The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
Thrashing from one end of the ring to the other, threatening to take each other down, professional wrestlers from the Canadian Wrestling's Elite (CWE) made their mark in Flin Flon last Thursday night. Roughly 80 fans were out to watch the wrestlers perform their best moves at the R.H. Channing Auditorium. Cheering on their favourites and trash talking the 'bad guys', male and female fans of all ages were into the show. Fans were treated to five matches and a main event Ð all of which had them on their feet yelling. The show featured Mentallo, Danny Duggan, AJ Sanchez, JJ Sanchez, Brian Rich, Tommy Lee Curtis, Heavy Metal, the Big Apple, Bash, Road Dogg and Big Vito. AJ Sanchez, who doubles as a crew member, says the show was a success. "Basically, what you saw tonight is what you would see at any other show," says Sanchez. Watching the show, fans cheered for some wrestlers while booing others. Sanchez is not a fan favourite and earns his fair share of bad remarks from the crowd. But, he says, that's how he likes it. "I, myself, am usually getting the negative reaction, but it's a preference as well," he said. And it's not just Sanchez who feeds off the crowd. "We (all) definitely feed off the crowd. I mean, if the crowd was not there, we would not be here," he said. The Flin Flon crowd's age range was typical for CWE matches, Sanchez said. "You know, a lot of older people seem to long for the days, I guess, of old, way back when they used to watch wrestling and it was like this," Sanchez said. "And the kids these days, they are right in on it. "They aren't afraid to voice their opinion." Though it may not seem like it at first glance, Sanchez says the show is family-friendly with no swearing or profanity. "It's just a father and son out to the show to enjoy the wrestling matches," he said. In the past, the wrestling world has been torn apart for being a negative sport, but Sanchez says, by now, people know what to expect. "I know there has been some scrutiny with wrestling in general in the past several years, but...we haven't heard anything personally," he said. "People, I think, know in 2010 that it's a show. They knew that when I tell someone I don't like them, that I don't really not like them." The Flin Flon show was one of a few stops on a CWE tour of Manitoba that also includes Winnipeg, Thompson, The Pas and Gillam. Danny Warren, who performs as Danny Duggan, is the CWE's CEO and owner. He says he was involved in wrestling from a young age and it's something he's always wanted to be a part of. Warren started the CWE a year ago in Winnipeg. To celebrate their one-year anniversary, the organization put together this latest tour. But the biggest stop for Warren was Winnipeg. "I didn't even know wrestling at this level existed," he said, speaking about his childhood. "I just...happened to come across a billboard at a community centre in Winnipeg and I went and checked out that show, back in 1997, and I went to that and watched my first live wrestling show. "From there on in, I watched that billboard every single week, waiting for it to come back." Warren says it never did. "We actually brought it back there this year for the first time in 10 years," he said. Being able to bring wrestling back to the neighborhood where Warren watched his first show, was really exciting. "...to be able to do a show in the neighborhood I grew up in and have all that community come out who knew that was my goal and my dream to be able to come out and support me...was definitely a special night for me," he said. Though his mother wasn't too thrilled about her son being a professional wrestler, he says she knew she had no choice in the matter. "There was never 'oh, I want to be a firefighter or an accountant,'" he said, "and, sure enough, I bugged (her) over all of my childhood years and into my teens, and sure enough, that's what I'm doing today." With the passion and the love of the show in his blood, Warren says a lot of work goes into what the fans see. "People really think a lot of it is put together and we spend hours and hours putting together these wrestling matches," he said, "but we've been doing it for so long that you just go in there and do it. You just go with the flow." See 'Crowd's' on pg. Continued from pg. Wrestling since his 16th birthday, Warren says he has been all over North America and someday hopes to make it overseas. For now, he continues with the CWE and promoting his passion. When it comes down to it, he said, it's a show that draws a lot of attention. "You can never predict what the crowd wants and what they are going to like," he said. "We can go into that rink and say this crowd is going to like this kind of match and if you put that kind of match together, there is a chance they may not (like it) and, no, you aren't entertaining you crowd." With that said, Warren says with CWE shows come a lot of improvising. "We just go in there and do our thing and we react accordingly to how the people are reacting," he said.
