The deceptively tall Stevens actually towered over Steiner. Truly the Billy Gunn of NWA.

Steiner hit a few nice suplexes and chops. I bought on two nearfalls off simple stuff. The first because Stevens' character is such a wimp and the other being a Stevens cheat.

Steiner had the match won with the Steiner Recliner when Question Mark interfered to boos. You heard that right. They booed the Question Mark! ASS then grabbed his title and hightailed it out of there while Steiner put ? in the Recliner. I thought for sure he was going to unmask the Mongrovian Marvel but it was not even teased.

Fashion Watch Part 4 or 5- Some fan was wearing a sweet early 90s style white Steiner Brothers t-shirt.

Aldis/Flip is up next with Sweet Charlotte on the line.

Flip looks completely different than I remember. He's really changed up....everything.

I like how Aldis got booed yet still received "Real World Champ" chants. That perfectly sums up Slick Nick.

Crowd is surprisingly almost 100% behind Flip. I was hoping/expecting ROH to be treated as hated invading outsiders. Guess not. I'll just chalk it up to Slick Nick's skill as a heel.

Gordon controlled early. Oddly enough with holds rather than his usual high flying.

The National Treasure just took control after powerbombing his way out of an armbar. And WOOOOO! Now we go to school....

Whew. The Champ retains! That was a close one. I can breathe again.

Flip put up a good fight. He had The Champ on the ropes several times. But it'll take more than Flip Gordon to dethrone The Best In The World!

Slick Nick won it by once again borrowing from a previous Best In The World- this time recycling the blocked victory roll finish from Bret/Owen at WM 10. Truly a student of the game.

The bipolar crowd suddenly started chanting "NWA" when Flip had Aldis close to tapping with a Crossface.

Match was basically a lesser version of Rosa/Kay. It was fine, but too 'modern' for my liking. I can watch this style of wrestling from literally every other promotion of note in the world. Yet I choose not to watch those feds. This is the NWA, dammit! Be different!

That awesome kid from the first set up tv tapings is back. You can always hear him over everybody else. "Nick is a cheater!" lol.

Tennessee Santa is in the house as well. But he's rather subdued by his standards. Nor is he in his usual front row seat

Main Event Time.

Trevor Murdoch vs. Ricky Starks for the TV Title. No time limit all of a sudden? What's up with that?

These two couldn't be more different.

The fashion-conscious Starks has channeled his inner Macho Man by wearing a new outfit for each of his three matches tonight.

While the rough and tumble Murdoch is selling the wars he's been through this evening. He enters sporting a beet red chest and tending to his ample stomach.

Who will be the first man to hold the rebooted TV Title? My heart says Murdoch but my head is telling me Starks.

Check back in 10 minutes or so to find out!

Your winner and NEEEEEWWWW NWA TV Champion.....

Ricky Starks!

Good match. Murdoch was the aggressor. Starks took two hellacious shots- One a Jerry Lynn-style 'floor meets face' bump. The other being a brutal Murdoch clothesline. Starks was either selling like a champ or legit knocked loopy. I'm honestly leaning towards the latter. But he persevered to win it with his unfortunately named Buster Keaton finisher.

Hmm....No championship ceremony for Ricky. So that's it!

Verdict: That was fun! Big improvement over the 'just there' Into The Fire. Will be back to do this again in April for the Crockett Cup.....unless I'm there to see it live. Which I hope to be. 

Rosa/Kay, Aldis/Gordon, and Starks/Murdoch were the standout matches. 

I can live with Ricky Showboat as TV champ, as he seems like a fresh young homegrown talent they want to push.

The entire Hard Times show is currently up for free on Youtube if 🤯 @admin or anybody else is interested. If so, I recommend you check it out asap. I was lucky enough to stumble across Into The Fire last month. It was pulled within hours.

Jan 25, 2020 20:28:30 GMT Baker said:

The entire Hard Times show is currently up for free on Youtube if 🤯 @admin or anybody else is interested. If so, I recommend you check it out asap. I was lucky enough to stumble across Into The Fire last month. It was pulled within hours.

Wife just konked out again. Will watch! You da man!!!

Enjoyed the show! I think the tag match was probably my favourite (which was a surprise because I didn't really care about that before hand) and the three way style really helped. I loved Kamille just wrecking Gibson over and over, and Bennett's amazing line about Royce being "libidinous" had me absolutely rolling.

I also liked Rosa vs Kay which really exceeded my expectations, even if it was far from perfectly executed. I agree with Bake's point that they probably could have cut 5 minutes off. Aldis/Gordon was fine but doesn't exactly have me screaming to see more from Flip, and I was a little bit disappointed (if not surprised) that Big Trev didn't win the TV title - but he certainly left Starks with a receipt via that clothesline which is one of the most brutal shots I've seen in a while.