I'm On Team Scrappy

My last post was all about choosing sides in a match where Ethan Andrews makes an appearance.  Here we go again with another Ethan match, this time from Wrestler4Hire where he wrestles Scrappy.  Can there be any doubt about my choice in this one?  Hell, yeah, I'm on Team Scrappy! 

Heck, let's be honest.  I'm usually on Team Scrappy regardless of who he's wrestling.  But in this match, it sure is fun seeing our little muscleboy go all alpha on the pale, pasty Ethan.  Scrappy is my favorite type of wrestler.  He's got muscles, and he loves to use them.  My guess is Ethan spends about half the match up in the air as Scrappy picks him up and tosses him around over and over.  Sure, Ethan gets in some good moves here and there himself.  But there's no point in highlighting any of that in this post.  After all, I'm on Team Scrappy!

Team Scrappy brings out the big guns!

I'm On Team Jett

Not long ago while promoting its newest match between Jett Bentley and Ethan Andrews, 88Wrestling asked us whether we are on Team Jett or Team Ethan.  Well, I've mentioned before my thoughts about Ethan Andrews, so there's no need to re-hash them again here.  Let's just say it comes as no surprise that I am totally on Team Jett!

Jett Bentley arrived at 88Wrestling a couple years ago as a ripped, rookie wrestler, described as a gym freak with a shredded physique.  After a few matches, Jett disappeared for a while before returning as a ripped wrestler, a gym freak with a shredded physique, but now with twenty additional pounds of muscle.  Holy crap!  He's even bigger and better!  The new and improved Jett has wrestled in several more matches now, but surprisingly this is the first time I have featured him in my blog.  He's muscular, masculine, confident, and boasts good looks.  These are all the qualities I love in a wrestler.  When it comes to choosing sides, there's no doubt I'm on Team Jett.

 Team Jett rocks Ethan!

For more pictures and commentary about this match, check out Joe's blog at Ringside and W.R.'s Screencaps.

The "Three Way"

Rex Bedford looks at his two shirtless buddies and says with a smirk, "I've always kinda wanted to be in a three-way."  Now, before you let your imaginations get the better of you, remember that I run a family-friendly blog here, not a porn site.  That's not the kind of "three-way" we're talking about.  Rather, 88Wrestling brings us a three-way wrestling match featuring Rex Bedford, Chase Lundquist, and Ethan Andrews (which is much, much better than porn in my book).

The three-man match has been a standard feature in pro-style wrestling for a long time.  It can take different forms.  In one scenario, you get two guys who team up together and dish out punishment on the third (like we saw before with Brad Barnes and Austin Cooper beating up on Ethan).  Another scenario has the single guy (usually a big dude) instead beating up on the other two wrestlers who try to gang up on him (a la Braden Charron against Cameron Matthews and Chris Richards).  And then you get the three-way match in its purest form where all three dudes are figthing against each other.

This match from 88Wrestling falls into the last category with Rex, Chase, and Ethan battling it out to prove who the top dawg is.  But you still get a taste of the other scenarios, too.  As the match progresses, we eventually see Rex and Chase form an alliance to take Ethan out.  What then follows is a temporary two on one battle.  Two of my favorite wrestlers beating up on Ethan?  I can watch that all day.  Then, with punk Ethan thoroughly defeated and out of the way, the combat turns to a contest between Rex and Chase.  Two of my favorite wrestlers battling it out in the ring?  I can watch that all day, too.  This is one of several matches that 88Wrestling filmed where the conditions obviously are hot in the ring.  I don't know if that's intentional, or maybe the air contitioning was broken.  As a consequence, you get a lot of sweat from the wrestlers, which adds to the appeal of their combat.  But you also get a slippery ring, which probably makes the wrestlers hold back a little bit on the action.  I really like to see power wrestling moves, with lifts and carries and slams, yet we don't get as much of that in this match as I would like because the mat surface quickly turns into a slip-and-slide with all the sweat.  But that's my only critique, because overall it's another fun and entertaining production by 88Wrestling.  As the fight continues, the contest transitions into a boxing match.  Eventually this leads to the conclusion where one stud flexes his sweat covered body in triumph over the knocked-out cold body of his opponent, leaving no dispute in the end who the top dawg is in this three man fight.

It's a "Three-Way" . . .  88Wrestling-style.

For more photos and commentary about this match, check out Joe's Ringside blog.

Ethan is Strong

Here are some more pics from 88Westling's awesome match featuring Rex Bedford and Ethan Andrews.  My last post was about Rex whose name means "king."  Today we're going to highlight Ethan, because I don't want to give you the wrong impression that this match was nothing more than Rex tossing Ethan about the ring.  No sir, Ethan is no one's whipping boy!  His name, by the way, means "strong" (or at least that's what came up when I googled it), and "strong" is definitely the right adjective for our Ethan Andrews.  He's strong enough to get into the ring to fight King Rex for the title belt, which is a tough feat for any mere mortal.  And from the pictures above, you can see that Ethan is physically strong.  He knows how to make another wrestler suffer, and suffer indeed did Rex at the hands of strong Ethan.  Why, Ethan is . . . well, he's . . . he's . . . oh fuck it!  That's enough about Ethan.  I want to get back to how awesome Rex is!

