MLW Fusion: Philadelphia 6/13!
Does Major League Wrestling count as indie wrestling? On the one hand, it’s not WWE or AEW. On the other hand, there’s pyro and a whole lot of big screens! We’ll leave it to others to sort out the definitions—as for us, we got stuffed full of a vegan cheesesteak from Monster Vegan and a water ice from Fred’s and went to the MLW Fusion taping in Philadelphia. (of course, the very name water ice invites more philosophical contemplation, but let’s stick to wrestling.)
The show took place at the 2300 arena in South Philadelphia, a building rich with pro wrestling history (though, fortunately, not odors), as it was the home of the late, lamented ECW, a promotion we never actually witnessed but which is clearly still fondly remembered, as there is a little memorial wall in the men’s room, and the crowd chanted “Eee-Cee-Dub!” at several points during the evening.
The tickets said to be there at 5:30, but wrestling didn’t begin till about 6:50. Wish someone had told us! But still, we got to soak in the atmosphere, and folks who wanted things from the bar or the merch table had ample time to line up and get their items before the show began.
At about 15 minutes to showtime, they started trying to hype up the crowd by inviting us to chant “Em! El! Doubleyou!,” and we obliged. They showed us hype videos. Ring announcer Lissy Almeida came out and spoke to us like she was a middle school teacher and we her unruly class, except she told us to be loud and energetic the entire night, which certainly was not the case in our middle school. (Come to think of it, had Mrs. Clodfelter used this reverse psychology, she might have left class in tears fewer times. Or maybe not! She was kind of high strung!)
We got a Don Gato tequila commercial, and then Don Gato himself emerged and gave some tequila to Tom Lawlor at the broadcast desk. And then more exhortations for us to be loud and energetic.
After a solid ten minutes of people telling us to be excited and loud, I turned to my son who accompanied me and said, “you know what would get me hyped up? Some wrestling!”
Finally, though, the event began.
As the episodes we saw being taped have not aired yet and I don’t wish to spoil your MLW Fusion viewing (Saturday nights at 6 on Youtube, so you can watch, have some dinner, and transition right into AEW Collision at 8! Or you could, you know, have a life! Your choice!), what follows will be somewhat more impressionistic than our usual wrapups.
Also, though we no longer drink and so don’t even have the alcohol excuse, our notes were absolute garbage, so we’re frankly unable to relay all the wins and losses even if we wanted to spoil the broadcast!
We saw two matches featuring the GBOT faction, which stands for Glasgow Boys on Top. Though Glasgow Men on Top would probably be more appropriate as all three members of the faction were large, full-grown men far closer to middle age than boyhood. In our time in Scotland we fortunately never met surly bullies like this, though there was one pub called the Pear Tree that was a student pub during the day and transformed into a scary biker bar in the evening as we found to our surprise one October evening! One of the Glasgow boys, Joe Coffy, competed for the Southern Crown championship (MLW is based in South Carolina), and neither he nor anyone else pointed out that, being from Glasgow, he actually is Southern by Scottish standards.
We also saw two matches featuring Matt Riddle, The Rude Dude, who was well-liked by the crowd and gave us fist bumps (we had good seats!) and did not appear to be rude at all. He also wrestled barefoot and had a multicolored pedicure! Good for him!
Jesus Rodriguez came out to cut a promo but was interrupted by the Contra Unit, an evil faction in MLW that, from the video montage that plays at their entrance, seems to be some sort of militant Sikh group, though no members of the faction sported turbans or untrimmed beards, so who exactly knows. (Well, one big white guy did have what appeared to be an untrimmed beard, but he was not wearing a turban.) In any case, they beat the stuffing out of Rodriguez who never got to say what he wanted to say. Instead, manager Josef Samael grabbed the mic and said, “Hail Contra!” He also wore shoes with long, pointy curled toes. Curious, we did some research: curly-toed shoes seem to have originated with the Hittites in the Bronze Age in what is now Armenia. The fashion also spread from Turkey through the Ottoman empire and eastern Europe. In Serbia, they’re called ‘opanci.” But Laplanders also make traditional boots out of reindeer fur with pointy, curled toes: they’re called sami! It’s unclear which of these cultures, if any, Samael was trying to represent, or possibly appropriate, but he was certainly sporting some eye-catching footwear! (Come for the wrestling, stay for the fashion history!)
The women’s match was the highlight for us. It featured Lady Frost, who seems to have some sort of wolf/game of thrones iconography going on, with Saya Katanabi and Rina from Japan’s H.A.T.E. faction (it stands for Harass, Abuse, Terminate, Eradicate, apparently) versus women’s champ Shotzi Blackheart with Scarlett Bordeaux and Zamaya. Rina and Katanabi were both quite petite and had a wonderfully incongruous ring persona where they did cutesy smiles and gestures (we’re not hip enough to know this for sure, but we suspect this is that mysterious thing known as “kawaii”) and also appeared to be insane sadists. We’re sure there are places where you have to pay extra for this, but it was included in the price of admission here! Though Shotzi is fun to watch and deserves her success, our favorite was Zamaya, who makes no concessions to the male gaze at all and just scowls and seems completely unhinged. We’re here for it!
After several matches we got another Don Gato tequila ad, to which the person seated to my left remarked, “More of this bullshit.”
Fortunately the bullshit was short-lived and gave way to more wrestling! Okay, okay, we are going to spoil the outcome of one match, because it was brilliant. A wrestler announced as Jumbo, weighing 400 pounds (who sported a singlet with “Big 4 Hunnid” on the sides in case you forgot his weight) took a solid minute to enter the ring, then spent probably ten seconds defeating his opponents—3 guys whose combined body weights probably didn’t equal Jumbo’s. He leapt at them, knocking all three to the mat and earning an instant pin. It was spectacular.
Diego Hill was also spectacular in his battle against two luchadors. Perhaps not surprising as he’s being trained by luchador Blue Panther. He’s incredibly acrobatic and fun to watch. One of his opponents was Templario, who pulled a sword from a stone on his way to the ring. Not sure representing the knights Templar, who seem to have invented both ethnic cleansing and banking, is such a great look in 2026, but, on the other hand, Templario is billed at 5’8”, and if that’s true, then I am Kris Statlander. We stan a short king, is what I’m saying.
There was a triple threat match for the heavyweight championship featuring Killer Kross vs. Donovan Dijak vs. Josh Bishop (not to be confused with Rat Pack member Joey Bishop, except every time I try to remember his name!). There were tables and chairs, and also a garbage can, a crutch, and a length of pipe. Folks, it was violent. We dug it.
Was the show maybe one or two matches too long? It was. Is Lissy Almeida as good a ring announcer as Rich Palladino? She is not. Did we have a fantastic time? We absolutely did. Can we rock that Shotzi Blackheart t-shirt that looks like an EC horror comic? We haven’t decided yet! Fortunately we can get it online! Or not!
