CNW: Making Wrestling A Family Business

[infinitywpi]

I was born twenty-two years ago. I never fit in with my family; it was clear I'd never be in the same business they were. Me, I wanted to be a pro wrestler. So I worked my hardest to make something of myself; I was small, but dammit, I was going to be somebody. My father said it was just some game I was playing at. He didn't realize what it meant to me. [quote="ECNN: East Coast News Network"]Tragic news for followers of professional wrestling today, as two well-known names in that industry have passed away before their time. In New York City, the man called TheStomper was the victim of a hit-and-run by what eyewitnesses call a drunken driver. But the bigger news is the death of the legendary Sam Strong. The Strongest One There Is was found dead in his Miami home by two would-be thieves who were planning on looting his collection of valuables, but instead they found Strong dead of an apparent drug overdose on his living room couch, watching an old collection of greatest hits.[/quote] Things changed when I turned twenty-one. My father died. My brother was an idiot, he couldn't take over the family business. He'd get himself killed. It would be like letting an epileptic work in a nitroglycerin lab. Bad news for everyone. And I was so close, too... I'd been working so hard, gotten so close, I was even working with my idol, I was going to be his heir apparent... [quote="WNN: Western News Network"]Just days after the drug-related death of a wrestling legend and the alcohol-related death of a wrestling owner comes worse news for the industry, this time from the west coast. Authorities in a southern Oregon county have confirmed that the victims of a murder-suicide in a local motel were AAA owner Anne Stardust and CZCW owner Cliff Anderson. The two had told employees that they were meeting someone about a possible business arangement, and both dropped out of sight until the discovery of their bodies late last night. Police are working on the theory that the two business rivals had been carrying on a long-term affair, which went bad when business interests entered the picture.[/quote] So I did what anyone would do... I took what I was given, and used it to get what I wanted. I still wrestled part-time in that year I took over the family business... but now, I'm able to do both, full time. I never liked the family business -- but I have to admit, it's given me everything I ever wanted. Even if it cost me something I thought I'd never give up. [quote="411Wrestling.com"]The string of shocking news at the end of 2006 is ending on an interesting note tonight, as on the penultimate day of the year a private investment group has announced they have obtained the assets of Angel Athletic Association, Coastal Zone Championship Wrestling, New York City Wrestling, and United States Pro Wrestling. The four territories will be united under the banner of Championship National Wrestling, which will officially begin operations in early 2007. No word on which works will be on the combined roster, or even what sort of wrestling you get when you combine four different products under one roof.[/quote] It began as a game. It became a passion. Then, it became too much for some people to handle. The country will call it Championship National Wrestling. But I know what it really is... And Cosa Nostra Wrestling is all mine. My name is Ricardo Del Veccio. And now, I'm a made man... in the family business.

[infinitywpi]

