huge props to Amell for being able to hang with a pro like Daniels.

3) Four Corner Survival Match: Tessa Blanchard defeated Chelsea Green, Madison Rayne, and Britt Baker DMD 12:41

The former Emma was the guest commentator for this match and is doing a lot in Ring Of Honor these days. LOL You knew who would be winning this match during the entrances when Tessa emotionally hugged Tully and Magnum TA in his wheelchair. This match was awesome right from the start and this women pulled out all the stops, beating the ever loving crap out of each other. Tessa looks so much like her dad, and no doubt she’ll be back in the WWE soon (apparently she was in NXT at some point). She’s the current Knockouts champ though, so maybe it will be awhile. “The Hot Mess” Chelsea Green was highly entertaining as she had two personalities that were always in conflict with each other. Nothing but action, building up to a frantic finish, with Blanchard getting the pinfall by surprise. It almost looked botched, but who knows. It was a great match nonetheless and the women worked really hard to deliver.

4) NWA Worlds Heavyweight Championship Cody (with Brandi Rhodes, Diamond Dallas Page, Glacier, and Tommy Dreamer) defeated Nick Aldis (c) (with Jeff Jarrett, Samuel Shaw, Shawn Daivari, and Tim Storm) 22:01

Talk about three guys who have absolutely nothing to do with each other! Cody’s corner crew was downright bizarre. Why these three? I’ll have to look that one up. And of course Cody’s DOG came out too! Also, Earl Hebner was the ref! That was a cool surprise. They really played this match up huge, with the crowd solidly behind Cody. I thought it was a good match overall, but at times, it felt like they were trying too hard to get this over. They were also playing up the NWA title as being something huge, but everyone knows it’s been at the bottom of the indie barrel for over twenty years. Apparently Billy Corgan owns the NWA now or something. In the middle of the match, Aldis elbowed Cody in the face as he jumped off the top to the floor. They played it up like Cody was hurt for real and were going to stop the match. DDP came running down to check on Cody and get him back in the ring, while Daivari ran down to yell at Hebner to end it. This all lead to DDP using the Diamond Cutter on Daivari, and the match resuming with Cody being a bloody mess. Meh, all that BS ruined the flow of the match for me, and you just knew they were going with the obvious ending of Cody battling back against the odds. Crazy bump at the end as Brandi jumps on Cody to save him and gets crushed by a top rope elbow from Aldis. Crazy spot. Cody makes his comeback, and as I joked about in a text, wins the NWA title on a show he booked, just like his daddy once did.

5) Chicago Street Fight: “Hangman” Adam Page defeated Joey Janela (with Penelope Ford) 20:08

This was the most insane match of the night, and also the most nonsensical and gimmick heavy. Bullet Club member Page regularly competes in PWG apparently. I don’t get the appeal, as it looks absolutely stupid and silly. Page was feuding with Joey Ryan’s penis in PWG (seriously) and after getting beat up by his penis, decides to “murder” Joey Ryan. There was a whole build up and a bunch of stupid videos hyping this crap. I thought it was truly fucking stupid, but the internet fans are just eating it up. My brother-in-law loved it too for some bizarre reason. Joey Janela is a long standing indie guy who’s gimmick is that he’s a crazy motherfucker, so at the very least you knew this would be entertaining. It ended up being a truly insane streetfight, with a lot of ridiculous sick bumps. They battled around the ring with weapons, including an actual Cracker Barrel (one of the restaurants sponsoring the event) which Janela rolled at Page, who jumped over it Donkey Kong style at one point. Goofiness aside, there were a lot of truly sick and painful bumps onto ladders, and even Page powerbombing Janela off of the stage, over a staircase, and through a table. The gorgeous Penelope Ford got involved at one point and was beating the shit out of Page. Late in the match, she had a garbage can, dumping out the cowboy boots that were haunting Page after he “killed” Joey Ryan (I don’t even know how to explain this shit). Page superkicked her in the face for her troubles, then brought out another garbage bag with the phone he also used in Joey Ryan’s murder, beating Janela senseless with it, then driving him off the ladder with some insane backwards piledriver thing through a table. Fuck that looked like he killed him! After the match, a whole bunch of PWG bullshit went down, with Joey Ryan being “res-erected” and a bunch of dudes coming out in penis costumes like they were the Undertaker’s druids. Joey Ryan’s penis beats up Page and flips him over and get his a massive pop. What the fuck! The streetfight was great, Janela was great, but Ryan and the PWG stuff was fucking garbage.

