Folks -- Here are the first two PNW Monday Maelstrom cards, which came in June 2007. The tournament has been reset for the new run, but a lot of the feuds are new.

Monday Maelstrom
June 18, 2007
Location: Mahlon Sweet Field, Eugene, OR

By Jason Ericks
PNW Online

I'm Jason Ericks, and I'm convinced I have the coolest job in the history
of the Milky Way Galaxy. I'm the play-by-play man for Pacific Northwest
Wrestling, and I'll give you updates after every edition of Monday
Maelstrom.
Last night was our first one. They say things get better after the first
time - well, at least that's what my girlfriend told me. But if that's the
case here, I'm not really sure how much better things can get. I'm also
convinced I have the coolest boss in the world - what other company can say
they hosted their first event on a runway at one of the busiest airports in
the whole friggin' northwest?
The show was at Mahlon Sweet Field in Eugene, headquarters for Pacific
Northwest. That's not a baseball field - it's an airfield. It's THE
airfield in Oregon besides Portland. And yet, Chris Colton being the
influential man that he is, convinced the folks that run the airport to let
PNW set up shop on one of its runways for a few hours. The planes flying
overhead only added to the excitement. If they'd crashed, I guess that
would have been.. uh.. more excitement.
Anyway, there was no lineup announced beforehand, but we still managed to
get 1,000 people into the stands - hey, you unleash Dahlia Lincoln and
Chris Colton on a liberal campus like the University of Oregon, and lots of
people show up. Those who did show up weren't disappointed.
Never one to keep the fans waiting, Mr. Colton decided to make his grand
opening speech another time, and we got right to the first match.

Match 1: "Wild Fantasy" Brandon Young vs. "The X-Caliber" Xander Keegan

This was Brandon Young's first official match, and the rookie with the
distinguished pedigree definitely held his own in the ring with Xander
Keegan, himself not all that experienced but a seasoned veteran when
compared to Young. Both men were extremely quick and agile, and the
momentum swayed back and forth for the first five or six minutes. Young hit
a nifty 360 somersault off the top turnbuckle and got a near-fall on
Keegan, but after a few more ground moves, Young took to the air again and
missed on a frog splash, giving Keegan all the momentum. A few moments
later, Keegan nailed a butterfly suplex, but kept it locked on into a
butterfly lock. Xander pulled Brandon up and nailed a spinning Widow's
Peak, a move Xander calls X-Crush. It was all academic from there. The fans
haven't known what to make of Xander since his sometimes-face, sometimes-
heelish stint alongside Chris Colton in HRW, but they definitely liked the
fact that he helped Young up after the match. The two walked down the
entrance ramp and into the back together.

Winner: "X-Caliber" Xander Keegan

Match 2: Jan Delgado & Azumi Tanaka vs. Mandy Ching & Lydia Cazmire

Mr. Colton definitely likes his females, and if they're talented, he loves
his female wrestlers. Word is that he only signed Mandy Ching, the
cheerleader, after she performed a.. um.. special cheer for him in his
office. But be that as it may, the pairing of Mandy and "Fatal Beauty"
Lydia Cazmire looked to be a pretty potent one. Azumi Tanaka and Jan
Delgado were both very determined women who weren't about to put up with
any nonsense, and they did a good job cutting off the ring, making Mandy
take plenty of punishment while Lydia looked on, half-ready to get in and
half-ready to go to sleep. Azumi finally Irish whipped Mandy into the
ropes, and Lydia made a blind tag, shooting into the ring with a slingshot
and plastering Azumi. Tanaka tagged out shortly thereafter and Delgado
quickly got the upper hand on Cazmire. Delgado hit her signature move,
which she calls "Bam, Bitch!" which is simply a floatover DDT. It made an
impact, as Delgado got the three count - or she would have, except the
referee was busy trying to get Mandy Ching out of the ring, and trying to
get her to quit yelling. Jan went over to get the ref's attention and
popped Mandy in the mouth in the process, but before she could turn around,
Lydia unleashed a vicious kick to the kidneys. The ref turned around to see
Lydia get the pin on Jan, milliseconds before Azumi laid her out with a
legdrop off the top ropes. Afterward, Mandy tried to celebrate with Lydia,
but Cazmire looked rather uninterested and simply walked to the back.

