AWF REVIEW - OVERDRIVE!!!

AWF! AWF! AWF!

What is the AWF, you ask? The Arizona Wrestling Federation (www.arizonawrestlingfederation.com). After attending two recent events, the A could easily stand for Amazing or Awesome. The first event I attended was back in June. I attended my second event this past Saturday (August 9, 2014).

This event was entitled OVERDRIVE. It was just that. The event was a full throttle Overdrive of professional wrestling – not Sports Entertainment.

Granted the AWF is only a small local promotion and this wasn’t a large arena house show, but the quality of the show they put on easily matches the big boys.

Simple fact, I was entertained and didn’t feel that the $10 I spent on my ticket was wasted. I received a lot more then $10 in my professional wrestling entertainment that night.

Overdrive took place at the Peoria, Arizona, Community Center, in the main hall. About 200 or so people attended (to my rough estimate), seated in folding chairs around the ring. A stage area was set up as an entrance ramp, with a portable screen used to project each wrestler’s entrance logo/videos. A second screen was set up to the left of the entrance area.

Each wrestler had their own personalized entrance and theme music.

Speaking of wrestlers, these are who performed that night:
Magod Ali     Awesome Andy      Aydan Colt      Ryan Dean      Chris Evans      Los Fox Stars
Jay Garland      Danny Gee      Bryce Harrison      Adrian Hawkins      Kahmora
Joey Law      The Pali Prince      Allie Parker      The Prophet      Gregory Sharpe
Alex Sinister      Super Chaos

Many of these performed at the last event I attended. Ali, Harrison, Kahmora, Law, Parker and Sinister were new to me.

Onto the show, which start promptly at 6 o’clock, but we saw our first wrestler, Adrian Hawkins before the show began. With little fanfare, Hawkins walked to the ring with a chair and sat down in the middle of the ring. After a few moments, he stood up and started working out in the center of the ring with his workout bands.

Yes, the show officially started with Hawkins doing arm curls in the middle of the ring. Once the announcer announced the show was to begin, Hawkins came to life, grabbed the mic and lit it up. He was in the ring to stay, and there would be no show until he got what he wanted, a title match against the AWF Champion, Chris Evan. He then listed off a litany of reasons why he deserved the match, and wasn’t already champion.

This spurred the champ to make an appearance. Evans didn’t think Hawkins deserved anything, other than the moniker of crybaby. He didn’t seem like he was going to give Hawkins the match, until he gave into Hawkins’ constant berating and the fans encouraging him to face Hawkins.

Bad move. Hawkins was doubly rewarded. He got his title match, and minutes later he was the new champ. Hawkins elation soon turned to anger when the announcer told the crowd that the owner decreed that new champion Hawkins would defend the title in the main event against Awesome Andy.

This was a very good opening to the event, which actually built upon previous events and storylines.

Hawkins would go on to the main event, and eventually defeat Awesome Andy and retain in his first title defense.

Between those two matches were seven other matches.

In my personal down moment of the night, my favorite wrestler from the previous event The Pali Prince lost in a tag match to the extremely popular ‘luchador’ tag team Los Fox Stars. These matches also saw Ryan Dean defeated Joey Law, but Dean’s tag partner Super Chaos came up short against the undefeated The Prophet.

We also saw Aydan Colt in a uniquely funny match defeat Gregory ‘Go’ Sharpe who come out with a jetpack strap to his back and ran around the ring. Yes, I did write that. Yes, it did happen.

We even had the ladies, with Allie Parker out of Vegas losing to Kahmora, who hails from the Far East.

There was even some blood!

Every single match on this card was a solid match. All delivered in some way. The weakest of the matches may have been Jay Garland versus Alex Sinister, and that was still a good match.

The best match of the night was a tossup between the women’s match (Kahmora versus Allie Parker) and the main event (Adrian Hawkins versus Awesome Andy).

I would have to say that Adrian Hawkins stole the night; he wrestled and won two matches, winning the AWF title and successfully defending it.

The event lasted just over two and a half hours.

Besides seeing some of the same wrestlers on this card, I also noticed a lot of the same fans. The AWF definitely has a fan base, and I am one of them now.


Rating: 7.5

Match of the Night: Tie - Kahmora versus Allie Parker and Adrian Hawkins versus Awesome Andy.
Wrestler of the Night: Adrian Hawkins
Impact of the Night: Adrian Hawkins’ title win and defense.