The office wasn't much, but it felt far too large. Part of setting up CNW involved setting up actual, honest-to-god offices. Naturally, they were in an office building owned by the family, for tax and money laundering purposes. We had a corner of the building, not much, but I had my own corner office. But something was wrong. I couldn't put my finger on it, but something was wrong. Maybe the decor... there was brand-new CNW graphics, and plenty of artifacts from the four promotions we had taken over. Nevermind. Business waits for no man, and we had also inheritted USPW's television show. CNW had to be ship-shape in just a few days. My first task was to whittle down our announcing team and staff, and I finally settled on the team of Danny Jillefski, Jim Lou Freebush, and Sue Danes -- that would give us a good mixture of USPW and AAA. AAA's Lois Hudson became our head (and only) referee, and Micky Starr found himself tasked as our Road Agent. That done, it was time to consider the rest of our roster. The merger of every major indy promotion in the country was enough to rank us as a cult promotion, but it shouldn't take much work to show people we were serious about having 'National' in our name. For managers, we were keeping Farrah Hesketh, Shane Sneer, Herb Stately, and Sheik Mustafa. That might be a bit much, but we appreciated the value of a good heel. As that thought entered our mind, we looked around the office. A heel... that's pretty much what I was now, with no scripts, gimmicks, or 'creative team' to blame it on. Everything had gone according to plan... the others in the family told me that nagging voice in the back of my head would go away in time. I sighed and hoped it would hurry up. Back to the roster. The Women's Division would be easiest. We had all of AAA's contracts available, but we were looking to drop the roster down to six women at most for now. A number of them were in their thirties and could be retiring soon... so age was definitely going to be a factor in our decisions. We finally picked our six: Cherry Bomb, Devil's Daughter, Gorgon, Joanne Rodriguez, Kristabel Plumb, and Raven Nightfall. Everyone else had their contracts terminated. Now, to cut a lot of the rest of the chaff... we'd keep an extra worker in each category, and that should work for us. Unfortunately, looking over the roster, I began to recall everything my mentor, Rip Chord, had said about all these men, and I saw all the ways they could fit together... and it was hard to let go of that many of them at once. Finally, I got the numbers whittled down... somewhat. We weren't hideously over-rostered anymore, as thirty-nine people received termination notices. And as I was making the list, the offers came in, as SWF, TCW and CGC began trying to poach what they saw as vulnerable, and available, talent. For a brief moment, I wondered if I was up to the task. I'd only just been training as a wrestler, now I was running a promotion... I had to be insane. A voice in the back of my head told me that I was going to fail, and fail spectacularly. I simply wasn't good enough. It was a voice I recognized. I looked over at the Sam Strong poster by the office door and walked over to it. "How hard can it be if you did it, old man? And how good could you have been... if it was that easy to have you whacked?" The poster stared out at me, unblinking, a championship belt held high. The picture was taken from the same match I specified the goons leave on repeat after they dosed Sam in his Miami home. I wanted to know the last thing he ever saw, and take some small pleasure in the fact that it wouldn't be the last image burned into my retinas today. Two days until CNW's first show as the new family of wrestling. And everything was going to go smoothly... or else.

[Greg McNeish]

Great back story. Gotta love the mafia.

[Liamo]

Damn good backstory... Poor Sam :(

[Bye1918]

The mafia? Wrestling? Infinity? COOL. I'm on board for this.

[infinitywpi]

