The Tag Rope Repaired

Just when you think you have a trend down cold, it has to go and reverse itself. In some cases, this is a bad thing, like growth on the stock market that suddenly makes a u-turn and crashes. In other cases, you're left pleasantly surprised. The apparent resurgence of tag wrestling in eW is one of these cases.

About a year-and-a-half ago, I bemoaned the dwindlage of tag team divisions. (To show how dated that post is, WFW still had pretensions of being an active fed then :p) Up until even a few months ago, that post rang true. The only fed that I knew of that had anything resembling a healthy, thriving tag team division was NAPW. Mind you, NAPW's division could stack up with any great tag division in the history of eW, but the truth was that even feds that did have a tag division ran it on life-support.

Then, something happened. People started giving a shit about tag teams again and made efforts to handle them as one handler or, the best part, palled together with other handlers to form tag teams. As a result, you had a great turnout for the MCW Tag Team Tournament, a concerted effort from Jarret and A1E to re-establish the tag division and the overflow in PRIME's newest roster expansion to enthusiastically enter the division and make it viable once more.

Does this mean there's been a sea change in the way people feel about tag teams? I would say no, because I feel that deep down inside, everyone wants to have a tag division. I would say that there's a sea change in the effort put forth to have a tag division, at least initially. It's very, very important to note that with PRIME and A1E, this re-expansion of the tag divisions is still in the infant stages. Who knows if and when people will get bored of it and go back to their selfish singles division exploits. For now though, things are looking up, and I feel that's a good thing.

When you have an active tag team division, you have a battleground for people to enter and do battle with other characters regardless of standing on the card. It's the only true place on the card where position really doesn't matter all that much. It's also the best avenue to show the collaborative side of eW, which is what I feel makes eW so great and sets it apart from other forms of writing.

Hopefully, the interest in tag teams stays up. I have a good feeling that it will though.

Some random notes

Alright, things have been hectic for me this week. That NAPW review took me about a week to do between RPing and work and turkey-related dealings of yesterday. Anyway, a random notes entry! Always fun...

- First up, big, big, HUGE congratulations are in order for James Irish, who captured the A1E World Championship at Cyber Brutality. It's two years late, IMO, but better late than never. If there's anyone in this hobby who deserves to be World Champion, it's James. As for the rest of the card, it was pretty good fare. It's good to see Steven Shane back in A1E; he's always been a solid character, and A1E is his home fed (one that he can actually compete in without having to deal with calls of self-booking :p). The "Slambo" swerve that got him back was pretty neat, even if it's still kinda overshadowed by the Beast/Anti-Cross unmasking that happened at GD. Speaking of Beast.... wow, what a match with him and Cross. Congrats to Cross too, as well as Hida Yakamo, for their title wins.

Three title switches and a draw in the tag title match... funny how A1E got somewhat strong contenders to their Tag Team Titles by accident with the draw. Hopefully, Blackburn and Drunken Tiger will be able to give Dog and Ryan the challenge they've been sorely lacking since they've gotten the straps.

- Lots of stuff surrounding MCW too. Josh Ray is turning the former Bolich-run up-and-comers fed into sort of a loose interfed construct, and he's running a tag team tournament. I'll be participating as a handler, which is a welcome change from the almost non-stop judging.

MCW Finale was also posted, and hopefully, that will be the next flagship review I do.

- My take on "story-driven" feds... they're the same as angle feds, unless they have nothing to do with wrestling at all. Then they're not e-feds at all and really shouldn't call themselves "feds." They should call themselves something different. But now I'm just being nitpicky.

I don't know. Maybe I'm getting crotchety, but if you're going to call yourself a "fed," you should be wrestling-centric. I'm glad those who don't like writing about wrestling anymore have found an outlet for their creativity, and Lord knows they should be allowed to talk about and promote these projects in our eW circles, but don't expect me to cover those projects here.

- Heads up for SbW. In their latest edition of Bad Juju (best name for a TV show ever, btw), check out the character DC Stark. He's handled by Obinna, who runs KingPRO and used to handle Anton Assault in AWC. Very entertaining character, one who could make an impact in the coming months.

- No I haven't forgotten about GTT6. It's now official that everyone off my shortlist has been eliminated. I'm terribly sorry for jinxing all of you. Please find it in your hearts to forgive me. We're down to our quarterfinalists, of which I'm one. I met my goal. Yay me! But enough about me. We have our first semifinalist, Sammy Brown, who is an amazing story. The handler, John Cantel (a ToC alum!), won a competition with the character pre-tourney, and elected to use him rather than one of his established characters (my favorite of which is the incomparable Tony "The Grin" Gamble). He proceeds to tear through the tournament, beating High Flyer and Easton Hall (another Obinna creation). He got to the semis because Tywon had to bow out with Olsig, but it's still no slight on Sammy Brown's run thus far. It'll be interesting to see how things turn out

Odds and Ends

Happy 150th post! w00t~!

- Superstar Vince Jacobs is back and he's in LoC. Huge, huge coup for Dan's fed. Once again, this proves that e-fed retirements are almost never permanent, which bodes well for those of us holding out for the return of Gregg Gethard.

- Jeff Bolichowski resigned as MCW fedhead. I'm not surprised by this, but I'm very glad he decided to keep the fed open in different hands rather than close it. In case you don't know, Karl Brown and Josh Ray have taken control. I like that combination a lot. Karl's been around MCW in its previous incarnation, and Josh has a great exuberance and enthusiasm that any fedhead should have.

