A Look at OVW Wrestling

One thing I want to do on my blog is to not only take a look at individual wrestlers, but also promotions that regularly feature women's matches.  There are a lot of promotions that feature solid women's wrestling.  Ohio Valley Wrestling, in my opinion, has always been one of the middle of the road promotions.

Over the years, Ohio Valley Wrestling has been home to a number of women that would go on to be very successful in the industry.  From women like Beth Phoenix and ODB to Serena Deeb and Katie Lea, the women division has been start studded before they were stars.  OVW is also able to claim experience as a training facility for both of the major US wrestling promotions, WWE and TNA.  

Established in 2006, the OVW Women's Championship has been held by 20 women.  The current champion is Trina Thompson.  I haven't been able to find many of her matches online, only three from OVW.  From what I have seen, it appears that she is still fairly early in her training.  She doesn't seem to have to ring awareness that some of the other women have.  But, I have to give her props.  The first match I saw of her, versus Epiphany airing April 20, 2013, she nearly had a wardrobe malfunction.  Since then, I haven't noticed attire issues.  

Supporting the champion, there are a few fairly notable names, Taeler Hendrix, Josette Bynum, and The Blossom Twins, which have all been seen on Impact Wrestling.  These are probably the four best women currently on the roster.  Taeler has been a staple of the division's focus for quite a while.  Josette has taken more of an administrative role, so we aren't seeing much of her in the ring.  Hannah and Holly have just returned from the TNA British Bootcamp competition, making their return in a tag match against Nikki St. John and Lovely Lylah.  Heidi Lovelace has also been working OVW for the last several months with a 2 month stint as the strap holder.  

The best thing going on in OVW right now is definitely the storyline between Taeler Hendrix and Heidi Lovelace.  Ringbelles did a great write up of the story, so I don't want to go into a lot of detail.  It will be very interesting to see how the story plays out.  While I have known about Heidi Lovelace for quite a while, I was never a fan.  For some reason, I just couldn't get into her.  But watching her on OVW has changed my mind.  Although she isn't in my top women to watch, I think there is something interesting about her and I am curious to see where she goes.  

The bad.....well, maybe not bad.....The not so good part of OVW is the talent in their division.  It is spotty at best.  There are some women who can put on a solid match and then there are some women that I think need a lot more work. Taeler, Josette, Blossoms, Heidi, and Jessi Belle are all pretty reliable in the ring.  I have seen many matches with all of these girls that was solid.  But when you put them in the ring with women like Epiphany, Trina, Lovely Lylah, Nikki St. John, December, Scarlet Bordeaux, etc the matches suffer.  Epiphany has been with OVW for a long time, since 2008.  She definitely has a presence about about her, but her work in the ring is lacking.  I can't tell if its that she needs bigger women to work with or if she is just in need of training.  After watching her matches, I'm always left with a feeling of confusion.  Nikki & December are not regulars with OVW and I have heard positive things about them from other promotions.  Only time will tell with them in OVW.  

I'm assuming that Trina and Lylah are both still learning their craft....at least I hope so.  I have only seen 3 or 4 match from each, but I have been less than impressed with what I'm seeing.  Their match together on April 27th.....well.....yeah.

I'm going to leave you with my favorite OVW Women's match to date.  This match took place on December 23, 2006 between two women who would go on to become champions in other promotions.  Beth Phoenix took on the the Champion Katie Lea for the OVW Women's Championship in a Ladder Match.  

Overall rating for the division (out of 5 belts):  

Welcome to my blog!

I’ve wanted to start a blog for a long time, but I could never really figure out just what I wanted to write about.  Back in the day when Xanga was popular, I had an account that I pretty much ignored because I didn’t have direction.  So, for this blog, I’m going to focus on one of the things I’m truly passionate about….women’s wrestling.  For my first post, I want to introduce you to who I am as a person and who I am as a fan of women’s wrestling.

Outside of my undying love for women’s wrestling, I’m a fairly typically 27 year old gay professional.  I own my own home in Northwest Arkansas and work as a bank internal auditor.  I have made my career in banking and I really enjoy the industry. 

I am very heavily involved in the American Cancer Society Relay For Life.  The Relay this year will be my 14^th.  My family got involved the summer after my grandmother was diagnosed with Lung Cancer.  Although she lost her fight with cancer, my family has continued to fight in her honor.  If you feel led to make a donation to the American Cancer Society, please let me know and I will get you the link to make a donation through their website. 

The most important part of my life is my family.  I have been in a relationship with a wonderful man for 5 years.  He has been amazing to me.  I have a really close family.  All of the holidays are spent out at my grandparents place with a house full of people.  If it wasn’t for the support system that my family has offered me, I wouldn’t be the person that I am today.

As a wrestling fan, I’m a very dedicated fan of women’s wrestling.  Growing up, my family watched a lot of wrestling on TV.  During the mid-90’s, there were not a lot of women in WCW or WWF.  It seemed that during that time, both divisions had a very similar talent roster with Medusa, Luna Vachon, and Bull Nakano among others sharing both rings.  These women, along with Akira Hokuto and Malia Hosaka, were some of the women that peaked my interest in the industry.  These were women that would get into the ring and fight like the men.  For some reason, I was hooked. 

My interest stayed with WWF during the time of Jazz, Molly Holly, Ivory, and Jacqueline.  While I wasn’t a big fan of Trish Stratus or Lita, this was a big time for women’s wrestling in the mainstream.  During 2004-2005 when these women started going on to do other things, I started to lose interest in wrestling.  I was graduating from High School and starting college, so I had other things to focus on.  I really didn’t follow wrestling at all again until TNA officially started their Knockout Division in 2007.  Between 2004 and 2007, while I was still interested in wrestling, my focus was on YouTube.  I spent time watching a lot of matches from the 80’s and 90’s of the Glamour Girls and Sensational Sherri.  I got familiar with the women in Deep South Wrestling and Ohio Valley Wrestling.  This was the also time my interest in the independent women started.

With the TNA Knockout Division bringing in several women from the independent circuit that I was familiar with, I decided to start following the division again and I stayed true to the division for several years until the independent talent started leaving and TNA’s focus because the women formerly in WWF/E.  By this point, I had been introduced to the promotion that has grown to be my favorite, SHIMMER Women Athletes.  SHIMMER has been the second most important part of my interest in women’s wrestling, taking second only to the mid-90’s women who peaked my interest. 

Since then, I have lost most interest in the WWE and TNA divisions and put most of my interest in the independent promotions and divisions.  I pride myself on being a fan for a long time and I have little patience for people who gawk at the women for carnal reasons.  Comedy wrestling isn’t my favorite.  I prefer to see two women get in the ring and beat the snot out of each other in a technical hard hitting match.

I have some ideas for some blogs, so I hope you come back and comment and share and all that other bloggy stuff.