Irish Promotions' Thread Info, News & Results

cinder · 10-09-2009 6:30pm

first time posting on boards. i'm big fan of wrestling i've been to all to the wwe shows that have been over here. Been to a few irish whip wrestling shows too. just wondering are the rampage shows good? love rvd. anyone know when their running shows again in ireland?

leggo · 10-09-2009 6:39pm

So ANGRY ANDY had his MMA fight with only four days of training behind him last Monday. How did he do? Find out below...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uUVlJWD0fMg

leggo · 10-09-2009 6:40pm

AAND here's Part 2:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDQKe_VZXSg

NeilFrenzy4Ever · 10-09-2009 7:35pm

I hate to break up the love in between Gerry Soul, Justin Ternet and company, and indeed to distract from the all-important Angry Andy saga, but is no one else concerned by the lack of live Irish wrestling coming up in the future?

IWW will likely run a couple more cards in front of 50 people in the middle of no where that they won't advertise and we won't hear about, and maybe the Fight Factory will run a cute friends and family show somewhere down the line, but this pales in comparison to what we've been treated to in the past, and what we as fans are entitled to in the present.

The recent AWR tour illustrated that fans WILL turn up to a show if they are given reason. People will point to Gerry Soul's recent Irish Promotions fiasco as proof that Irish fans don't care about independent wrestling, but I believe that this is a cop out. Casual fans didn't bother with the show because it was competing with some GAA match or other and was promoted badly. And 'smart' fans, or older fans, didn't show up because they weren't really given a reason to. Where was the unique selling point of the show? What was its edge? Offering free tickets to a show isn't an edge or a selling point. Interesting match-ups, wrestlers and angles are.

Take the debut No Limit Wrestling show for example. It didn't feature Rob Van Dam, Bret Hart or whoever, yet it still drew over 300 paying fans to the National Stadium's Ringside Club. How? It offered fans a genuinely exciting card and never before seen match-ups, and the show went down a treat. Irish Promotions attempted to do something similar but it failed unfortunetly; it promised IWW stars for example but then didn't announce any, it promised an online show and then it didn't even have a website.

Now, Mr. Soul has gotten a hard time for the IP debacle in the past and theres no need to give him another hazing so I'll leave that example there; I just brought it up as I feared people would respond to my my post with something along the lines of "Well how can you expect people to put on shows when fans like you won't bother to attend them?". I didn't attend the IP show because IP gave me no reason to. I have however attended numerous IWW, NLW, AWR, NWA and a couple of CPW shows, whenever a show looked interesting.

So to conclude; I think its a shame there will be no live wrestling in this country in the coming months, as a small, passionate, well-organized promotion could do do reasonably well for itself, or at least keep its head above the red-ink, in my opinion.

Tommy Ref · 10-09-2009 7:45pm

As mentioned before the Wrestling.IE shows in the north feature wrestlers including Dunkan Disorderly, Shawn Maxer, Paul Tracey, The Omen, Bingo Ballance, Massacre and others. English stars Andy Boy Simmonz, James Tighe and Chris Andrews have been on shows also. Since the beginning of the company last December at different shows there have been a crowd of 200-400 people which is really good for the irish scene. Every show so far has been an entertaining night. There definately worth checking out and i'm not just saying that cause I work for them haha.

The Cannibal · 10-09-2009 8:04pm

We're too old school in mentality really.

The logic of thinking, attitude of peope involved, ambition, methods of promotion etc is about 20 years behind the US and even the likes of Japan. Too much of an overly cautious attitude combined with internal bickering, as well as spurning the hardcores in favour of the one ticket pony kids has led to the scene receding rather than expanding. We need to get with the times.

Back in 2002, there was a rabbid casual wrestling fan base in Ireland, and a solid online community. One bad promotional move after another has seen that gradually squandered. We had a sharp rise period of about 3 years, but all the rest has been a slope into obscurity due to a combination of many things. Left in the right hands, Ireland could have been turned into a very solid and consistent territory by now.

