The Minnesota RSPW Mutants stormed the Lakeside Ballroom in Waconia, Minnesota for another night of wrestling action. I believe this was the first wrestling card I've been to in over twenty years where all the matches booked that night were the same as the advertised/scheduled matches. No substitutes! The card had a 7:30PM start time (which with Northern Premiere Wrestling means 8:00 at the earliest) so I planned to get there by 6:45. I couldn't find the Waconia Hooters NightClub for pre-match drinks :-) so I headed on over to the Lakeside Ballroom (with a fine view of Lake Waconia and 'Coney Island) around 7:00 after a 35 mile drive (luckily Waconia is on the same side of town as the suburb I live in or it would have been a lot longer). Rush hour was over, so it didn't take much longer than a half hour to get there. "Dangerous" Darin Peterson and his friend Julie (who had never been to a pro-wrestling card before) were already sitting ringside. Brent and another RSPWer (T Larson, who actually lives in Waconia) migrated to the heel section. This turned out to be the entire RSPW contingent for this card. Five of us. But since the total audience was 52 people (probably slightly less paid) we had our 10%. I've decided to give up the "star system" for rating matches in favor of "how much was this match worth monetarily". If I had used this method for reviewing NWA Grandslam I in Minneapolis a few years back it probably would have racked up over $100.00 for the entire card. All seats were general admission $8.00 seats. With about 50 people they probably took in about $400.00 total. With eight wrestlers on the card, each probably got paid about $50 and paid for their own travel. This doesn't take into consideration paying for the three referees, the ring crew (one guy that set up the ring and took robes, belts, etc). I'll assume the local cable company pays for the announcers (Mick Karch and Chris) and Al P the cameraman. I'll also assume they got the arena for free since the house must have pulled in a couple hundred bucks in beer sales. As seems to be the case for most NPW matches, the ring is about 18" off the ground instead of 36" or whatever most rings are. The ropes are really thin and looked really worn. At 7:50 Chris got in the ring and tried to warm up the crowd. He said they just had a card in St Cloud with about the same number of people and they were twice as loud as we were. I told him if he supplied free beer we'd be a lot louder. At 7:58 JB Trask and Luscious Lenny Lane came out for a six-minute interview. When they realized there wasn't much heel heat, one of them turned around and yelled "shut up" at the crowd, which of course had the desired effect. ===== MATCH #1 ===== The Nightstalker (heel) 245 lbs from Chicago IL -vs- Scotty Z (face) 245 lbs from Minneapolis/Pittsburgh referee: someone I didn't recognize The Nightstalker did about two moves other than "punch" and "kick". It went out of the ring briefly but was mainly one long resthold. The seats to my left were occupied by face-cheering mark-brats who didn't realize they were sitting in the heel section. :-) The Nightstalker is basically your fat non-working stiff. We warmed up by calling him "NightCrawler" and telling him to do a moonsault or a shooting star press. Neither wrestler even tried to work the crowd. Scotty Z with the clean pin in 16:00. I'm probably being generous in rating it $0.75 ===== MATCH #2 ===== The Hater (heel) 265 lbs from East Los Angeles CA -vs- Kenny "Sodbuster" Jay (face) 245 pounds from Bloomington MN referee: Eddie Sharkey I don't think I've seen Kenny Jay lose a match since the AWA folded, and I was cringing at the inevitable job The Hater (formerly of the Punishers) was going to do. The Hater (who has been great at generating heel heat since I first saw him wrestle at Georges/Ropers in Fridley about five years ago. He went over to the"mark" section, took one guy's popcorn and dumped it on him, got in the face of some overweight ladies, etc. The kinda stuff you don't see in the Big Two anymore (well, maybe with Diamond Dallas Page, but that's about it). Kenny Jay puts The Hater in several headlocks over the first six minutes, pulling The Hater's hair on every break. The Hater finally gets tired of it and pulls what little hair Kenny has left after busting sod for 60 years. At 6:30 JB Trask wanders out to the ring (there was an angle at a recent card I wasn't at where Kenny Jay revealed that he is JB Trask's uncle) and watches silently. At 8:50 JB Trask hits Kenny when the referee isn't looking. Ther Hater rolls Jay up for the pin in 9:00. I give the match $1.50 (mostly for The Hater working the crowd). After the match, Brent called Eddie Sharkey (the trainer of champions) over to our seats to ask how his trip to Japan went. He said it went well. He was over there with the Hater wrestling for Mikinosha(sp?) (ever hear of this group Hisa?) and the Hater either won or retained the PWA belt (or won the Mikinosha title, I didn't catch which). Brent talked Eddie into bringing the belt out for us to see. The first thing I noticed is that it didn't have as professional a look as the NPW belt. It looked heavier but not as polished or "stylish". The second thing I noticed was that "heavyweight" was spelled "heavy weigth" on the PWA belt. :-) Brent snapped a picture of Sharkey with the belt. Sharkey said the next PWA card would be in Delwood (he later told us Excelsior) on Friday May 17th. The only names he could remember that would be there were Wayne "The Train" Bloom (of the "Destruction Crew") and the Hater (who