Crowning achievement for Berwyn Championship Wrestling

By Mike Pankow

September 25, 2018

Nearly a year after its first show, Berwyn Championship Wrestling crowned its first heavyweight champion in an action-packed show at the Berwyn Eagles Club last Saturday night in Chicago’s West suburbs.

“The Heart Throb” Jaden Roller emerged victorious in the main event to win the title, defeating veteran “Ice Pick” Vic Capri after a referee bump and outside interference from Craig Mitchell.

Roller, billed from Los Angeles, Calif., who cites Shawn Michaels and Randy Savage as influences, has the look of a young Michaels with parts of Dolph Ziggler and Tyler Breeze. Roller came out to an instrumental version of “Careless Whisper” by George Michael. Capri has wrestled for two decades and was trained by Sam DeCero, who used to run Windy City Pro Wrestling.

Capri won a qualifying match in May over Egotistico Fantastico, “The Shogun” Chris L.O.G.A.N. and Jay Bradley to earn a berth in the championship bout.

Meanwhile, Roller won a 30-man Royal Rumble-style match billed as the Heavyweight Rumble For Gold. There was a random draw for entry, but unlike the WWE Royal Rumble, BCW’s format had the wrestlers choose the numbers, then a fan would pull that number out of a bingo tumbler every two minutes and the wrestler who drew the number earlier in the evening would enter the match.

The final five were Bradley, Mitchell, L.O.G.A.N., Roy “Flash” Gordon and Roller. Bradley was dumped out, then Mitchell was eliminated. After he was knocked out of the ring, Mitchell distracted both L.O.G.A.N. and Gordon, leading to Roller dumping both over the rope to win the match.

Another key storyline during the Heavyweight Rumble was the appearance of Frank the Clown, who wasn’t a competitor in the match. Frank slid into the ring and eliminated Egotistico Fantastico from behind. That story continued later in the evening.

After the Heavyweight Rumble, which was about an hour of action, Arc Williams defeated Lina De’Oro in a women’s match. De’Oro played the heel, stalling at the start of the match and kept trying to get the official to check Williams for foreign objects. Williams eventually won the fun affair after hitting a move off the top rope.

The next match was a tag team match in which Egotistico Fantastico and L.O.G.A.N. defeated Dale Patricks and Josh Crane. Before the bout even began, the two teams brawled down the entrance ramp and around the ringside area. Fantastico, a local favorite, even leapfrogged a seated fan to deliver a blow to one of his opponents.

Once the match got going, Patricks and Crane got into a disagreement after about what happened during the Heavyweight Rumble and Patricks turned on Crane and delivered a piledriver on his partner, leading to the win for Fantastico and L.O.G.A.N.

While Fantastico and L.O.G.A.N. were celebrating, two masked goons jumped them from behind and again Frank the Clown emerged to orchestrate the attack.

After the beatdown, Fantastico grabbed the mic and challenged Frank’s mysterious duo to a match at a future BCW show. Then Patricks, who was still at ringside, challenged ex-partner Crane to a “no rope barbed wire match” for BCW’s Anniversary show on Dec. 8.

In an action-packed eight-man tag team match, Gordon, Ace Perry, JDX and SugarWolf Rivera defeated Mitchell, Ernesto Aguilar, Braxton Hunter and Dale Springs when Gordon pinned Mitchell.

The next bout was a crazy six-team elimination match with Dick Davis & Kevin Graves of “Fatal Attraction” last eliminating Brian Alexander & Mike Strong of “The Empire” for the victory in bout that also featured Damien Tyler & D’Angelo Steele of “The Empire,” Barry Ryte & Jack Monahan, “Samoan Savage” Will Moah & Eddie Vendetta and Willie “Da Bomb” Richardson & Bret Havoc.

After the match, Vega Venum, the newest member of “The Empire,” who accompanied the group to ringside, gave Davis a hurricanrana to clear the ring. Then Strong got into the ring and got onto a one knee and proposed to Venum, who is his longtime girlfriend. Venum accepted the proposal with a classic Daniel Bryan “Yes” double-finger point. The crowd applauded the duo, who were working as heels during the match.

Then BCW Commissioner Frankie Rodriguez introduced Gary Michael Cappetta, who performed his one-man show, “Beyond Bodyslams” Friday night at the Eagles Club, as the special guest ring announcer for the final two matches of the evening.

In the semi-main event, Steve Michaels, “The Master of the Chicago Bearhug” defeated Bradley by submission. Michaels, who has been wrestling for slightly less than a year, is a hulking, 300-plus-pound giant, who is adept at brawling. Bradley, who wrestled for WWE last decade as Ryan Braddock and IMPACT Wrestling recently as Aiden O’Shea, did the honors for Michaels after a match that featured a brawl around the entire ballroom.

At one point, Bradley was thrown shoulder-first into the concrete wall. Michaels also threw Bradley onto several chairs at ringside. Michaels finished the match by securing the bearhug on Bradley for several seconds before the veteran grappler tapped out.

In the main event, Roller defeated Capri. After the first referee was escorted from the ringside area by Rodriguez, a second referee took over. With that official distracted by Roller, Mitchell hit Capri with a steel chair, setting up Roller for the victory.

Roller was presented with the title as Cappetta announced him as Berwyn Championship Wrestling’s first Heavyweight Champion, closing the fun and entertaining four-hour show.

For a photo gallery: https://www.windycityslam.com/photos/