I still think there is long term potential for an Irish promotion, but I don't see any major shifts in the scene happening until January at the earliest. Until then you just have the maybe twice a year AWR show to look forward too or Wrestling.IE if you live up North and like your self contained one night tournaments.

leggo · 10-09-2009 8:12pm

Yo Forbes, good to see you're still around. Just a quick thing though to re-hash something that I explained in the old thread:

The recent AWR tour illustrated that fans WILL turn up to a show if they are given reason. People will point to Gerry Soul's recent Irish Promotions fiasco as proof that Irish fans don't care about independent wrestling, but I believe that this is a cop out. Casual fans didn't bother with the show because it was competing with some GAA match or other and was promoted badly. And 'smart' fans, or older fans, didn't show up because they weren't really given a reason to. Where was the unique selling point of the show? What was its edge? Offering free tickets to a show isn't an edge or a selling point. Interesting match-ups, wrestlers and angles are.

Sorry dude, but offering up AWR as an example of a small, homegrown promotion is laughable. And hey, I like what AWR are doing! I've only heard good things from people who've gone to the shows and wish them the best! But that's like saying, "TNA's recent PPV numbers are a good indication that regional low budget house shows can still draw".

They're a large-scale company with a multi-millionaire financial backer. As I explained in the other thread, in times of recession people still do have money but they're not as willing to spend it on risky, unproven commodities. They'll invest in surefire things. An AWR show with proven name value on the card will draw...a local Irish indy has to work its absolute arse off to do the same because, no matter how good the card, wrestlers etc...people won't even LISTEN to your USP because you're unproven. Fact.

Take the debut No Limit Wrestling show for example. It didn't feature Rob Van Dam, Bret Hart or whoever, yet it still drew over 300 paying fans to the National Stadium's Ringside Club. How? It offered fans a genuinely exciting card and never before seen match-ups, and the show went down a treat.

From numerous sources that were at the NLW show (and I believe you were too if I'm not mistaken), it drew that much because it was predominantly family and friends of the roster. One person I know told me that they were on first-name terms with a good 75% of the audience.

That isn't a knock on NLW either...but I'm simply saying that giving F&F figures is not a credible example of a solid business plan (even Satan can cite scripture for his worth and all that).

F&F promotions draw like this: you'll get a big first show because the roster have recruited every fan they can...but after that the 'favour' that the F&F have granted these people by attending has expired and numbers dramatically drop. Do you have the crowd attendance for the rest of their shows in the Moat handy by any chance?

So to conclude; I think its a shame there will be no live wrestling in this country in the coming months, as a small, passionate, well-organized promotion could do do reasonably well for itself, or at least keep its head above the red-ink, in my opinion.

Wrestling is a great business to get into if you've got a wad of money burning a hole in your pocket...and that's in the best of financial times. Your post is well put-together, but unfortunately the points don't make sense in the real, money-making world.

The ONLY exception to this rule around at the moment is Wrestling.ie. I just had a look at their site the other day and, from the looks of things, they are doing a PHENOMONAL job. That's because, without even knowing who promotes it, I can tell it's a person who has their business brain screwed on and not a mark with cash like (unfortunately) a lot of the well-wishing promoters around today (not just in Ireland, everywhere). They do all the small things brilliantly (and I don't even begrudge them stealing my idea of doing anti-BYW talks in schools

) and have given them every chance of thriving in the worst of times.

I'd advise the promoter to take his business brain and use his talents in a more profitable industry...because he could become a millionaire anywhere BUT wrestling.

But if the guys are happy here and if it's making Irish local wrestling thrive again...then that's great to see!

NeilFrenzy4Ever · 10-09-2009 8:33pm

leggo wrote: »

Yo Forbes, good to see you're still around.

lolz

NeilFrenzy4Ever · 10-09-2009 8:34pm

Tommy Ref wrote: »

As mentioned before the Wrestling.IE shows in the north feature wrestlers including Dunkan Disorderly, Shawn Maxer, Paul Tracey, The Omen, Bingo Ballance, Massacre and others. English stars Andy Boy Simmonz, James Tighe and Chris Andrews have been on shows also. Since the beginning of the company last December at different shows there have been a crowd of 200-400 people which is really good for the irish scene. Every show so far has been an entertaining night. There definately worth checking out and i'm not just saying that cause I work for them haha.