Winner: Mandy Ching & Lydia Cazmire

Match 3: Raider vs. Kazuki Shimizu

If Young vs. keegan was a classic wrestling match, then this one was an
old-school brawl. Shimizu, at 5-11 and 238 pounds, met up with Raider, who
stands 6-1 and weighs a petite 380 pounds. Raider was definitely the
stronger of the two men, and did his best to keep the Japanese brawler on
his back or his knees. Shimizu eventually got the upper hand when one of
Raider's many clubbing forearms failed to register. Kazuki grabbed the arm
and executed one of the quickest snap lariats in the history of wrestling.
It didn't quite drop Raider, but after Kazuki bounced off the back ropes
and hit a clothesline square on the Raiders tattoo on the back of Raider's
head, he went down. Kazuki went to the top rope and hit one of the ugliest
looking frog splashes in recent memory, but Raider couldn't get out of the
way in time. Kazuki picked up the win, but Raider kicked out with authority
just after the ref's arm counted three, and Kazuki rolled out of the ring
before Raider could try to use his superior weight against Kazuki.

Winner: Kazuki Shimizu

At that point, the obvious drum beats of Nine Inch Nails' "Closer," rocked
the airfield, and the sexy scrumptious Dahlia Lincoln confidently sashayed
out to the ring. My broadcast partner, the degenerate Tyler Hill, mentioned
that he'd like to f--- Dahlia like an animal, too, but I think the censors
caught it. Wouldn't want to piss off the FCC just yet, especially
considering that with people like Chris Colton and Bruce Saotome on the
payroll, we'll be doing that quite enough in the future.
Dahlia decided to keep things brief, and in between flashes of leg to the
crowd, she announced that she'd be running the women's division of PNW, and
also that she and Chris would share control over the tag team scene. On
that front, she made a huge announcement - a 14-team tournament to decide
the tag team championship. She said she'd leave the details for Chris to
explain at some point later, but did mention that the teams were randomly
put together and the bracket was randomly drawn, so as to leave plenty of
room for whatever might happen. She also announced that the first match in
the tournament would be right now, and instructed the tech folks to hit the
music.

Match 4: TAG TEAM TITLE TOURNAMENT, Round 1, Match 1:
La Mascara Azul & Godiva Lavery vs. Andrea Kristian and Cornelius Gore

This match was a monstrous contrast of styles, with a small, scrappy
luchadore and an easygoing all-arounder matched up against two of the
nastiest, meanest folks in PNW. The problem for La Mascara Azul and Godiva
Lavery was that they found out about this match about three seconds before
they had to wrestle it, and they even came out separately, whereas Andrea
and Cornelius came to PNW as a package deal and caught a very fortunate
break when the random drawing paired them up. They were obviously very used
to working with one another.
This is not to say the match was a squash. Godiva's strategy was to attack
Andrea early and catch her off-guard, and that worked to a point. Godiva
tagged in La Mascara Azul, who took to the skies against Andrea and nailed
a couple of very impressive moves. Under PNW's rules, however, a man and
woman are only allowed in the ring together in a mixed-tag match for one
minute or until a pinfall or submission occurs, whichever comes first, and
Andrea lasted the full minute without even having to survive a pin attempt.
Cornelius came into the ring when the minute elapsed and immediately
unleashed some heavy blows against the smaller Blue Mask. He and Andrea
worked like a well-oiled machine for the next few minutes, executing quick
tags, keeping La Mascara Azul in their corner and switching in and out
every few seconds. LMA rebounded off the ropes and hit a flying elbow on
Andrea, scoring himself enough time to make the tag. When Godiva came in
though, Andrea had already recovered and hit an unsuspecting Godiva with a
move she calls the Cyanide Syringe. Gore came in and stopped LMA from
breaking the tag, and he and Andrea advanced to the second round.

