The Jukes Box
August 31, 2006

Hey folks, welcome to the third edition of The Jukes Box! I didn't get to see CSW Saturday Night this week, and I'm waiting on watching the Art of War pay-per-view until I can get a proper download of it off of pwtorrents. Hopefully, I'll have my thoughts on the pay-per-view next week.

NEW Saturday Night:
Brian Kendrick and Jerrelle Clark drew Chris Sabin and Johnny Devine **3/4
Rhino beat Andrew Martin **3/4
Kid Kash and Carlito beat James Gibson and Ron Killings ***
Chris Jericho beat John Bradshaw Layfield and The Rock ****1/4

This week's episode of NEW was certainly eventful. Chris Jericho won the NEW Championship back only six days after losing it at Summerslam. Jericho pinned JBL to regain the title, keeping The Rock strong as he exits for a tour of CSW. The other exciting moment this week was the debut of Chris Hero. Hero interrupted the opening match by attacking members of both teams. This leads me to wonder where exactly this will lead. I was surprised that America's Most Wanted and Tommy Dreamer were left off the show this week, following up on what happened at Summerslam. AMW should be looking to get the NEW Tag Team Championship back and Dreamer should have been boasting about his Hell in a Cell victory over Mick Foley. Still, this week's Saturday Night was so jam packed with developments, I can understand.

NEW released Trevor Murdoch this week.

NWA: Mexico:
Mexico's Most Wanted beat Super Dragon and Teddy Hart **1/2
Cibernetico beat Matt Stryker **
Juventud Guerrera beat Perro Aguayo Jr. ***3/4
L.A. Par-K and La Parka beat Los Guerreros del Infiern ***1/4
Shocker and Ultimo Dragon beat Fuerza Guerrera and Donovan Morgan **3/4
El Hijo Del Santo beat EZ Money ***

Things are certainly looking good for NWA: Mexico. This week's episode was arguably the best edition of their Saturday show to date. Juventud Guerrera continues to be one of the hottest comodities in wreslting today, putting on another world-class bout, and on free television to boot. Shocker, Teddy Hart, Super Dragon, and Matt Stryker all debuted this week, joining the roster with notable ease. Out of the group, it looks as though Shocker is in line for the biggest push, as he won his debut match while the others all jobbed. Also, I finally got around to watching Glory Days, as my copy of it arrived late in the mail.

Glory Days:
Averno and Mephisto beat Mexico's Most Wanted **
Abismo Negro beat La Parka II **1/4
Fuerza Guerrera beat Ultimo Dragon **1/2
Juventud Guerrera beat Dos Caras Jr. **
Donovan Morgan beat Acero Dorado **1/2
Ultimo Guerrero beat Perro Aguaya Jr. **1/2
Dr. Wagner Jr. beat L.A. Par-k **3/4
El Hijo Del Santo beat Cibernetico ***1/2

Don't let my ratings fool you, it was actually a very good show. The roster is still establishing themselves, and it's a real treat to watch El Hijo Del Santo in the main event. I'm becoming somewhat of a Mexico mark.

NWA Midwest:
Sterling James Keenan beat Jimmy Jacobs *1/4
Abyss beat Balls Mahoney *3/4
Chad Collyer beat John Walters *1/2
Chris Benoit beat Sabu ***3/4

The Midwest product continues to impress this week. A good portion of the matches were used to put over some up and coming talent in Sterling James Keenan and Chad Collyer. They made their opponents look good too, which will go a long way to creating a strong mid-card. Ken Kennedy also earned some heat with a few NWA officials for a verbal shot he made to New England Wrestling during his promo. Other officials claimed this heat was hypocrisy considering that JBL bad mouths the other NWA territories on a weekly basis on NEW programming.

Chris Benoit and Sabu have reportedly been earning praise for continuing to put on high quality matches, even though they are both clearly past their prime. Others are hoping for Abyss and CM Punk to step up and take over in the near future.

NWA: Mid-Atlantic Saturday Night Flood:
2 Live Kewl beat Backseat Boyz ***1/4
Piloto Suicida, Human Tornado, and El Generico beat Mikey Whipwreck, Chris Masters, and Gene Snitsky *
Chavo Guerrero and Shane Helms beat The Outsiders ***3/4
Steven Richards, Sting, and AJ Styles beat Val Venis, Randy Orton, and Christopher Daniels ***1/4

The Mid-Atlantic branch of the NWA has become the place to be for talented superstars to finally get the big break they deserve. Val Venis, Steven Richards, and Shane Helms have all gone from being underutilized and jobbers to being the big stars. Not only that, but this is the same territory that employs Hulk Hogan, Scott Hall, Kevin Nash, and the Ultimate Warrior, so it's amazing that any former undercard talent is getting any breaks. The Bohemians stable continues to take up a huge portion of the shows, this time with the jobber half of the group losing to Solucion Suicida and the other portion picking up a big win over The Outsiders. Other exciting happenings included the heating up of the Christian/Cena feud. Cena has been treated like a hero in NEW, but it's made him a very over heel in M-A.

So that's all I've got for now. I've been a very happy wrestling fan lately, with all the great territories I've been able to watch. I hope it keeps up.

Special add-on to the Jukes Box #3.

I sat down and watched my downloaded copy of Hotter than Hell from Midwest (don't worry, I promise I'll buy the dvd when it comes out).

Claudio Castagnoli beat Bobby Roode *1/4
The British Invasion beat Arik Cannon and Jack Evans *1/4
Ken Kennedy beat Terry Funk **3/4
CM Punk beat Raven ***3/4
Homicide beat Jerry Lynn **
The Naturals drew Lords of the Ring **1/2
Chris Benoit beat Abyss, Batista, and Sabu ***

This was an interesting show and I marked out like a little kid when Benoit won the title.

The ladder match was excellent as far as work-rate goes, it was the crowd that ruined it for me. It suffered the same fate as the Boston Harbor title match at Summerslam.

The CM Punk/Raven feud looks to be far from over.

I'm really enjoying watching the former PTL guys show up in other territories. Harry Smith debuted by getting involved with the Cannon/Evans vs. British Invasion match up. I'm really excited to see where this goes.

It'll be interesting to see how this show did for buys, as it aired the same night as CSW's Art of War.

Mine's not PPV. Ironically, though, the other Territory in my game had a PPV on the same night as my show.