Any chance of a Leinster show in the future? If not, why not?

Tommy Ref · 10-09-2009 9:08pm

The company wants to concentrate on the north at the moment but southeren shows have not been ruled out.

cinder · 11-09-2009 7:03pm

where up north is your shows on?

Tommy Ref · 12-09-2009 12:06am

Upcoming show dates are on the website www.wrestling.ie

GerrySoul · 12-09-2009 12:37am

NeilFrenzy4Ever wrote: »

I hate to break up the love in between Gerry Soul, Justin Ternet and company, and indeed to distract from the all-important Angry Andy saga, but is no one else concerned by the lack of live Irish wrestling coming up in the future?

IWW will likely run a couple more cards in front of 50 people in the middle of no where that they won't advertise and we won't hear about, and maybe the Fight Factory will run a cute friends and family show somewhere down the line, but this pales in comparison to what we've been treated to in the past, and what we as fans are entitled to in the present.

The recent AWR tour illustrated that fans WILL turn up to a show if they are given reason. People will point to Gerry Soul's recent Irish Promotions fiasco as proof that Irish fans don't care about independent wrestling, but I believe that this is a cop out. Casual fans didn't bother with the show because it was competing with some GAA match or other and was promoted badly. And 'smart' fans, or older fans, didn't show up because they weren't really given a reason to. Where was the unique selling point of the show? What was its edge? Offering free tickets to a show isn't an edge or a selling point. Interesting match-ups, wrestlers and angles are.

Take the debut No Limit Wrestling show for example. It didn't feature Rob Van Dam, Bret Hart or whoever, yet it still drew over 300 paying fans to the National Stadium's Ringside Club. How? It offered fans a genuinely exciting card and never before seen match-ups, and the show went down a treat. Irish Promotions attempted to do something similar but it failed unfortunetly; it promised IWW stars for example but then didn't announce any, it promised an online show and then it didn't even have a website.

Now, Mr. Soul has gotten a hard time for the IP debacle in the past and theres no need to give him another hazing so I'll leave that example there; I just brought it up as I feared people would respond to my my post with something along the lines of "Well how can you expect people to put on shows when fans like you won't bother to attend them?". I didn't attend the IP show because IP gave me no reason to. I have however attended numerous IWW, NLW, AWR, NWA and a couple of CPW shows, whenever a show looked interesting.

So to conclude; I think its a shame there will be no live wrestling in this country in the coming months, as a small, passionate, well-organized promotion could do do reasonably well for itself, or at least keep its head above the red-ink, in my opinion.

Hey forbes. You seem to really want a homegrown irish promotion and if you know me at all you'll know its what i've always wanted. As i've said in the past i simply did'nt do enough to help the show and that was its downfall. IwW ran a show a couple of weeks ago on the same day as a dublin match and they drew a good sized crowd. At the moment i'm simply too busy with work and getting married in 2 weeks to even think about doing it all again. It will be November at the very least until i think of doing anything with a promotion again, if ever. i'm concentrating on my wedding and re-hashing my reffing career. I enjoyed the AWR SOOOOOOOOOOO much i'm getting back into the reffing game.

Its unfortunate theres nothing now(CpW is still very much missed) but thats just the way it is. maybe in couple of months but i honestly can't say for sure. Thank you for the interest though. you obviously wanted my show to give you a good wrestling experience and it just didn't deliver. hopefully i can give you something you'll like down the road.

thanx for the interest

Gerry Soul

PS orestes the D4 tag team is no longer together and neither of the guys wrestles much any more which is a shame cause they had good talent.

