CM Punk is the IWA veteran here while Michael Shane is making his debut. Dave Prazak, managing Punk, makes this point during his pre-match promo. He also lets us know that Shane is Shawn Michaels’ cousin which was really Shane’s selling point for a long time. CM Punk also talks and he insults specific crowd members before doing a hard switch into his catchphrase. One of the interesting things about this period of IWA is watching the crop of indie guys who were raised on ECW seeing where their version of that attitude would go.
As Shane poses in the corner, Punk hears something he doesn’t like from the crowd and goes after the front row. They trade holds early with Shane getting the slight advantage. Punk gets a quick series of strikes in, but Shane fires up with a flapjack and a flip dive drawing slight applause.
They chop on the floor which gets a slightly better reaction. Punk walks Shane around the ring but ends up getting whipped over the top two ropes and goes flying into the third row. That brings the crowd to life a little more as they head back into the ring. Shane uses some jabs but Punk hits a spinebuster to take control.
Punk makes sure to use the Shawn Michaels pose after hitting the underhook backbreaker. Punk’s offense is all about chokes and eye rakes, which actually does its job in getting the crowd to rally behind the unknown Shane. It’s small, but going from the crowd refusing to count along with his punches in the corner to rallying behind him getting out of a chinlock isn’t nothing.
Punk keeps working the neck & upper back. He goes back to another chinlock but Shane hits a nice hooked overhead belly to belly on Punk. Fired up Shane hits the flying forearm and some more punches. Punk jumps into a TKO which gets 2 and a good reaction from the crowd.
A nasty cobra clutch suplex from Punk cuts off the fire briefly but Punk ends up taking a tornado DDT. A second one gets countered and Punk hits a split legged moonsault for 2. Shane rolls through a powerbomb for a near fall and hits an equally nasty German suplex on Punk to make up for that cobra suplex.
Punk is out on his feet and walks into a superkick that gets 2. Shane seems out of ideas and goes back to punches, which lets Prazak get involved and Punk hits the pump handle Michinoku Driver to get the win.
Final Thoughts: I wasn’t sure what to expect going into this. This is by far the earliest Michael Shane match I’ve seen and early Punk can be hit or miss depending on his opponent. Overall, this was a strong debut in IWA-Mid South for Shane and a very giving match from Punk. After the opening promo it wouldn’t have been surprising to have Punk dominate the match with Shane getting in a few moments of offense before getting pinned. Instead, Shane got a lot of offense and, more importantly, a lot of chances to show what he did well. His big moves landed well and the crowd got into his comebacks and at least some started to buy into a possible upset. There were some clunky moments and strikes that looked off (mostly from Punk) but this was a fun 17 minutes that could have set Shane up for success in IWA moving forward. ***
This match can be found at https://independentwrestling.tv/promotion/IWA-Mid-South
Untitled Wrestling Reviews 