Thursday, April 9, 2020

Review: Axel vs. Ty Alexander (UCW)

Ty: "So what are the rules for this again?"
Axel: "Um, there are no rules. No rules at all."

Now, this was a very pleasant surprise. I never expected Ty Alexander to pop up in UCW, even though it makes perfect sense now that I've seen this match. He and Axel have wrestled before, so there is that connection. While he's made a great shift onto the indie scene with a lot of bookings (pre-pandemic, of course), I'll always be happy to see him in our neck of the woods.

Welcome to UCW, Ty.
Hope you survive the experience.

Axel is the golden boy of UCW, so it only makes sense that he'd welcome Ty to the ring and give him a proper introduction. The two boys seem pretty comfortable with one another in a frenemy kind of way. It's nice that they acknowledge they know each other. They're both barefoot in bright trunks, which get yanked up their cracks a lot. Yep, this is UCW.

It's a fun time at the UCW ring.

Uh, that's not a handle, Axel.

Yeah, I think Ty gets the UCW vibe.

Action-wise, there's a real mix of styles, befitting UCW's anything-goes vibe. Both guys have wrestled in indie shows and bring some of that here with the clothesline, dropkick, headlock, hip toss, irish whip, suplex, etc. And there's some submission work, with moves like arm and leg locks, crabs, and scissors. But, this is UCW, so there's a ton of dirty versions of all that, too.

I wondered how Ty would fit in, especially as he starts with a standing side headlock and takedown. Nice moves but traditional. He gets the point once Axel unleashes his UCW trickery. From there, nipples, bulges and wedgies are fair game. Ty's remarkably good at being vicious, going further than I can recall him going anywhere else. He's more than willing to go as low as necessary. You'll see below that Joe titled his review, "Nasty Bitches" and that's a fair assessment,

The trunks are stretchy but strong.

They could offer this as "Taste of UCW".
I'm sure lots of guys would buy tickets.

Hey, Axel, how's the view?

Feet play a surprisingly memorable roll for all this, too. Axel starts it by biting into Ty's foot. From there, they're consistently getting creative by adding a foot-to-face element to many holds. Ty stomps Axel then steps on and over his stomach. Axel ups it by planting his foot on Ty's head and stepping over, crushing his head under his weight. Ouch. At the end, it's only fitting that one guy flexes over his unconscious opponent with his foot on his (face) cheek for a ten-count.

A simple elbow drop becomes much
more painful when it lands low.

Hey, Axel, still happy there are no rules?

Axel's big feet find Ty's face.

In the end, I really enjoyed seeing these two superstars together. I feel like we see a new side of Ty and he excels in the chaotic, cheat-fest environment of UCW. Although if there are no rules, maybe there's no such thing as cheating? Hm. Either way, I see that they've released another TY match at UCW, so I'm definitely inspired to check that one out, too.

What are other bloggers saying?


So that's my take. What's yours?

Alex

2 comments:

  1. Anything with Ethan Axel Andrews is worth watching!! Now, when he plays the heel is when he is my favorite. I truly enjoy many of his earlier matches where he was smaller. Smaller beating up bigger is a major YES for me.

    I own several UCW matches, but they aren't my favorite. Why?? Because I like matches with rules. Why?? Because I LOVE when the heels ignore them and use them to beat the crap out of the faces. Add in a clueless ref and nirvana in close at hand. This is the same reason I don't really like Havoc or NHB matches.

    Sadly enough< I haven't watched many Ty Alexander matches. Will have to correct that.

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    1. Axel isn’t really the heel of UCW, he’s the good guy, so I can see how that wouldn’t be up your alley, too. One thing about no rules is that you can see how far guys will push it. I think that any match without a ref is no rules if guys want to go that way.

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