*stares off into the distance thinking of the good auld CpW days*

Tommy Ref · 12-09-2009 12:43am

Results from the Wrestling.IE show, 11th September, Larne, Northern Ireland

King of the Ring tournament

Quarter finals

Rockhard Redman def. JC Williams

Shawn Maxer def. Tron (DQ)

Chris Andrews def. The Omen

Bonesaw McGraw def. Dunkan Disorderly

Semi finals

Rockhard Redman def. Shawn Maxer

Bonesaw McGraw def. Chris Andrews

Finals

Rockhard Redman def. Bonesaw McGraw

littleman · 12-09-2009 10:29am

GerrySoul wrote: »

Hey forbes. You seem to really want a homegrown irish promotion and if you know me at all you'll know its what i've always wanted. As i've said in the past i simply did'nt do enough to help the show and that was its downfall. IwW ran a show a couple of weeks ago on the same day as a dublin match and they drew a good sized crowd. At the moment i'm simply too busy with work and getting married in 2 weeks to even think about doing it all again. It will be November at the very least until i think of doing anything with a promotion again, if ever. i'm concentrating on my wedding and re-hashing my reffing career. I enjoyed the AWR SOOOOOOOOOOO much i'm getting back into the reffing game.

Its unfortunate theres nothing now(CpW is still very much missed) but thats just the way it is. maybe in couple of months but i honestly can't say for sure. Thank you for the interest though. you obviously wanted my show to give you a good wrestling experience and it just didn't deliver. hopefully i can give you something you'll like down the road.

thanx for the interest

Gerry Soul

PS orestes the D4 tag team is no longer together and neither of the guys wrestles much any more which is a shame cause they had good talent.

*stares off into the distance thinking of the good auld CpW days*

Ah gerry your not the only one that misses those days and how much fun it was to help out in whatever way i could in the days of CpW and it brings a tear to my eye everytime i think that it might not happen ever again but as you've said in the old irish promotions sticky "never say never".

p.s good luck with the wedding

Bingo1 · 12-09-2009 5:18pm

Sounds like a good show in Larne.
Did they have a good crowd?

Bounty Hunter · 12-09-2009 9:40pm

Tommy Ref wrote: »

Upcoming show dates are on the website www.wrestling.ie

Your new so this is only a lil heads up kind of warning, usually messages like yours above would be considerd spam. If you want to give upcoming dates for shows then give them, dont just link to your website.

like in your other posts which do promote wrestling.ie, you need to give information rather than solely linking away from boards to where info can be got.

Afterall its not hard for people to work out what your promotions website is now is it

Tommy Ref · 13-09-2009 12:35am

Bounty Hunter wrote: »

Your new so this is only a lil heads up kind of warning, usually messages like yours above would be considerd spam. If you want to give upcoming dates for shows then give them, dont just link to your website.

like in your other posts which do promote wrestling.ie, you need to give information rather than solely linking away from boards to where info can be got.

Afterall its not hard for people to work out what your promotions website is now is it

Ok no problem

Tommy Ref · 13-09-2009 12:36am

Bingo1 wrote: »

Sounds like a good show in Larne.
Did they have a good crowd?

Yea there were around 250 people

Tommy Ref · 13-09-2009 12:46am

Results from the Wrestling.IE show, 12th September, Armagh, Northern Ireland

Shawn Maxer def. Chris Andrews

Bonesaw McGraw def. Kev Rocks

Tron def. The Executioner

Bingo Ballance def. JC Williams

The Omen def. Rockhard Redman

10 Man Tag Elimination Match
Shawn Maxer. Bonesaw McGraw, The Executioner, JC Williams & The Omen Vs Chris Andrews, Kev Rocks, Tron, Bingo Ballance & Rockhard Redman

Order of Elimination
Bonesaw McGraw
Kev Rocks
Tron
Rockhard Redman
The Executioner
The Omen
JC Williams
Bingo Ballance
Shawn Maxer

Soul Survivor: Chris Andrews

The next Wrestling.IE shows will be the 25th September at the Castle Leisure Centre in Bangor and the 26th September at the Valley Hotel in Fivemiletown

Gonzo · 13-09-2009 1:28am

NeilFrenzy4Ever wrote: »

IWW will likely run a couple more cards in front of 50 people in the middle of no where that they won't advertise and we won't hear about, and maybe the Fight Factory will run a cute friends and family show somewhere down the line, but this pales in comparison to what we've been treated to in the past, and what we as fans are entitled to in the present.

The recent AWR tour illustrated that fans WILL turn up to a show if they are given reason.