6) ROH World Championship Jay Lethal (with Lanny Poffo) (c) defeated Flip Gordon (with Brandi Rhodes) 14:21

A couple gimmicks here. Flip Gordon’s gimmick was the he was ‘All Out” because he wasn’t booked for this show, but then he won a battle royal in the pre-show, under a disguise, to challenge for Lethal’s title. A mysterious hand slapped Lethal on the shoulder as he was walking backstage before the match and handed him a pair of sunglasses, and he transformed into Black Machiso, doing a full Macho Man entrance, and bringing out Lanny Poffo to be in his corner. All the Macho Man stuff at the beginning was really funny as Machiso put Brandi in his corner like she was Elizabeth, did the Mega Powers handshake with Poffo and Flip, and later put Brandi on his shoulder like it was the end of Wrestlemania IV, before Brandi slapped him and he turned back into regular Jay Lethal. The crowd was nuts for all this goofiness. The match itself wasn’t my style, as Flip lived up to his name by doing nothing but flips and skinny guy aerial moves. I give him credit for being a great athlete, but I dunno, it wasn’t for me. Silliness ensued later in the match when they copied the ending of Mania V, by having Lethal drop 3 elbows, then Gordon ‘Flipped Up’ and did the ten millionth Hogan impression of the year. Lethal finally put him away with his finisher to end this. This was probably my least favorite match on the card, but I did enjoy Poffo and the initial Black Machismo stuff at the beginning.

After the match that fat loser Bully Ray came down to beat both guys up and disrespected the Code of Honor (acting as though the Dudleys reunion never happened… hmmm… maybe that’s for the best). Colt Cabana came down for the save. I can’t figure out the IWC popularity of that dweeb, but the fans marked out huge for him.

7) Kenny Omega defeated Penta El Zero 17:47

Now this was fucking awesome! The next three big matches really delivered, with this being my favorite of the whole card. Penta is a star in Mexico and TNA and has an awesome scary gimmick. He wrestles a ruthless style, with a few lucha moves mixed in. Him and Omega went back and forth, absolutely destroying each other with big move after big move. This was so awesome and well done, with so many crazy false finishes. Absolutely loved this match. Penta seemed to have Omega beat and everyone, including us, thought it was over. But somehow Omega fought back and won with the One Winged Angel. Fucking awesome match. The hugest and coolest surprise of the night happened after. The lights went out for a good minute, and when they came on, it appeared as though nothing had changed. Suddenly Penta got up off the mat, looking oddly different, and destroyed Omega with a codebreaker! He beat him up further, then slowly pulled off his mask to reveal Chris Jericho! Holy shit that was a crazy great moment surprise. The place came unglued.

8) Kazuchika Okada defeated The Villain Marty Scurll 26:05

This match was an actual feud as Okada, one of the hugest stars in New Japan, has been refusing to wrestle Scurll because he’s too small and not at his level. Okada has even being making 205 jokes at Scurll, which is fucking hilarious. This ended up being a tremendous, hard fought back and forth battle. The Villain gave Okada all he could handle and really took this to the limit. It definitely had a New Japan feel to me, as they kept teasing and kicking out of super move after super move. So many false finishes and near tap outs along the way. It was a long match too, going over 25 minutes, but the action and story were so good that it never slowed down or got boring. Okada motioned 205 to the crowd during the match, which had me laughing. In a nice touch, Scurll used his umbrella as a weapon on Okada, who’s finisher is called the Rainmaker, and I believe that’s his nickname too. Scurll used his own rainmaker on Okada and nearly had him beat, but Okada came back hard and absolutely destroyed Scurll with two vicious looking rainmakers to win and put this away.

9) The Golden Elite (Matt Jackson, Nick Jackson, and Kota Ibushi) defeated Rey Mysterio, Rey Fénix, and Bandido (with Theo Rossi) 11:48

With the last match running long (reports are that they went 10 minutes past their allotted time), the main event was super rushed. But it was balls out insane. It was like watching a video game, which in this case is a huge compliment, as these guys were destroying each other at full speed. Mysterio looked shockingly amazing, like he turned back the clock 15 years and kept up with all the younger stars in this match. It was pure action and nonstop insanity for the full 10 minutes as they rushed to deliver as much as they could before PPV time ran out. The Golden Elite completed the clean sweep of victories for the guys who put on this card, but it all made sense, as that’s exactly who the fans wanted to see win. The PPV ended abruptly after the three count.

The four hours flew right by! This show was so refreshing and so much fun. What a tremendous showcase and celebration of global wrestling talent. There truly was something for everyone. Even though I hated the PWG garbage, I loved the brutality of Omega-Penta. I loved the sparing use of names from the past, keeping them in supporting roles and out of the middle of ring. I loved everything about this event, as it truly felt like something special. What a tremendous night of professional wrestling! Definitely count me all in.