Ethan may be strong, but Rex is no pushover himself.  Ethan finds this out the hard way many times when bad boy Rex slams his sorry ass.  Yes, Ethan may be strong, but is he strong enough to overthrow the King?  King Rex isn't going to turn over the throne without a fight.

King Rex honors his fans by declaring today another Backbreaker Monday!

Rex is King

A couple of weeks ago, 88Wrestling was kind enough to send me a preview of its new King of the Ring 2 match featuring Rex Bedford and Ethan Andrews.  While I am a big fan of Rex, my views on Ethan Andrews are somewhat lukewarm, so I guess I was not in a real hurry to watch it.  But now that I finally got around to it, holy shit!!  This match blew me away!  While Ethan may not be high on my list of favorites, he clearly is a skilled wrestler with tons of experience.  And when you put him in the ring with another wrestler of the same caliber like Rex (who is very high on my list of favorites), the end result is one of the best matches I've seen from 88Wrestling.

There are great moves here by both guys, but this post is all about Rex (maybe later I'll share some of Ethan's highlights).  "King of the Ring" is a great title for the match since "Rex" means king, and Rex is here to defend his throne, or rather his title belt.  Just seeing Rex in the top photo with the belt, you know it's going to take someone with pretty big cojones to step into the ring to try to take it from him.  Rex just impresses me as a wrestler.  He's got the muscular, shredded body, a strong MMA backround, and he rocks those camo tights.  And Rex is not shy when it comes to bodyslams and backbreakers, which gives me a great reason to show off his awesomeness in my blog.  I don't do my "wrestler of the year" award anymore, but if I did, the 2018 award likely would go to Rex, with his performance in this match sealing the deal.

Watching Rex break Ethan's back puts me in my happy place. 

For additional commentary about this match, check out Joe's Ringside blog.

Odd Man Out

So, what happens to a lean, gawky, scrawny guy who finds himself in a wrestling ring with two beefy muscle guys?  He discovers pretty fast that he's the odd man out.

It's a two-on-one wrestling match at Wrestler4Hire featuring Brad Barnes, Austin Cooper, and Ethan Andrews.  Both Brad and Austin sport a lot of muscle on their bodies, but not so much for the lanky Ethan, who clearly looks like the odd man out.  I love Brad Barnes!  And I'm a big fan of Austin, too, because he loves bodyslams and other power moves.  But as for Ethan . . . well, I have to admit that I always struggle with him. The set up for this match is that Ethan has long been a a bully to Brad, but he finally gets his due when Brad and Austin exact revenge on the smaller dude. In real life no one would ever believe an Ethan could be a bully to a Brad Barnes, but in the world of underground wrestling, Ethan often plays the bully, or rather the heel, to bigger muscle guys.  And that's where I have struggled with Ethan.  I like seeing the good looking, masculine muscle jocks delivering a beat down on a smaller jobber.  But when I see Ethan giving a musclestud a beat down, it just doesn't appeal to me.  That's especially the case at 88Wrestling, where Ethan clearly is the "odd man out" among all the fitness studs and physique models on the roster there, but those muscleboys always seem to play jobber to Ethan's heel.  Of course, it's a matter of personal taste, and lots of guys obviously enjoy seeing Ethan in that type of match.  Also, to be fair, I don't want to give the impression that I don't like Ethan at all.  He's a talented and prolific wrestler, and I think he is awesome in the role of heel at UCW Wrestling.  He really fits in there.  But when he's wrestling a big, good-looking muscle jock, I want to see Ethan suffer.  So, this really is just a long-winded way of saying that I liked this two-on-one match at W4H a lot because two of my favorite musclestuds dominate Ethan with tons of power moves like bodyslams, pile drivers, backbreakers, torture racks, and bearhugs.  So there you go, Ethan!  Take that, you damn bully!

Now that's how a muscleboy treats a jobber!

No Samson Effect

Josh Steel showed up at Rock Hard Wrestling as the long haired blond surfer boy, so I didn't even recognize him at first in RHW's newest match where he appears sporting a hair cut.  This brought to mind the story of Samson from the Bible and how he lost his strength once his hair was cut.  Such a tragedy did not befall Josh Steel.  According to the write up for his new match against Ethan Andrews, Steel has bulked up with thirty pounds of added muscle.  And the match preview shows him having no trouble demonstrating his power by lifting and tossing around Andrews in the ring.  I'm not sure who ultimately wins the match, but the shorter hair adds up to added strength for our buddy Josh Steel.