I’ve written at length about our backyard wrestling days here on the SoBros Network Patreon. I don’t know why all of that ended up here, but there’s a lot of fun stories to share from that era of my life, and we did a lot of super dumb shit that I look back on and think, “man, this is actually kind of entertaining.”
So, with that in mind, I’m going to share the story of what I feel is the best (read: most ridiculous) wrestling finish we ever booked in the SHWF (Stoney’s House Wrestling Federation).
The SHWF ran in the backyard/garage of the house I grew up in from 2004-2008. In 2008, we had our biggest event to date – it was out in the backyard, I made an actual entrance set, we had fireworks, drew a crowd of about 12, the whole nine…it would also end up being our last event ever.
I wrestled our resident film critic, Brandon Vick, on that show – it was the culmination of a year’s worth of storytelling. It was also the reigniting of one of our most storied rivalries in Gladeville backyard wrestling history. Think HHH vs. HBK in 2002-03. That sort of thing.
It was a tournament semi-final. The winner of the match would go on to wrestle in the finals in the main event of that show. So, we wanted to do something unprecedented. That’s when we decided to pull a card that we had been saving for a special occasion – I was going to kick out of Brandon’s finisher clean.
Brandon’s finisher must have been badass, huh? Nope – it was the Hogan leg drop. We protected that shit for four fucking years. No one ever kicked out of it. But, we thought this would be the perfect occasion to do it for the first time. You might think that’d be a big deal for me to ultimately get the win!
Again, though…..nope. We were still going to put Vader Vick in the main. In fact, he was going to walk out with the SHWF World Title that night. So, we thought we’d get Brandon over as even more of a heel. We were going to give those 12 people in the backyard just the slightest hope that I was going to actually pull off the win, just for the dastardly Vader Vick to get away with one.
So, what was the best possible way we could get this over? Simple – I kicked out of the leg drop, crowd goes wild, Vader Vick immediately goes and grabs a steel chair, knocks me out cold, pins me, 1-2-3.
That was it. That was the finish. I can’t wait to replicate this at a real wrestling show one day. We thought we were being so creative – in hindsight, it’s just hilarious.
Stoney Keeley is the Editor in Chief of The SoBros Network. He is a strong supporter of Team GSD and #BeBetter. “Big Natural” covers the Tennessee Titans, Nashville, and a whole wealth of nonsense. Follow on Twitter @StoneyKeeley
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