Wednesday came, and I had asked for everyone still on the roster to be flown into Jersey for our first show. Yeah, the company offices are in Jersey. I [i]said[/i] it was a family-owned building, didn't I? Don't act so surprised. I arrived fashionably late, but not on purpose; booking the show for the night took longer than I had thought. So when I arrived backstage, I drew attention to myself. At first, I had this... this insane notion that I could blend in as one of the guys. But it was Fox Mask, that guy from CZCW, who said in just a few words what everyone else was thinking as I unpacked my gym bag. "Antonio? Thought you were Chord's boy. You're MAW. What're you doing here?" So much for blending in. "Well... Antonio's just a stage name, y'know? My real name's Riccardo. Riccardo... Del Veccio." "As in Del Veccio Ventures?" This was coming from Warlord Anger, one of the older tag-team guys from USPW. "The company that bought out the four corners of the country?" "That's me. The comapny is... was, my father's." Murmmers began spreading through the room. One voice, slightly louder than most, said "Great, there goes the promotion. He'll hold gold inside a month." "... Bailey, right? Relax, man... Look around this room. We've got the best of CZCW, USPW, NYWC... the women of AAA will be flying in for next week's show... and me. I don't hold a handle to half you guys. The other half, on a good day, I might be able to get in the ring with and not make a fool out of myself. Except maybe you, Roger. No offense." "None taken. S'probably true." "Look... yeah, for all intents and purposes, I'm running the show here. But I am not some... some businessman here to wring every last drop of profit out of you. I'm going to be in there with you, hitting the gym, taking my bumps, trusting you not to drop my on my head just like we've always trusted the people we're in the ring with. And I promise you this... I'm not holding a title belt until you guys think I should. Deal?" I'm not the most charismatic guy (I'm only a D-), but apparently, that was enough to calm some dissension. I gave out assignments and got everyone to their positions. Five minutes before showtime, I threw up in the men's room. Don't tell the other guys in mi famiglia about that -- losing face at the start of a venture like this would be bad, very bad. I've got an image to maintain now, after all. The lights go out in the park, and the sold-out crowd of two thousand begins buzzing. The lights come on as our announce team welcomes everyone to the first episode of CNW Nationwide, playing up how we've got the roster made of the best of American independent wrestling, and then announce our first match... and I step through the curtains, the first face to be seen on CNW television. For the next ten minutes, everything outside the ring is out of my control... if I hadn't emptied my stomach earlier, I definately would now. I climb into the ring as my opponent, Darryl Devine, is announced, and he comes down playing to the crowd, confident, sure of himself. The announcers have their instructions to hype up how this is something that wouldn't be possible last week, two young men whose paths would never have crossed otherwise. I don't know right away, but Sue points out how green I look (in the face, not in terms of skill) and compares it to Darryl's confidence -- I'm justified in my keeping her on staff. For the next six minutes, Darryl and I put on a buffet of wrestling... some holds and counter-holds, some brawling, a splash here, a dive over the ropes here, nothing major... just a wide variety of styles. It finishes with him suplexing me onto my back and I roll through, getting my feet on the ropes and holding him there for the three-count. I hang around looking smug afterwards ad Darryl argues with the ref, but the ref never saw a thing... and I get away with it. Wishful thinking? Maybe. I'll let my psychiatrist think about that if I ever get old like Tony Soprano. But I leave the ring and head to the back. Darryl follows moments later, and I'm back in control, sending Black Hat Baily down to the ring. From there on out, the hard part's over. I can do this. Baily talks up how he's heard there's going to be a championship tournament, and he feels it's unfair not to just give him the belt. I send Bruce