Watching Jonny Storm's PWG debut many moons ago and it surprised me the positive reaction he recieved. . . surely an East Coast wrestler would be better known?
Two things.
1. Jonny Storm was on the same CZW show where Super Dragon and B-Boy made their debuts in the company, and that show was seen by many SoCal fans(even some SoCal fans flew out to see the show) and obviously knew who he was because of it. When Dragon and B-Boy made their debuts, it was a big deal since it was their first east coast gigs. Now that you have B-Boy, Dragon and various SoCal guys on the same shows as Beef Wellington, it's not really that special and fans wouldn't go out of their way to see many of the shows they're all on.
2. The reaction wasn't even that big, plus PWG's live fanbase at the time was a lot smaller than it it now. Plus it was made up of a different crowd. PWG crowds were a lot more smarkier and knew more about wrestlers on the east coast than they do now.
The PWG fans aren't idiots
ummmm
They know the indy business in and out, and a guy wearing cow pants and tassels, whether you know of him or not, is obviously going to stand out.
Stand out in a promotion where there's a dude who has a gimmick where he's a cokehead and wears thongs over his singlet with beads on the back?
Beef Wellington, last year, had a streak of wins over guys like Chris Hero and Super Dragon in IWS. These wins made him legitimate, so even when his appearance and theme music were silly, the fans didn't give a shit, because the guy could go. And I've seen these matches, and they're actually very good.
And at the same time, a lot of people in California wouldn't really care about those wins, nor would they know about them aside from a few die hard fans. Even with those wins, he's still a comedy act in a lot of promotions outside of IWS. Maybe there they'll take him seriously, but would you honestly think anyone outside would take a guy whose signature move is him punching a guy in the ass and the guy overselling it seriously? I doubt it.
If Team Masturbation were to happen in PWG, I guarantee you that at least 75% of the crowd would pop. PWG fans love wrestling, but a majority of them also love the comedic side of things. So what makes you think they wouldn't fall in love with a tag team that does both incredibly well?
Hmmm, lets see:
1. Given the fact that most fans didn't know who Claudio Castagnoli or Matt Sydal were when they made their debuts, I doubt those fans would pop for a team they know almost nothing about.
2. Just because PWG fans love comedy, doesn't mean the Team Masturbation act would get over. As said before, Sexxxy Eddy didn't get over, and he's pretty much the kind of bump machine who does comedy type wrestlers PWG fans would love.
PWG did a promo that they put on their website once, and I think it involved Scorpio Sky. You think something like that wouldn't work for TM?
No, because that promo was just a short music video that involved a wrestler people knew about, and didn't make a big impact on things. I doubt some promo on the website would do much.
Beef has the mic skills to make the PWG fans love him. He's like Chris Bosh, but less racism and more dialogue.
Beef's comedy is pretty dull in my mind and sometimes comes across as if he's trying too hard to be funny. With Bosh, he just says random things and it's funny. So what if Beef has less racism and more dialogue?
The guy has had matches with pretty much every regular in PWG.
Really? So when has he wrestled Disco Machine, Joey Ryan, Topgun Talwar, Scott Lost, Chris Bosh, Scorpio Sky, Nemesis, Ronin, Chris Sabin, Rocky Romero, TJ Perkins, Human Tornado, Quicksilver, Davey Richards, Jack Evans, or Frankie Kazarian?
If a burnt-out veteran like Donovan Morgan got a shot, I don't see why a comedy-style, interesting character shouldn't.
Donovan Morgan had a reputation out here in California for being one of the best wrestlers in the state(and the indies) along with Mike Modest. He has also made a name for himself in NOAH and won SoCal MOTY in 1999. Nobody had seen him in a long time and he didn't have to be flown in from another country.