Florida Championship Wrestling: The Recap

Josh Matthews and Dusty Rhodes are the commentators again. They announce that later tonight, the World Heavyweight Champion, Chris Jericho will be on the show.

1. Drew McIntyre vs. Eric Escobar (for the #1 contendership to the FCW title)- Matthews tells us that last week Escobar and Johnny Curtis had a 5 star match. Ummm...no. The FCW Champion Sheamus O'Shaunessy comes out to sit in on commentary and "scout" his potential opponents. Escobar starts off quickly will a roll up for an early near fall. He then comes back and hits two arm drags followed by a very sloppy dropkick, McIntyre gets on the advantage slamming Escobar's head into the top turnbuckle and then after a few punches lands a headbutt. McIntyre hits a clothes line and makes a cover but only gets a 2 count. McIntyre locks in a chin lock that Escobar works out of. After getting only a 1 count following a neck breaker, McIntyre hits a leg drop and again only gets a 2 count. Back to the chin lock which after a few moments Escobar works out of again with a chinbreaker. Escobar follows up hitting a "complete shot/ He follows up with a back elbow and suplex which nets him a 2 count. Escobar then sort of, hits a brutally ugly leg lariat which again yields a 2 count. McIntyre headbutts Escobar in the gut and tries to get on the offense, by Escobar quickly reverses and hits the full nelson slam, "Latino Temper" and gets the victory.

-After the match, Escobar gets on the mic and speaks in Spanish and English saying that tonight he is proud to be #1 contender and says it will be an honour and privilege and a dream come true to be the next FCW champion. He addresses Sheamus and says that he (Escobar) is willing, able and has all the tools (having tools is one thing, using them correctly is another) to beat him. Sheamus and Escobar stare at each other from across the arena.

2. Roucka vs. Wesley Holiday- This wasn't a very pretty much, no offense to the personal appearances of the ladies. Holiday didn't look very good. Roucka started out with a side headlock and then knocked Holiday down with a shoulder tackle. Holiday came back with a hip toss and arm drag and then applied a side headlock of her own and used the ropes to gain leverage and take Roucka over. Holiday hit a monkey flip on Roucka and then tried to go for another out of the confer, But Roucka blocked it and dropped her onto the top turnbuckle. Roucka took control with a back elbow and then a non-bionic elbow drop (as Dusty said) and a cover for a 2 count. Roucka locked in a dragon sleeper like move. Holiday got back some offense with a flying head scissors, a clothesline and a body slam followed up with a leg drop that landed ugly and got her a 2 count. Roucka came back with an "idon'tknowwhatthefuck" move that was so botched my best guess is that it was supposed to be a stunner, then she dropped a leg on Holiday and got the 3 count. Roucka isn't terrible, but Holiday is really green and you can see by the moves I described, they're really still at the basics with these girls, even though Roucka has been in developmental for a while now.

-WWE World Heavyweight Champion Chris Jericho comes out to address the crowd. The fans chant Y2J to start and he tells them to take that Y2J chant and "shove it up their rears." Okay then. Jericho goes into his usual diatribe about how he is better and more honest than everyone else, including the fans and the boys in the locker room. He says that he proved a dishonest man like Shawn Michaels can never become champion (wait...Michaels was champion when he was at his most dishonest). He then goes into talking about Cyber Sunday and Batista, but since we all ready know that didn't work out well for him, no point in going into that. He mentions the refs though and then says Austin is a beer drinker and a user of profanity. The crowd starts the "WHAT?" gimmick and Jericho just smirks and says, "if you think I'm walking into that trap...this promo is over." and then he drops the mic as his music plays. Not a very exciting promo, but the end was everything that makes Jericho great. He totally gets how to use the fans.

