Wrestling Review // ICW No Holds Barred Volume 9 (IWTV)

https://www.icwnoholdsbarred.com/

Volume 9 kicked things off in 2020 for ICW No Holds Barred and it was just a few days over a year after Volume 1.   Though this was in Florida, it was apparently cold.   Danny Demanto started out the show by bringing out the entire locker room and then singling out John Wayne Murdoch for being Wrestler of the Year and commenting on how people don't take deathmatch wrestling as seriously as other wrestling.   I look at it like this: you go to wrestling school and train so you learn how to throw a suplex and while training you probably take your fair share of suplexes as well.   But how do you train to go through barbed wire or glass? It's just on a different level, but to me it's a higher level since it's more painful.

John Wayne Murdoch was interrupted by Rickey Shane Page, who was on top of a Uhaul for some reason.   RSP said that Danny Demanto had a bunch of troll accounts made and he rigged the contest for Wrestler of the Year.  Now, look, RSP has questionable morals, right?  So if it was that easy to do, why wouldn't RSP just do it so that he could win Wrestler of the Year?  And if he couldn't rig the nominations then at least he could have gone on and rigged it so that JWM didn't win, if RSP hates him that much.   Perhaps I'm overthinking this though.  Eventually, RSP leaves after saying he starts with SHLAK but will ultimately face JWM.   Whenever this match happens, it's going to be so huge.

Last we saw Neil Diamond Cutter he was having a battle of the theme songs with Jeff Cannonball but no one wants to talk about how Satu Jinn comes out to "Sugar" and that should be a sing along theme song as well.   Satu Jinn and NDC were two of the newer wrestlers we saw come in during the end of 2020 and to see them kick off the show in 2021 seems only fitting.  NDC got that win and I think that puts him in a good spot going forward.   

Ugh.   Brandon Kirk came out next and Kasey Catal said that he headlined the best deathmatch wrestling show of 2020, but no one seems to know what that was.   For my money, the best deathmatch show of 2020 was ICW NHB Volume 6 but Brandon Kirk didn't headline that-- he just got his ass beat by Dominic Garrini.   Nolan Edward, whom I love more and more every day, put Brandon Kirk through a sheet of glass to win this one and hopefully Kirk goes home and tries something different next time since it looked like having his wife at ringside might be his key to winning but now that theory is out the window.

This was my first time seeing Lord Crewe, which it's nice to see ICW NHB still having these debuts on every show, giving some fresh faces a chance to show what they can do.  Though Lord Crewe took a loss here at least he went to a Shining Wizard Seminar, unlike his opponent (that thing was so laughable, it'd be like me trying to do it)   AKIRA unfortunately started off 2021 with a loss to Atticus Cogar, who is now 3-0 versus AKIRA.   This was a great match I just wish AKIRA had won.

There were advertisements for various shows on IWTV shown during intermission and it wasn't too bad as they promoted an IWA-MS show that has John Wayne Murdoch on it.   That's some good cross promotion right there.   Following the break, we had Reed Bentley coming in hot and defeating Orin Veidt.  Orin Veidt lost to JWM recently so he said, of The Rejects, "Give me the little one", which seems to be setting up Veidt vs. AKIRA at some point.  This match also made me wonder if we'd see Reed Bentley vs. JWM at some point.  I know we've seen JWM vs. AKIRA, but with Reed Bentley being undefeated that could be a big time match up right there as well.

Rickey Shane Page came out and complained that the ring wasn't clean enough for him to wrestle in.   Eventually, SHLAK came out.  RSP did a lot of the running away outside of the ring thing in this match.  Neither man really seemed to get too beat up and then RSP just rolled up SHLAK really quick for the pin.   It felt like a fluke and there was so much match left to have, but it also leaves me wondering what will be next for RSP.  Does he go after AKIRA?  The undefeated Reed Bentley?  I don't think he's ready for JWM yet.

In the main event of the show, John Wayne Murdoch took on Shane Mercer, who is just one tough guy.   I was thinking Shane Mercer would work his way up to this type of fight but he was just thrown right into it.   Since it was cold, there were these trash cans with fire burning in them to help keep everyone warm and that was used as a weapon during this match.   That wasn't the only use of fire during this match either and this is easily the best match I witnessed through all of the wrestling which took place in January of 2021.

So where am I now?  I've been watching all of the ICW No Holds Barred shows on IWTV since the beginning of the year or so.  I watched Volume 9 on a Tuesday, I'm typing this all on a Wednesday, will post it on a Thursday and then ICW NHB has a doubleheader this coming Saturday.    The matches between the two shows are really something special.   Nolan Edward vs. Atticus Cogar should deliver, while Cogar (who has been on a roll) will have to go up against the undefeated Reed Bentley during the second show.   Gary Jay and Justin Kyle may well kill each other and they're not even in the cage!   This is definitely a weekend I am looking forward to for wrestling and especially ICW NHB.