Winner: Andrea Kristian and Cornelius Gore

Match 5: Bruce Saotome vs. L.A. Jackson vs. Hector Santiago vs. Chris
Colton

This was a surprise match, since Chris isn't even a wrestling member of the
roster and Hector Santiago is just a tag-team wrestler here, teaming with
his girlfriend Lacey Raines to make up the River Riders. But these four all
go way back, with Bruce and L.A. forming the wildly popular tag team
Lights, Camera, Action. Bruce is the reason Hector got started in American
wrestling, and Chris and Hector have spent many nights at the poker tables
in Las Vegas. Also, Chris and his former tag team partner, Tony Richmond,
threw numerous parties for LCA when they had their amazing run as NEO Tag
Team Champions a few years back. There is absolutely no animosity between
these four, and Chris and Dahlia figured an old-school wrestling exhibition
between four old friends would be a great way to close out the first event.
Chris and Dahlia were right.
The rules were played where only two men could be in the ring at once, and
the first pinfall won the match. Bruce and L.A. started, which was an
interesting clash between a MMA specialist and one of the best high-flyers
on the roster. Bruce hit a few high-impact power moves on his partner, and
L.A. managed to get off a few aerial shots. L.A. tagged in Hector, but
Santiago really wasn't able to exhibit much of his superior technical
skills against the 6-foot-9 Japanese martial artist.
After a few minutes of dead-even wrestling, Bruce tagged in Chris, who
immediately turned things up a notch amidst huge cheers from the crowd,
especially the women. Wonder why.
This match went on about 10-12 minutes more, taking Maelstrom way past its
hour time slot, but nobody seemed to notice or care. All four men spent a
fair amount of time in the ring, but things really got interesting during a
point when Chris and Hector were in the ring. L.A. had just gone for a big
corkscrew dive out of the ring on a prone Colton, but Chris had gotten out
of the way just in time, sending L.A. crashing into the steel barricade.
Hector took his place and while things were heating up between he and
Chris, an unscheduled visitor made his way down to ringside in the form of
"The Sexiest Man Alive," Jason Tendo.
When the card started, we weren't even aware if Tendo's contract with PNW
had even been signed. But apparently it has, because he stalked down to the
ring, toting a baseball bat as he strutted down the ramp. Tendo's old foe
from their days in California, Bruce Saotome, was on the ring apron
watching the action, and didn't see Tendo coming - until he caught a bat
handle in the kidneys. Jason started drilling Bruce with the bat on the
outside of the ring while Chris and Hector kept things going in the ring.
Finally, L.A. recovered and saw what was happening to Bruce. L.A. quickly
scooted into the ring and executed a picture-perfect slingshot outside and
right onto Jason Tendo. The momentum kept L.A. going into another
barricade, though, and by the time Chris and Hector noticed what was going
on, Tendo managed to get away, much to the chagrin of the crowd.

Winner: No winner - match never officially ended.

That's it for me this week, folks. But needless to say, PNW's first Monday
Maelstrom made a big splash. What will happen next week when Bruce Saotome
goes looking for Jason Tendo? What's the deal with this mystery tag-team
tournament no one wants to really get into the details of? We'll find out
next week when PNW heads south to Medford, Oregon!

*********************************

Monday Maelstrom
June 25, 2007
Location: Medford Civic Center, Medford, OR

By Jason Ericks

The second Monday Maelstrom has come and gone now, and man, it took a few
days just to get over all the crazy shit that went down over in Medford on
Monday. It’s a pretty quiet little town nestled into the valley in southern
Oregon -- after what Bruce Saotome, Jason Tendo, Brandon Young and one of
PNW’s newcomers, Shaun Covell, did this week, I’m not sure those folks will
ever be the same.

We got right to the wrestling when the show started:

Match 1: Jayde Griffen vs. Kyra Braddock

The opener pitted an established star in the female ranks -- on this side
of the pond and that one -- against an up-and-coming woman from the other
side of a different pond. Jayde Griffen is one of the most talked-about
women in the wrestling world right now, with good reason. Besides her
excessive hotness and smooth mic skills, she can also put on the kind of
show in the ring that even a proven veteran like Mr. Colton would be proud
of. It looked as if the young Brit, Kyra Braddock was a bit overwhelmed at
facing her for her first match. I won’t call this a squash, because Kyra
did her best to stay in the match and even hit a few impressive moves, but
in the end, there was too much Jayde Griffen. About five or six minutes in,
Jayde hit one of signature maneuvers, a sitout crucifix powerbomb, and she
was about to head up to the top rope for a finishing move when she realized
it wasn’t necessary. She scored a quick pin just off the powerbomb.

Winner: Jayde Griffen

Mr. Colton -- he keeps telling me to call him Chris, but I look at the
pussy the dude gets, and it’s really sort of difficult to call a man of
that caliber by his first name -- decided to get right to the wrestling
first, like last week, but unlike last week, he decided to follow it up
with a personal appearance. He felt it was time to come out and introduce
himself to the crowd. Not that the Thriller needs any introduction, really,
but he felt like taking some time and explaining his grand design for PNW.
He’s got some big ideas, folks -- there’s really no telling what’s in
store.