down on cue... that's Bruce the Giant... to argue how he should be the champion.. and he'll prove it tonight, because the main event is the two of them in a title tournament match. We put up a graphic saying the new 'owner' of CNW, Shane Sneer of the Sneer Corporation, will be giving a speech later tonight, and cut to commercial. We come back with three of CZCW's flip-flop-fliers coming down to the ring one at a time to showcase one of the styles of wrestling we'll be using. They go a bit longer than my match did, but they're making full use of the ring ropes (the ring itself is an NYWC ring Stomper kept in excellent condition, but the ropes are CZCW's... I figure they'll be using them more). In the end, Fox Mask is left tied up in the ropes as Insane Machine pins Black Eagle. As they leave, Shane Sneer comes out and first asks for a moment of silence for the four corners of the wrestling industry that we lost in the last few weeks... and announces that all four will live on. The CNW Heavyweight Title is being decided by title tournament... but there are four other belts in this comapny, and two will be decided here tonight. There will be a match between the finest independent technical wrestlers for the new CNW/NYCW Title, and two legendary tag teams will face off for the CNW/USPW Tag Titles as The Warlords take on The Demons of Rage. Next week, the CNW/AAA Women's Title will be contested, and Insane Machine will learn who his opponent for the CNW/CZCW Xtreme Title will be. The past is dark, but the future is bright... and Nationwide. Commercials, and we return to Black Hat Bailey ranting about 'that oversized lump' before moving moving into the CNW/NYCW Title Match. I know the two men who are a good mix of a known veteran and an up-and-coming youngster. Steve Flash and Frankie Perez worked each other for thirteen minutes until Flash forced P-Dawg to tap out and won the title. So far, the matches were going pretty well, and we were just over halfway in... so far so good, right? We cut to a video hyping up "The Dirty Half-Dozen" of AAA, the All-American Angels as we called our women's division, and then did another one when we came back from commercial... gotta get all six of them screen time, of course. The next match, I was worried about, as the combined age of the men in the ring was well over a century and a half, but the Warlords finally fell to the Demons of Rage, and it turns out even asking them to go ten minutes for this special occasion was asking a bit much... their spirit was willing, but the flesh was weak. Regardless, the Demons took the CNW/USPW Tag Titles, celebrating in the ring... then pausing for a moment as we announce that next week, the first new CNW tag team will be in action. Captain USA and The Whistler are calling themselves True Patriots. Finally, our main event, as Black Hat Bailey faces off against the massive Bruce the Giant. It turns out the two have good chemistry together... and the crowd hated it when Bailey got the pinfall. CNW was looking to be something different... here, if the bad guys were skilled enough, they could get wins just as much as the good guys... The show over, I quietly went to throw up again before returning to the locker room. Bruce looked upset... everyone else just looked at me... somewhere, someone clapped, and a small round of applause swept through the room before everyone turned back to packing up their things. I could do this... I could really do this. And I [i]was[/i] doing it. I didn't know until the next day that something very bad had happened that night as well. [quote="WNN: Western News Network"]Authorities have released new information in the Cliff Anderson / Anne Stardust double-homicide tonight, revealing that it was not a murder-suicide as originally thought. The two wrestling promoters were found shot, and authorities how believe that both were killed with the same bullet, fired from outside their motel room. The bodies were then moved after the murder to obscure the fact. Police are not commenting on a motive.[/quote] Antonio over Darryl Devine, C- Insane Machine def. Fox Mask, Black Eagle, C Steve Flash def. Frankie Perez, NYCW Title, C- Demons of Rage def. The Warlords, USPW Titles, D+ Black Hat Bailey def. Bruce the Giant, CNW Title Tournament, C Show rating: C, 7.68 Rating

