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Charter Cable system here in Greenville carries, for some reason, the MAV TV network. MAV TV, for those uninitiated, is a low rent network featuring some wrestling, roller derby, extreme sports like motorcycle racing and a bunch of other garbage shot with a handicam.
The wrestling shows on the network are XCW out of Denton, Texas. It’s an independent league and has featured Rodney Mack and Necro Butcher at different points. It is filmed in a bar where you need to bring your own beer, cans only since they want to leave the glass for the ring, and the crowd is usually vocal.
It is a small budget promotion with a small budget atmosphere. The do their best to make it a better promotion but it is clearly an under funded company. It doesn’t strive to be anything more than that. They do make their fair share of mistakes. One episode, someone clearly forgot to splice out the portion with Matt Shannon, their lead announcer, flubbing his lines. He stops, repeatedly says f**k over and over. His announce partner, Matt Avery (an undiscovered talent) tries calming him down and then Shannon goes in to his lines again and successfully completes them. The show then ends on that and leaves the viewer with ten minutes of crummy commercials. It was a disorienting spectacle but in their defense, if it can be defended, it hasn’t been repeated.
Their productions values are minimal (has that been stressed?) but the put just enough lipstick and mascara on it to hide the serious flaws and make them look minimal. The announce team just a decent job of moving along the action even if they tend to do some horrible overacting for no discernable reason. In their defense it is not a Mike Tenay/Don West style of overacting. The Matts are just new and need some time and they possibly can work it out.
The announcing also covers up the small time atmosphere. You do not hear the ratty fan trying to get himself over at the expense of the show and the workers. In the small bar environment it is easy for the crowds one liners and zingers towards the wrestlers to come across on tape.
ChickFight, if you can’t tell by the name, is a women’s program that features different bouts and tournaments from around the states and Europe. It regularly features Cheerleader Melissa, Mischif, Daizee Haze, Lacey and a slew of other independent wrestlers. A lot of the Shimmer wrestlers, as you can tell, are featured as well. I am relatively new to the show but from what I have seen it is not impressive.
Now, the talent on the show is not in question. The match quality is not in question here as well. Those two aspects of the show always deliver. Ok that is a slight exaggeration as they are prone to bad matches but still, the match quality is usually good. They even have some decent show graphics promoting the show but that is about it. There is a small introduction every week from ChickFight headquarters and then you are taken to the action.
The production values of ChickFight are offensive. It is offensive to the talent, it is offensive to the viewer and it is offensive to women’s wrestling. Now, I enjoy watching women’s matches. I am not sexist enough to dismiss women’s wrestling and claim it cannot stand on its own but a show like ChickFight fuels that argument. I am a firm believer that a women’s wrestling product can work and become financially viable. It can work on its own merits if given the attention that the men receive.
Usually the matches come from very small venues with a crowd total no more than 200 people. This isn’t a big deal when it is disguised on tape. You do not want to present your product as small time if it is on television. ECW did wonders making their crowds look large even when they were not. XCW does this as well and ChickFight should be able to do this. Instead the women have good matches in what appears to be an abandoned room. It is all about aesthetics and they are missing the boat.
Really all it takes is some lighting changes and that part of the problem is fixed. Sure some of it is tied in to the venue but it should still be addressed. If you want a product taken seriously and possibly turned in to a money making venture you have to spend the money. Buy a lighting rig, pay for the expenses of making the show look professional. You can hide this small problem and at the same time make the show visually appealing.
This sort of events fuels the misconception that if you are not in WWE or, I guess, TNA that you aren’t a “real” wrestler. Tack on to that the fact that these are women wrestlers and the stigma grows. Being a woman wrestler you aren’t just behind the eight ball; you are under it and then buried under the table after being set on fire.
Another way they can hide the fact they are a small product and television program is the biggest problem with ChickFight; there are no announcers. Allow me to clarify this. There are some events that have an announcer. There are some events that are broadcast without an announcer and really, there isn’t much of a difference. Their announcers, when used, take so many breaks in between calling the action or getting across the different wrestlers personalities that the crowd noise overwhelms the action.
Look, this isn’t a request for a Jim Ross and Jerry Lawler type team. What the show needs though is a semiprofessional crew that can call the action and build on the story in the ring and the large-scale storytelling. As it stands now the wrestlers are left to tell the story in the ring but the distractions of the, mostly male, crowd are a nuisance. You cannot turn down the crowd noise or it will appear that no one is interested in the matches. It’s not that difficult of a balance. Hire some college kid straight out of broadcasting school and give him a chance. Develop them if need be but get someone in the booth with at least some training. Put someone in the booth that can talk and has some personality to enhance the broadcast. This is all done in post-production anyway so there can be multiple takes if need be. The matches arte from The States and Europe so they have a good deal of time collecting the shows and then producing them.
Eric Nelson and I called a match at the Wrestle Mania fanfest last year and we were spectacular. (Yes Eric I’ll try and make a copy.) Hell, Dusty and his hetero lifemate Josh called a match as well and they came off better than Tenay and West. Kevin was busy buying a John Cena shirt so he didn’t get to call a match. (Yes this is true.) So if you want, we can call the matches. There, the Audio experience crew is officially putting their services out there to be the official announce team of ChickFight.
It’s understood that this is going to come off harsh and probably unnecessary but with ChickFight and Shimmer women’s wrestling has two distinct outlets for success. Every opportunity should be taken to make them as successful as possible. But having a product on television that looks like it is irrelevant is not going to help. The matches are good. The wrestlers themselves are all distinct enough that they stand out. What they need is a little help from the people with the money. You gotta spend some money to make some money after all.
Jeremy Maes is the “J” of the DEJ Audio Experience. You can listen to that group of organized crime perpetrators every Wednesday night on the member’s portion of PWTorch.com. You can read Jeremy’s thoughts every Sunday on PWTorch.com. You can even contact Jeremy torchmaes@yahoo.com or any member of the DEJ faction on the PWTorch VIP Forum, or by email at theaudioexperience@gmail.com.
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