It wasn’t the best of nights last night in St. Petersburg, Florida for the Canadians on the NWA 53rd Anniversary show at the Wrestleplex.
Though the vacant NWA Canadian title was captured by former champ EZ Ryder from the Winnipeg-based CWF promotion, another Winnipeg boy, Steve Corino, wasn’t as successful.
Corino defended his NWA World title against Shinya Hashimoto from the Japanese Zero-One promotion in a match that seemed very much in doubt over the past few weeks. For one, Corino has announced that he plans to get out of the wrestling business by the end of the year. Hashimoto’s trip to Florida was in doubt, and even cancelled at one point, because of the anthrax scare in the state.
Though the match did come off, the ending of the bout certainly didn’t finalize things. After a little over 10 minutes, referee Fred Richards stopped the match, awarding the coveted title to Hashimoto. Corino had been on the receving end of a brutal beating, with many stiff kicks to the face. Newly-elected NWA president Jim Miller stepped up later and said that the title was being held up.
The NWA Canadian title match had a much easier to understand finale. EZ Ryder took the vacant title from ECCW-vet Juggernaut after about five minutes. After dominating the match, Jugg fell victim to Ryder’s use of brass knuckles.
Another Canadian on the show was Spyder from CWF-NWA, who entered as NWA North American champ, but didn’t exit with the title. He lost the title to Quinn Magnum of NWA East.
Christopher Daniels, a regular in ECCW-NWA, had the match of the night, losing to A. J. Styles.
The main event of the four-hour-plus show was a War Games match between Team NWA Florida — Chris Nelson & Vito DeNucci & Lex Lovett & Rod Steel & Buck Q with Howard Brody and Team IPW — Scoot Andrews & Todd Shane & Mike Shane & Mike Sullivan & Chaos & Jet Jaguar with Ron Niemi. Like the NWA title match, it also ended in a no decision.