Never a truer word has been said, this country has gone from a wrestling heaven 4 years ago to a wrestling wasteland today, Im starved for live wrestling shows, I used to see 4 to 5 wrestling shows a month back in teh glory days of Irish Wrestling when IwW was on fire but now theres hardly anything, the AWR show in Tallaght a few weeks ago was amazing and at least temporarily has given me my fix for a few weeks but what now, aside from TNA in Dublin Ive nothing else to look forward to wrestling-wise for months on end to come. Hopefully the Irish scene will start to pick up again in next year.

smoggy11 · 13-09-2009 1:28pm

Gonzo wrote: »

Never a truer word has been said, this country has gone from a wrestling heaven 4 years ago to a wrestling wasteland today, Im starved for live wrestling shows, I used to see 4 to 5 wrestling shows a month back in teh glory days of Irish Wrestling when IwW was on fire but now theres hardly anything, the AWR show in Tallaght a few weeks ago was amazing and at least temporarily has given me my fix for a few weeks but what now, aside from TNA in Dublin Ive nothing else to look forward to wrestling-wise for months on end to come. Hopefully the Irish scene will start to pick up again in next year.

Not true. Wrestling.ie is on fire up north, and doing better than IwW ever did - bigger crowds and better shows. If you really want to see a live wrestling show, then make the effort to go to the shows. Irish Wrestling can't just be confined to Dublin, no matter what a lot of dubs think

Whiplash · 13-09-2009 1:35pm

Now would be a good time for Wrestling.ie to come down south. Its fair to say the fans are hungry for some regular irish wrestling. With guys like Maxer,Dunkan and Cabray being booked on the shows should draw a good few of the Newer fans familiar with them from the AWR shows. and with some regular competition down south might make iww get their act together.

Rawm2008 · 13-09-2009 2:54pm

i dont see why wrestling.ie would even bother to go down south, when they clearly doing well for themselfs up north, wrestling.ie is basically turning northen ireland into its own versiatile little territory for wrestling,

Dublin was over saturated with wrestling and it bascially got killed cause of the oversautaration, now theres only 2 promotions left down south who promote, IWW and AWR, NWA:I havnt run a show since late last year i think.

Back up north you got Wrestling.IE runnen all over the north and then PWU running in different areas of belfast every couple months.

The Cannibal · 13-09-2009 3:24pm

I agree that wrestling.ie should stay up north for now. If it ain't broke don't fix it. Going south would be an unneccesary risk that they aren't in any pressure to take right now.

I don't agree the south has been over saturated though because what has been there has had next to no exposure. Go to a WWE event and ask all the fans there to name an Irish wrestling promotion and probably less than 1% would be able to do it.

Apart from IwW nobody has had sustained exposure to the public. CPW only ran in Drimnagh mostly, NWA mostly in Bray, WIN folded after one show, UCW and PWU never hit the south and NLW/AWR only hit here a couple of times a year in their present format.

The reason none of those went on to bigger things is that they didn't do **** to develop the fan base. They just did throw away spot shows and didn't do any long term planning or development. It was the equivalent of getting a meal with all sides and no steak. If you wanted to follow the happenings of these promotions they made it very hard for you to do so. Local pub bands often do better jobs of promoting themselves.

Rawm2008 · 13-09-2009 3:51pm

compeltly agree its hard to follow the scene when all you get is results, not detailed accounts of matches or storylines.

And shows are never filmed for distribution mainly for the face there mostly filmed on one, very basic, camera.

Id know PWU, an FFPW do there own storylines for there fan base, on the night storylines for new comers and having longer fueds for fans who attend there shows on regular basis.

Tommy the ref could prob tell us everything thats going on in every fed, hes got the best seat in the house for every show lol

Gonzo · 13-09-2009 4:55pm

they should come south, maybe do a wrestling show in dublin every 2 or 3 months. Also the name Wrestling.ie springs to mind a wrestling promotion that is for Southern Ireland rather than strictly Northern Ireland only which is uk territory. Myself and several others would definitely go to the shows if they were in Dublin.

the flananator · 13-09-2009 5:16pm

All that Wrestling.ie illustrates to me is that I was right about what I've suspected for years; Irish wrestling CAN be successful, if and only if promoted correctly. I remember attending NWA and IWW shows around Kildare, shows that were promoted half-arsed (maybe a handfull of crappy paper flyiers, maybe a ****ty poster in a chip-shop or pub), and as a result drew **** crowds.