After that, he introduced another new PNW superstar -- "Barely Legal"
Jessie Jensen. She’s not 18 or anything -- not barely legal in the Larry
Flynt sense of the word. Actually, she just graduated from Stanford with a
law degree, passed the bar in Oregon, and she’s the official legal counsel
for Pacific Northwest. She’s also incredibly flippin’ hot -- one of the
tastiest morsels on the overstocked menu that is the PNW Women’s Division.
It’s barely legal to be a lawyer and be that hot at the same time -- thus
the nickname. Mr. Colton said her first match would be at next week’s card.

He then gave more details on the tag-team tournament: it’s not really a
tournament, so to speak. The seven random tag matches are more like
qualifiers. The seven teams that win, those partners will go into two
separate seven-man/woman battle royals. The winners will be paired up and
will face a super-team that Mr. Colton will bring in just for the occasion.
A team so good, by his description, that they don’t need to qualify for
anything. So.. that should be interesting.

Speaking of interesting, the next qualifying match in the tag-team
tournament was next, and this is where things really began to get
interesting.

Match 2: Tag-Team Title Battle Royal Qualifier -- "The Bollywood Bombshell"
Amara Singh and "Wild Fantasy" Brandon Young vs. Ophelia Johnson & Trey
Svenning Jr.

Again with the randomness of this drawing -- or complete lack thereof. The
pairing of Singh, a cheater who is sometimes lazy in the ring, and Young, a
rookie babyface who works his ass off inside the ropes, was pretty random.
But their opponents were Ophelia Johnson & Trey Svenning Jr., a pair that
have known each other -- in many, many more ways than one -- for years.
Young held his own against the stronger, more brutal Svenning, taking the
martial artists best moves and throwing them right back. Young, a classic
throwback all-arounder, decided to show off a bit of his strength as well,
leveling a couple of suplexes on Trey. They were about even when they
tagged out to the women, and Opehlia and Amara also fought fairly evenly
for about five minutes. Brandon took advantage of PNW’s unique intergender
tag rules, and spent about 45 seconds in the ring, twisting and pulling
Ophelia into a couple of positions even she’s never been in -- and let me
tell ya folks, those are hard to come by. He wasn’t ready to pin yet,
though, and after he tagged Amara back in, the crowd flared up a little bit
as an unknown guy rushed down to the ring with no entrance and very little
fanfare. He waited till the time was right, then struck -- right as Amara
was getting into trouble in the ring and needed the tag. Before Brandon
could get in, the mysterious man yanked him off the apron and immediately
started laying the hammer down outside the ring. Young immediately
recognized the man, who we now know is "Wildfire" Shaun Covell. Apparently,
these two have some history, because once Covell showed, Young lost all
interest in what was going on in the ring. Amara got an advantage on
Opehlia and tried to pull tights to win a couple times, but eventually she
found herself in the ring with much stronger Svenning. With no one to tag
out to, she was helpless. Trey took Opehlia off the top rope, bodyslammed
her onto Amara, and the pin was academic. Even after the announcer gave
Svenning & Johnson the victory, Covell and Young kept going at it,
eventually getting into the crowd as the next match fired up.

Winners: Opehlia Johnson & "The Nordic Star" Trey Svenning Jr.

Match 3: "The Sexiest Man Alive" Jason Tendo vs. Grady Mitchell

Tendo had a mic in his hand on his way down to the ring and made it very
clear that he was NOT under contract with Pacific Northwest Wrestling. Yet,
anyway. He also made it very clear that he had no obligations to appear,
and the only reason he did was because this was clearly going to be a
cakewalk. He was still preening and posturing to the fans -- with his back
turned to the entrance -- when Grady Mitchell came out. He took some
exception to Jason’s comments and immediately executed a single-leg
takedown, then spent the next few minutes executing technical move after
technical move. He was definitely the aggressor, and the look on Tendo’s
face said it was a bit more than he’d planned for. Jason was caught off-
guard and paid for it, but Tendo, no slouch in the technical department,
countered one of Mitchell’s backslides and followed it up with another
classic technician’s staple -- a stiff kick to the kidneys, of course while
the referee wasn’t looking. Mitchell is very experienced, but Tendo is as
well, and he’s not afraid to bend the rules a little -- or a whole hell of
a lot -- to get what he wants. Jason executed a simple school-boy roll-up,
but by using the ropes for leverage, Mitchell couldn’t kick out.
Following the three-count, Tendo immediately got up and planted a low blow
right in Mitchell’s crotch. Tendo began beating the technician down, but
the crowd began to go nuts. Tendo didn’t look up, but Bruce Saotome was
heading down to the ring slowly and methodically. Once he got there, he
slid into the ring right behind Tendo and just glared at the man. Tendo got
up to leave, and immediately bumped into Saotome’s imposing body. Tendo
nearly shat himself but quickly sprinted backwards out of the ring. Saotome
didn’t move -- he just smiled. Tendo tried to smile back as he headed to
the back.

