May 25th, 2018
Shane Strickland arrives with big boy, Barrington Hughes, in a sweet looking car. Salina De La Renta confronts Strickland, saying his car isn’t the only thing that’s rented, as she points to the MLW Championship.
Santana Garrett vs. Chelsea Green
MLW did us a solid by featuring the women on TV for the first time, but this match was quite sloppy at times, with a ton of pinfalls that the crowd didn’t buy into. Thankfully, we get Chelsea Green, THE WRESTLER, and not the crazy, hot mess gimmick of Laurel Van Ness. Santana picks up the win here, as she remains undefeated in MLW competition. If MLW actually gives its women time on TV each week, a women’s title would be interesting. Otherwise, this wasn’t anything too great.
Winner: Santana Garrett
Match Rating: **1/2
Tom Lawlor cuts a promo on Jimmy Havoc, being as sarcastic as possible, saying how sorry he was for Jimmy. Good work by Lawlor, his transition to pro wrestling has been great so far.
Simon Gotch Prizefight Challenge
Danny Santiago answers the open challenge, and if he wins in under 5 minutes, he’ll earn $250. Right out of the gate, Santiago eats a T-Bone suplex, followed by a Gotch Piledriver, and that’s all she wrote. Gotch picks up the win with ease, and MLW continues to give Team Filthy momentum.
Winner: Simon Gotch
Match Rating: NR
We were supposed to get an interview with MJF, but Joey Janela and Aria Blake exit MJF’s locker room. . After the break, MJF smells smoke, goes into his locker room, and sees that his locker room has been destroyed.
A nice little video package is shown for Strickland/Pentagon, leading us into the main event, which will be the first MLW Championship match on Fusion, and is Strickland’s first defense of the title.
MLW World Heavyweight Championship: Shane Strickland (c) vs. Pentagon Jr. w/Salina De La Renta
Even with week of build, a video package, and a Mariachi band performing the Mexican National Anthem, this match didn’t live up to the hype. The match lost quite a bit of steam with TWO commercial breaks, when MLW usually doesn’t take away from matches with commercials. Still to this date, one of their best matches was Austin Aries vs. ACH, and that didn’t have a single commercial. That aside, Pentagon dominated most of this match, with a seemingly uninterested crowd. There were two big near fall spots, letting Strickland thrive as a babyface, but they needed a bit more reaction, or commentary putting the moves over to make me believe a title change was actually going to happen. The chair being brought into the ring felt unnecessary, and it doesn’t make sense why Pentagon is doing Canadian destroyer’s on the ring apron, when it just leads us to a commercial. In the end, Pentagon accidentally misted Salina, which allowed for Strickland to get Pentagon down, and hit the Swerve Stomp. A pretty flat finish, to an overall disappointing title match.
Winner: Shane Strickland
Match Rating: ***
Final Thoughts:
Props to MLW for building up a big title match like Strickland/Pentagon, but it ended up being a let-down. Some small things held those two back, and if they would’ve just went out there for a 12 minute sprint, I’m sure my review of that match would’ve been the complete opposite. Anyways, a lot was accomplished on this episode of Fusion, even though the in-ring action wasn’t the best. Santana Garrett picks up momentum, and we’ll see where this women’s division goes. Team Filthy continues to dominate, and we got some more build to Lawlor/Havoc. A new feud has arrived, that being Janela/MJF. Finally, what was Low-Ki doing on the stage for Pentagon/Strickland? Even with the first defense of the MLW World Heavyweight Championship being one to forget, things are still moving along well, and Fusion is still a very easy show to sit through.
Show Rating: 6.0/10