It didn't make any sense. The logic seemed to be that because they were small companies, they couldn't justify investing money in decent promotion, advertising, marketing etc. This was and is truly a false economy. To use the old adage; one needs to spend money to make money, while saving money in the short term by being stingy with advertising is a fool-hardy move when one ends up losing money in the long term when one's cards are poorly attended.

NWA-I didn't and don't seem to care too much. They seemed happy to use its cards as simply stages for their wrestlers to develop and hone their skills before moving on (in the manner that Devitt, Tracey, Morrow, Brennan etc. have); the promotion itself wasn't really important. By comparison, IWW had a ton of ambition while its training school was designed to be a feeder into the promotion itself- not the other way around as it was with NWA-I (and still is with FFPW). Unfortunetly, IWW were and are so hopelessly inept at what they do in general that despite all of its energy, passion, and a handfull of minor triumphs aside, it was never able to fufill its potential and become a sustainable wrestling organization capable of cultivating the Irish territory.

Now, I won't pretend I know what Wrestling.ie's business model is, because I don't. But it seems to be working, and thats marvellous news to me as I finally believe again that a legitimate and successful Irish wrestling promotion can exist. Hell, there are other examples of Irish wrestling's potential if we look back far enough;

* IWW drew large (for the time) crowds to the Basketball Arena in 2002; there were no name performers on the Marquee, but people saw "wrestling" and were willing to pay to go and see it in their droves.

* No Limit Wrestling sells out its Moat Theatre events whenever they run there. That IWW often struggled to get half that number of people when they ran there clearly illustrates that there is a right way and a wrong way to promote wrestling, that 'Irish Wrestling' isn't fatally flawed in itself as some on here would have you believe.

* IWW attracted about 400 rabid fans to the SFX for its Supershow event in 2005. Now, this card DID have name talent, and like the earlier NBA shows probably lost moeny due to IWW mis-management. However, what this does reveal is that there IS a hot-bed of wrestling fanatics in the greater Dublin area, who WILL turn-out for a wrestling show if they are given a reason. And contrary to what others on this forum will tell you, I do not believe that that reason necessarily HAS to be foreign imports. Great wrestling and interesting angles should suffice.

* Despite its many, many flaws, even that old darling of Irish wrestling CPW managed to attract the same group of fans (usually numbering about 150 while I was there in late 2005/early 2006) to its monthly cards in Drimnagh. This shows, on an admitedly small scale, that a loyal fan-base for Irish wrestling CAN be created and sustained if said fan-base are given more than just throw away house shows, and indeed throw away matches, characters etc.

Rawm2008 · 13-09-2009 5:27pm

Have to agree on the promoting stuff, you gotta be willing to take the risk on advertising to increase the chances of success, from what ive seen at wrestling.ie shows theres are great A3 Glossy proffesional posters everywhere in towns, flyers by the stacks in shops by the tills, and at the venue a huge 5 1/2 foot cardbard cut out containing flyers aswell for any one who stops at the venue can just pick one up.

I do feel though that promoted correctly and long enough any wrestling show in this country can draw from 200-400 on home grown talent alone, wrestling.ie proves that, Hell UCW back in its hayday got 900+ people to the ulster hall for a show.

In my books imports arent required, there mainly used to attract smarks more than anything.

Whiplash · 13-09-2009 11:02pm

I hope a higher up in Wrestling.ie is see this discussion. Its obvious that there are ppl wanting them to come south. Granted there are risks but perhaps it is worth a risk to see how they'd do. I would suggest they hold a show in Dundalk. It isnt that far from dublin for those really want to check them out out its an hour on a bus/train and easier to get to than up north to see a show and secondly its bordering the north so they dont have far to travel either with the ring etc. The fairways hotel would be the ideal location, AWR had a great attendance there last year (400+ i'd guess) and even a crappy Orig williams show drew 150-200 ppl a few yrs back.

Irish Promotions' Thread ***Info, News & Results***

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Irish Promotions' Thread Info, News & Results