Patrick W. Reed

It's a measured decision - there's a bigger show on Sunday, by trying to push through it tonight I might wear myself out more and not be up for that one. But it would be nice to go back to having a body that doesn't find "do two things in one weekend" an unattainable goal.

Long Covid is a bastard. I'm mostly fine these days, but it hit around 2pm and I was so exhausted I could have fallen asleep standing up. Had a nap, woke up at 4, had every intent of going to the EVE show tonight, so started getting ready to head out, but felt so tired and brain foggy I gave up.

I liked Brian Kendrick for it in the Cruiserweight Classic; constantly trapping people's arms under turnbuckle pads, or finding ways to tie them up in the ropes. Fit Finlay was good at it, too.

That doesn't need to be feats of acrobatics like this, it's just a matter of looking at the ring and its surrounds and figuring out new ways to engage with it, rather than starting with "wrestling move" as your baseline. It's finding new ways to interact with the ropes, the buckles, the apron.

in a more abstract sense, what passes for "innovation" in wrestling tends to be taking the set-up of Move A and pairing it with Move B. It's everyone playing from the same toybox.

What a wrestler like Akeem does here, that's more exciting to me, is find a new way to engage with the physical space.

I'm not convinced this 100% works, but all I ask of wrestling these days is to give me something I haven't seen before, and Sidney Akeem certainly does that.

the greater risk is that someone - I'm looking at you, Jeff - makes a concerted effort to bring him in to creative. I still don't see it happening, though.

the last time Road Dogg was on the unemployment line, they could have brought him in for some comedy stuff with the Gunns and the Acclaimed. That they didn't do it then tells me that now, having been burned by ex-WWE names before, and less beholden to Attitude Era nostalgia, there's no chance.

the series went in a weird direction after Robocod, didn't it?

leather and sandalwood seems to be a pretty common combination; I definitely have a few aftershaves with that combo, and I've seen it in candles.

It's *beer* that is breaking my brain. If anything, that's the smell I normally want soap to get rid of.

Clip from Jan 1907 Mirror of Life newspaper. It reads: Jack Wannop as a Boxer and Wrestler. BY THE CROSSBUTTOCKER Jack Wannop, of New Cross, holds a unique position among athletes, as he is the only heavyweight in England whoever combined the sister sciences in a superlative degree. He took first honours as a middleweight in most of the wrestling rings of Cumberland, Westmorland, Northumberland and Durham, in the seventies, and while still under 11 stone he threw William Blair, of Solport Mill, in 1878, at Bridge of Allen, the same year that Blair threw George Steadman in the final falls at Lillie Bridge, Blair was the greatest buttocker within living memory, and when applying the buttock with a head hold, he made some magnificent falls, and nearly always threw his opponent dean over his head.

screengrab from an article I wrote years ago for Who Do You Think You Are magazine - it shows Jack in a sketched portrait, in smart outfit and with bushy moustache, approx 1901, and a black and white pic of Jack wrestling his pupil Tom Thompson, taken from Crossbuttocker's 1901 book. Jack's got prominent biceps through a white undershirt.

It's British Science Week #BSW26! In 1907 Jack Wannop (1854-1923) of New Cross, Ldn, was described by top wrestling writer THE CROSS-BUTTOCKER as The Finest Exponent of the Sister Sciences (wrestling and boxing). Jack was "the only heavyweight in England" to combine them "in a superlative degree" 🥊🤼‍♂️

It's World Book Day and if you fancy helping an independent cooperative bookshop during a tricky month, this is great timing...

You can do a lot worse for an album to be stuck with than that one, to be fair. Though my favourite of theirs is II.

There was other good stuff too:

Benego Diakité & Neba Solo- A Djinn and a Hunter Went Walking
Mariachi El Bronx - IV
The Would-Be-Goods - Tears Before Bedtime
Carpenter Brut - Leather Temple

A fun month, a ton of interesting stuff to dig into.
The Wuthering Heights soundtrack was good too!

February was a great month for new albums, particularly at the intersection between heavy rock and jazz - if that sounds insufferable to you, look away now.

Three faves:

Jazz Sabbath - Jazz Sabbath Live
Stetson, Fox & Dunn - Nethering
The Messthetics & James Brandon Lewis - Deface The Currency

Your regular reminder that the UK is in fact a high trust society and anyone who implies it isn’t is either selling you a pup or has bought one.

because at the moment, there's a tag team that always loses, who just lost, and then their mate showed up. Forgive me for not quaking in my boots on behalf of every babyface in the company.

maybe they didn't know if they were going to be able to sign Finlay or not. But there was nothing in the last month of TV that feels like it served them better than if they had just held off and had them "debut" (I know they've all been on AEW TV before) as a Trio in a big, dramatic way.

can't stop thinking about The Dogs. About Tony Schiavone telling us what a "force" they've been in AEW. They haven't won one tag match. Clark Connors has lost every match he's been in, all of them to either Darby Allin or Orange Cassidy, the people they lost to on this show.

just the daftest possible time to do the "it's been made official for Revolution" announcement - every show should end with a hook, yes, but when new champions are celebrating after a controversial win, why have your announce team talking about something completely different?

not a big fan of getting the Trios Titles off of one team of a singles champion and his mates and on to *two* singles champions and their mate, though I love that Davis was the guy to pick up the win for his team.

I like characters on a wrestling show to feel like they exist in a wider universe outside of their own angles, but this episode just feels like nobody can remember who they're feuding with. First it was the Don Callis Family with Jet Set Rodeo, now it's FTR interrupting Tomasso Ciampa.

though, like the impromptu title match, doesn't this raise questions about how and why Don Callis has so much power in this company? How is he managing to get different members of his stable a chance at getting a shot at the Continental Title *every week*?

I've seen a few complaints about Moxley defending against random members of the Don Callis Family, but Excalibur putting this match over as showing the depth of the Family, and how many different styles Moxley is having to defend against week after week, is a good way to put over a fighting champion

the way World's End played out was the most interesting thing AEW have done in a long time, a real genuine conversation-starter, and going by the TV shows since then you wouldn't even know it ever happened. How they decided the follow-up to that was Takeshita vs. Moxley is beyond me.

not wanting to do a "just throw all the luchadores together" thing, but they could break Andrade, El Clon, Rocky Romero and Hechicero from Callis as the nucleus of a separate group, and the Don Callis Family would still have Okada, Fletcher, Takeshita, Davis, etc.!

I would have long since split the Death Riders into Yuta/Garcia/PAC/Shafir and Moxley/Claudio, with only the latter as babyfaces.

I was hoping that the size of the Don Callis Family was to give babyface Takeshita a heel factory to work through, but that story's gone nowhere.

Marina Shafir cutting a heel promo on Toni Storm while walking to the ring managing the babyface Jon Moxley. I know I complain about this dynamic every week, but it's the first time it's occurred to me that they have Brandi Rhodes-d the Death Riders.

Renee Paquette dressed as if she has AEW Dynamite at 8, then getting arrested by ACME Detective Agency for a daring international heist at 9.

if nothing else, it's the longest time ever between Tony Khan apparently making a match, and Excalibur being told that it had been made official with a full graphic and everything.