- Not suprisingly, the number of folks I have so far for the ToC are concentrated from a few feds. Surprisingly, those feds aren't the usual suspects. Well, one of them hails from a fed you could call usual; EPW has sent all three of its current Champions, which is a virtual 100% compliance, given that Jarret's on hiatus and thusly won't be entering Beast (although I'm sure he would if he had the time... Jarret's always been a big supporter of projects like these). But the other three... well, I'm surprised, but it's a pleasant surprise. First up in the queue is PRIME, a fed that's sending four of its eligible superstars (Vangelus Olsig, Danny Ferguson, Kyle Lamen, Karina Wolfenden). To get a turnout such as that from a fed as prestigious as PRIME... I'm flattered. Next up is another PTC fed sending four, FUSE. They're sending Mikael Lundgard, John Covel, Tigera and Damien Cruz. Finally, there's NAPW, who's really responded to this tournament, sending D!, Devastation, Bayman Jakey and Ravager. Now, that's not to say other feds haven't stepped up. The CSWA and AWC have both sent two, as has ACW. And we have a smattering of guys signing up from odd feds too. So right now, I do have the cross-pollenation I wanted. I'm very pleased so far, and hopefully, the RPing and judging will go off like I want them too.

MCW's first show and... WOW! What a promo!

Holla! Holla! MCW's got their first show up, and it's pretty darn good.

clicky clicky

It may be only three matches long, but they go a long way setting up a direction for the company, especially with the end angle. Good strong show, and hopefully this is the first step towards growing their roster.

And a link for this week...

HOLY JASON PAYNE BATMAN!

Seriously... this is one tremendous promo. Everyone has been talking about YYJ, including myself and rightfully so, but he's got some competition this week. Katz said that Jason found his voice with this promo and character direction. I'd have to agree. Hopefully he keeps up the good work, because the stronger the chase for the ULTRATITLE is, the stronger the person who finally does win it looks, and the better it is for the hobby overall.

Holy shit, a giant entry

Working two jobs, one of them being full-time, is a bitch, and it totally cuts into e-fedding time. I'm really sorry I haven't found more time to update this thing, but fear not, loyal readers. I am not abandoning it, and I have no plans to, actually.

Even as I have less time to do stuff, there are still plenty of things to say about the world of e-fedding. A lot of news, controversy, you name it, we have it this week. Hopefully, this won't become a strictly weekly thing, but I hope you guys understand. I have a lot going on.

Anyway, onto the entry for today.

First up, we have a new addition to the e-fed blogring, which really is just Jeff Paternostro's blog moved from ENN's old site to Blogspot. Once again, I ask you visit him and read what he has to say from time to time. It's always good to have different voices in the e-fed community, because if I were the only one dispensing opinions, things would be dull.

Next up, I kinda hinted at something big and new coming up in the e-fed queue with my last entry, and The Big Bolich finally announced it this week. Major Championship Wrestling is coming back in a new form. Jeff brought the fed back as a place where unproven and new characters in the e-fedding world can come to make a name for themselves. Anyone who has won a World Championship anywhere on the FW circuit or in A1E or MBE cannot join. It's an ambitious idea given the propensity for some handlers not to create new characters, but it's an idea worth getting behind. Once again, as with FMLL, I really can't dedicate any time to handle in it, but I fully endorse it, and I will follow its growth on this blog.

Speaking of Bolich, I've recently heard that some pretty disparaging things were said about him as a fedhead. Basically, I've heard that some folks were saying he has no idea how to run a fed and they even said some pretty hurtful personal things towards him. Well, everyone has their faults. We all know that Jeff at times loses passion for e-fedding and can disappear into retirement, which hurts the feds he's in as a handler. As a fedhead, if he does that, it could mean disaster. HOWEVER, when he has the drive and the passion for the hobby, he is an outstanding handler and fedhead. You only need to look at his time running EPW as a testimony. I can honestly say that EPW wouldn't be what it is right now without Bolich's early guidance, and to say otherwise is petty disparagement.

Now, over in the NFW universe, it seems like the big week 8 interconference shebang has developed a case of the shoots. In both big matches, shooty sidebars have broken out. First there was the Survivor Series match where Stanton and Steve went off on a sidebar about CSWA history. This was relatively innocuous, or at least it seemed so. I haven't gotten the chance to speak to Steve or Mike about whether there were any deep-seated problems being manifested, so until I do, I can only assume that it was just historical posturing.

The other incident seemed to carry far more venom. In the Hulk-A-Thon tournament, Paul Miller and Brunk had an aside based off recent heat. Basically, everything stems from Miller's repeated shots at EPW and EPW booking in his promos and Brunk lashing out in defense of his promotion.

In either case, whether harmless or cancerous, you have to ask yourself the question... what do shoots like these accomplish? It's well-known that Mike McNichols, one of NFW's bookers, hates seeing the use of what's happened in other feds as a basis for your promos in NFW. So if you know that, why even go there? Why bring the CSWA into the equation at all? Or why keep taking the shots at EPW? It's counterproductive to the goal at hand, and that's to build for the match in NFW for that week.

Honestly, the only person I don't find much fault in with this is Brunk. Although he might have been best served not to have taken that road and just ignored it, he has a great amount of pride in his fed, as well he should. Honestly, the uneasiness could have been avoided had he taken the high road, but to tell someone they should take the high road and ignore the comments to someone who has to read/see/hear negative comments about who he is or what he does is really hypocritical, unless you yourself either have no pride in what you do, or are completely one with the universe and do not feel any reaction in your body or brain when someone badmouths something you do.

And while we're on the subject of EPW booking... they have a female character as their World Champion. So what, get over it. We don't need to hear about it in every promo when facing someone associated with the fed. You don't have to agree with it, but at least respect it enough not to sully up someone else's fed with it when you should be promoting a match.

Now I think I blew a fuse in my brain and I need to take a break. Fear not though, I have a few more ideas for entries today. So hopefully, Edmunds, you won't have to post another comment about where I've been hiding ;)