3. Ryan Braddock vs. DH Smith- So here we have two guys that are "kind of" on the main rosters. They start out in a collar and elbow tie up, and DH works it into an armbar. Braddock goes for a clothesline but DH ducks between his legs and catches him with an armdrag. DH takes Braddock down with a dragon screw leg whip and then fires away on Braddock with forearms. After a blocked attempt at a hip toss, DH winds up with his head draped over the bottom rope and Braddock does some damage from the outside before getting back in a mounting Smith and lading some punches. Braddock hits a solid short knee followed up with a jumping knee drop. Braddock applies a figure four headlock on Smith, which Smith eventually rolls over to reverse and the hold is broken. At this point, for the second week in a row Dusty brings up seeing "Liza Minelli" in the crowd. Josh said he didn't know who she was so he looked her up on Wikipedia. Josh asks Dusty if he knows about the Wikipedia and Dusty says that he and Murdoch used to drink there. DH is backed into the corner and Braddock charges but DH moves out of the way and uses a school boy for a 1 count. Braddock fires away with some headbutts and a side slam. DH reverses a hold into a backslide but never gets Braddock's shoulders down. Dusty mentions that he's not a big fan of the backslide because he tried it a few times and it never got a pin, but he did win the world title from Flair with a small package (let's not forget that Kerry Von Erich defeated Flair for the same title with...a backslide). Braddock and Smith begin to trade punches and then forearm strikes. DH hits a Saito suplex on Braddock and gets a 2 count. Braddock then hit the move that is kind of his finisher where he gets on the middle rope, plants his knee into the upper back of his opponent and then drives them down to the mat...but DH kicked out of a pin attempt. Braddock then readied for a lariat, but Smith ducked, scooped him up and hit the running powerslam for the pin. Not a bad little match. I've always liked both these guys. DH obviously has the pedigree (not the move) and Braddock was trained alongside CM Punk and Colt Cabana by Ace Steel and Danny Dominion...so they know what they are doing.

4. FCW Tag Team Title Match- Dolf Ziggler and Gavin Spears vs. (FCW Tag Team Champions) "Handsome" Heath Miller and Joe Hennig- So I guess he still is going to be Heath Miller. Spears and Hennig start out and they lock up and drive back into a corner and start battling in there. Hennig goes for the "PerfectPlex" early but Spears escapes and bails to the floor. The next few minutes of the match there were a bunch of tags. Spears tagged to Ziggler, Hennig threw some punches at Ziggler, and I will say this, they need to either work on his punches or teach him to only throw forearms, because his form is awful. Ziggler got pulled into the champs corner and Miller tagged in. Miller was then dragged to the other corner and Spears tagged back in, then Hennig tagged back in for his team. Henning nailed Spears with a clothesline and the Ziggler with one, then he sent Spears over the top and to the outside with another clothesline while Miller ran in and did the same to Ziggler.

BREAK

Back from break the heels were still getting back into the ring. Dolf Ziggler was now the legal man and after a few moments he bailed out of the ring to set a trap for Henning while Spears ducked low around the corner. Henning went out to chase Ziggler, and he ducked the sneak attack from Spears, but it was enough of a distraction to allow Ziggler to capitalize. Back in the ring, Ziggler landed three elbow drops in a row and then a leaping elbow drop and a cover for a near fall. Spears tagged in and hit a back breaker on Hennig but a subsequent cover only produced a 1 count. The next few minutes the heels made quick tags while Miller grew impatient waiting for the tag. At one point, Hennig hit a back suplex on Spears and Spears rolled to the floor, but when Hennig went to make the tag, Spears took out Miller's legs and knocked him off the apron. After a few more moments of working Hennig over, Miller finally got the tag in and quickly took control. He hit a one man flapjack on Spears for a 2 count. Ziggler was on the apron and Miller was between him and Spears. Spears charged but Miller moved and Spears knocked Ziggler off the apron while Miller schoolboy'd Spears for another near fall. Both men got to their feet and Spears came charging again at Miller near the ropes and was back dropped over the top onto Ziggler. Miller then hit a pescado on Ziggler and Spears, to the floor. When they got back in the ring, Spears and Miller were fighting it out on the top rope. Hennig came in and while Ziggler accidentally distracted the ref, Hennig back suplex Spears and then Miller came off the top with an elbow drop for a near fall that was broken up by Ziggler. Hennig came in but was side stepped by Ziggler and went to the floor. The ref was distracted again and Ziggler hit a huge leaping "complete shot" on Miller and Spears tried to take advantage and get the pin but only got a near fall. Ziggler again distracted the ref while Spears went for a neckbreaker but got shoved off into the corner where Hennig was, and Hennig hung him up on the top rope, Spears rebounded back and Miller hit a leaping inverted DDT on him and got the pin to retain the tag team titles. Not a bad match. Ziggler/Nemeth isn't very good, but that leaping complete shot move looked awesome. Miller does have some "Edge" to his moves, though it's more the 1998 unrefined Edge. Fun match towards the end.

The show closed with the weekly video montage. These are very well done.

So far, FCW has been pretty enjoyable. There aren't a lot of promos, something that OVW was filled with, and no backstage sketches. From a wrestling point, you can see clearly some guys (and gals) as way off, but some do have potential.

Next week, Kelly Kelly will be the "WWE Guest" and Eric Escobar challenges Sheamus for the FCW title.

Source: WNW