[Greg McNeish]

Great first show. Great job keeping a bit seperation between the shows, while slowly integrating. It's something that would have benefited the WWE/WCW invasion greatly. On a side note, take THAT Bruce the Giant.

[mistaken]

you don't do bad ideas, do you!

[infinitywpi]

"You wanted to see me? [i]Sir[/i]?" "Bruce, yes... come in, please. Sit down." "Chairs in here are to small." "... sorry. Look... I know you're wondering why I had you lose a couple nights ago. Quite simply... I have too many big names on the roster right now. If I don't get rid of them, theneveryone'll be unhappy." "So I'm fired. I'll get my coat. This is the biggest mist--" "Shut up, big man, you're not fired. You've got an offer from SWF. I know. You lost because I actually expect you to head over there. There's a few others with offers who didn't get used at the last show. You did, because I know Bruce the Giant could be the focal point of this company. If he stays. So I want you to know... if you leave,SWF will offer you big money. But let's face it... TCW is going to be takingg them down. And Championship National Wrestling is going to be there to take over the #2 spot in the country. So it's up to you, big man... You can always be a contender here... or you can hope theEisens don't decide they want you jobbing to women and midgets. Now get your coat... we're done here." Okay, so maybe I was a little brusk with him. I had a piece on me, I knew the guy outside my door had one too, and I was still upset after our first shwo was called "good, if a little underwhelming." Underwhelming? Do you realize how hard it was to throw that together in that short a time? Anyway, yeah, I jobbed out Bruce 'cause I figured he'd be jumping... maybe letting him know I knew that would keep him around. And if it didn't, well... we'd work around that. The next day, I learned we'd also have to work around our kayfabe owner, Shane Sneer, as well as one of our announcers, Danny Jillefski, both fleeing to TCW. Storyline-wise, they'd be hard to cover... well, Shane would be hard to cover for, but Danny we could just ignore. Hopefully that would be our only bad news for the week... A few days later, I got Bruce's response as the dirtsites began screaming loudly (well, as loud as websites that were lucky if they pulling in four figures a day can scream) about Bruce heading toSWF... and he was taking Darryl Devine with him. Well, so much for letting Darryl get his win back over me... This week, we fly everyone we needed out to Washington State. Since we were having the CNW/AAA Women's Championship match, it only made sense. We started out with Captain USA and Whistler announcing that they were, indeed, The Patriots and they were challenging anyone to face them tonight... then our first match saw my cheating to defeat Darryl again (and I'd already broken my promise to the locker room... but the boy was quitting on us, so who cares?). We then held the second half of ourCNW/CZCW mini-tournament, with Masked Cougar, Remmy Skye, and Snap Dragon more-or-less following the pattern from last week's match, ending with Skye getting the pinfall on Cougar. We announce Skye vs Machine, but it won't be next week... it'll be on Pay Per View at the end of the month. CNW: Rebirth. Backstage, Darryl Devine kvetches about the company and packs his bags, saying something rotten is going on here. Some commercials, and we have the CNW/AAA Women's Title match between Raven Nightfall and Joanne Rodriguez. After ten minutes of action, we had Gorgon run out and clobber both of them, the burly girl holding the belt high over both their bodies before dropping it on the mat and leaving. We do a mini-injury angle with the medics coming out to check on them both, then cut to commercials. We come back with the Patriots in the ring, looking to see who will challenge them, and the screen lights up "Force / Mass = ... Acceleration!" Yes, it's the idea so crazy it has to work, we've teamed up Jim Force and Land Mass as Acceleration in the worse physics joke to ever hit professional wrestling. The two teams struggle in what can only be described as USPW-style, going way too long and being way too sloppy, until Jim Force gets the pinfall by pinning Whistler to the mat. But hey, now I knew I wasn't having the worst match of the night. Backstage, Shane Sneer is doing paperwork at his desk when Farrah busts into the room, followed by cops. "There he is, officers... the man who made sure my former boss would be at that motel!" Shane protests as the cops cuff him and drag him away, leaving Farrah looking righteously pleased. And, finally, our main event, part of the title tournament, had Grandmaster Phunk defeat T-Rex. Yeah, we were fairly sure at least one of those two wouldn't be with us much longer. It turns out the show was even worse than our last one... maybe I didn't have as much of a handle on this booking thing as I thought I did. The flying guys seemed to do well, the women seemed to do well, but the rest... honestly wasn't working well. [quote="WNN: Western News Network"]It's not a storyline... Shane Sneer, a popular wrestling manager, has been arrested after police found evidence linking him to slain wrestling promoter Anne Stardust. Sneer was arrested live on television, leading many to believe it was part of a storyline.[/qoute] Enjoy your new signing, TCW... Antonio over Darryl Devine (D) Remmy Skye over Masked Cougar and Snap Dragon (C) No Contest in Nightfall vs J-Ro (C-) Acceleration def. Patriots (D-) Grandmaster Phunk def. T-Rex (D) Show rating: D, 2,000 tickets, 6.16 TV

[Greg McNeish]

Glorious! Simply glorious. Great backstage stuff with Bruce the Giant (SWF is the natural home for him anyway), and the Shane Sneer angle was awesome. Acceleration!!!!! I love it! Nothing's cooler than physics, baby!

[ReapeR]

Absolutely riveting! Definately darker than what we're used to seeing from you, but that's what makes it even more entertaining. Definately keep this up and hopefully you won't abandon "Welcome..."

[infinitywpi]

[QUOTE=ReapeR;328364]Definately darker than what we're used to seeing from you,[/QUOTE] ... dude, I'm the guy who had Vince McMahon sell his workers' souls to Satan, and a plane crash take out half the WWE roster. And this is darker than what I usually do? The hell do I have to do to be considered dark, nuke Orlando during a TNA show? :)

[ReapeR]

[QUOTE=infinitywpi;328481]... dude, I'm the guy who had Vince McMahon sell his workers' souls to Satan, and a plane crash take out half the WWE roster. And this is darker than what I usually do? The hell do I have to do to be considered dark, nuke Orlando during a TNA show? :)[/QUOTE] Hmmmm..... Got to remember, your whole satan thing was a long time ago. We're... well, I'm used to your "Welcome..." write ups that are a little more light hearted. But nuking Orlando would be considered pretty damn dark indeed.