is the booker for the PWA I believe). First intermission (which lasts 23 minutes). I remark that they need that much time to recharge the batteries in Kenny Jay's pacemaker for the inevitable run-in during the next match. ===== MATCH #3 ===== JB Trask "The Brentwood Badboy" (heel) 230 lbs from Brentwood CA -vs- Horace The Psychopath (face) 235 lbs form St Peter's Asylum referee: Mike Diamond JB Trask was announced as being part of Plumbtree Enterprises, but Mortimer Plumbtree wasn't there tonight. I'm wearing my asylum shirt (which seems to be nearly identical to Horace's) and am cheering for the face for the only time tonight. Horace shows that he has the best workrate of anyone there and he gets a decent face pop. Since Horace guaranteed that this match would be all over the arena and that "blood would be spilled", I start a "we want blood" chant (Scherer, Keller, and Kunze can chastise me for this). After about five minutes JBT throws Horace out of the ring. Horace ducks his head down by the apron. As soon as I see Al the cameraman switch from filming Horace to focusing on JB in the ring I know that Horace is slicing his forehead with a razor blade. Unfortunately, he is a quarter of a ring away this time, but I still yell "hey, Horace--what are you doing down there?" He looks up and has a nice cut about an inch above his eye. Some decent action and workrate from both men (mostly Horace) and by the end of the match half of Horace's face is bloody (as is his shirt). There are bloody hand prints of JB's on the top of HTP's shaved head. At the fifteen minute mark, Kenny Jay does a "run"-in which for some reason results in a "no contest". Mike Diamond helps Horace back to the locker room. Although this is the worst Horace match I've seen since NWA GrandSlam I, he still put more effort than anyone else there tonight. Anyone who will blade for 50 drunken assholes deserves my respect. I give this match $4.00 ===== MATCH #4 ===== Championship Title Match Luscious Lenny Lane (heel champ) 232 lbs from The Virgin Islands -vs- Dynamite Dan Jesser (face challenger) 235 pounds from Albertville, MN referee: Mike Diamond A gal whom I have to believe is Jesser's wife/girlfriend (she was pretty much silent for the entire card but now was cheering her lungs out for Dan) was taking pictures on the side opposite from us. Lenny Lane came out first and did an interview. He said there were two added stipulations for this title match. Jesser isn't allowed to hit Lane in the face (since Lane is a model) and Jesser isn't allowed to mess up Lane's hair. One of the least exciting Lane matches I've seen. Lenny Lane is one of the few people I'd consider "The Next Ric Flair". He can do excellent heel-Flair-type interviews. He did one Flair flip over the top turnbuckle to the outside ring apron. I'm not 100% certain, but I think it was this match where we had a few excellent Flair chops across the chest. It may have been Horace on Trask, though. Some drunks in the mark section were getting on Lane's case about steroid use. Either in this match or an earlier one (possibly both) the heel responded to the "you suck" comment from the kid next to me with a "so does your mother". After 13:50 of action, Lenny Lane rolls Dan Jesser up for the pin to retain his title. This is the nicest belt I've seen (other than Flair's gold belt). $1.50 Second intermission (which lasts 20 minutes). I grab another $2 can of beer (gh0d I love small towns). Horace comes to ringside (with his head bandaged) to sign autographs and sell autographed pictures of himself for $1.00 apiece. Dan Jesser's SO comes over first and gets Horace to autograph her chest. Then about eight kids and two adults purchase pictures from Horace. That probably paid for his gas to and from the arena. ===== MATCH #5 ===== Six-man tag main event Heels: JB Trask, The Nightstalker, The Hater -vs- Faces: Kenny Jay, Horace The Psychopath, Scotty Z This must be the shortest six-man tag match in history. Horace is in for about 20 seconds, not too much action, then Kenny Jay and JB Trask go at it. It ends up with JBT and KJ rolling over each other outside the ring with the other four wrestlers trying to separate them. Double Count Out in just under five minutes. $0.50 Total match time: 58:50 Total cost of the evening: $8.00 plus gas, beer, munchies, etc. Total entertainment value: $8.25 Not the best card I've been to, but it could have been worse. At least the two stiffs (Kenny Jay and The Nightstalker) both jobbed in their prelim matches. No Kamikaze Kid (whom Mick Karch had listed as being part of the card) but the top three guys there (Lane, Horace, Hater) all won their respective matches. I don't think I agree with The Hater being on the undercard, but I suppose he books himself in the main events on the PWA cards so he gets *some* recognition. Started losing my voice mid-way through the second match, but didn't lose my voice totally like the last UCW match at the Sports Garden. Notice how all the faces were announced as being from Minnesota and all the heels were announced as not being from Minnesota? :-) The promoter is listed as Brenda Ber whom I assume is JB Trask's wife. After the matches were over cameraman/producer Al P asked if Wade Keller got all his scoops from me. I smirked. Next four NPW cards: Saturday 1 June 1996 in Spencer Iowa (715) 262-3904 7:30pm Sunday 2 June 1996 in Mankato MN (507) 625-7553 3:00pm Friday 14 June 1996 in Austin MN (507) 433-0502 7:30pm Saturday 15 June 1996 in Waseca MN (507) 835-3251 7:00pm This article is copyright 1996 Otto E Heuer. All rights reserved.