Winner: "The Sexiest Man Alive" Jason Tendo

Match 4: Tag-Team Battle Royal Qualifier: Kazuki Shimizu & Mariko Shimada
vs. "The X-Caliber" Xander Keegan and Jan Delgado

Keegan’s high-flying, high-impact style would be a lot of anyone to take,
and the stronger Shimizu was no exception. Most of this match was dominated
by those two, as Mariko showed little interest in joining the action -- not
a big tag-team fan without the right partner -- and Xander and Kazuki were
more than willing to keep mixing things up. Jan and Mariko brawled a little
bit on the outside, but played a very small role in the outcome of this
match. Xander got the upper hand toward the end, laid out Shimizu with a
flip piledriver, then went up top and hit his X-Insanity -- in other words,
a corkscrew shooting star press of biblical proportions.

Winners: "The X-Caliber" Xander Keegan and Jan Delgado

Before the Main Event was announced, several members of PNW security were
called to the backstage parking area because of a disturbance. Disturbance
was right -- PNW Security showed up just in time to see Brandon Young
suplex Shaun Covell through the back windshield of somebody’s beat-up Buick
LeSabre! Not mine, thankfully. Covell was busted open at that point, and
something that had occurred off-camera made Brandon Young that way as well.
More than 30 minutes, this brawl had been going on, and it took PNW
Security a few minutes and more than a few men to keep Young and Covell
apart. Finally, Covell broke away from security, found his own car in the
lot, and drove away -- all while Young, who also broke away from security,
gave chase.

Main Event: Lex Talionis vs. Bruce "The Oni" Saotome

This one was an intriguing match-up, because it pitted two of PNW’s bigger
men against one another, and we knew very little about Lex Talionis at the
top of the card. We know a lot more now -- mainly, that he can hold his own
with someone as talented as Bruce Saotome, and that he’s not going to take
anything cheap and easy. The two men were putting on a hell of a show --
mostly incorporating high-impact power moves and a lot of martial arts,
mostly coming from Bruce’s side. Bruce had just gained a slight advantage
when the crowd began to boo -- yep, it was Jason Tendo time, again. He
seemed pretty happy just watching from afar, though, and after a few
moments of warily looking at him, Talionis and Saotome got at it again. It
wasn’t long before things spilled out onto the floor, though, and Tendo
just couldn’t help himself. Lex bluntly draped Bruce’s throat across a
steel barricade, and rolled into the ring to break the 10-count, when Tendo
joined him in the ring -- armed, of course, with a steel chair. Bruce was
just starting to get up outside, and when the referee turned to look, Tendo
wrapped the steel chair around Talionis’ skull -- it knocked him out cold.
Tendo motioned for Saotome to come collect his prize, and began to walk out
of the ring. Since this was fought under normal rules, the ref had no
choice but to award the match to Lex Talionis on a DQ.

Winner: Lex Talionis

Bruce wasn’t about to be satisfied, and started chasing Tendo back to the
back. Tendo almost made it all the way there, when L.A. Jackson and the X-
Caliber, Xander Keegan, suddenly spilled out of the back, delivering twin
crescent kicks to Tendo’s through and knocking him to the ground. Saotome
ambled up the ramp, and while L.A. and Xander looked on, Bruce picked up
Tendo by his throat, screamed at him for a minute -- then nonchalantly
chokeslammed him off the entrance ramp to the floor about four feet below.
The crowd went nuts as Bruce, L.A. and Xander all raised their arms in
victory on the ramp -- could we see an alliance forming in PNW?

That was it for the card, but next week is just a couple days away. PNW
will be in South Lake Tahoe, right on the California-Nevada border, and it
promises to be one hell of a show. What will come of this huge brawl
between Brandon Young and Shaun Covell? Is that the end of Jason Tendo, or
is he going to be back at Bruce Saotome’s throat next week? Tune in next
week, folks!