Front and Center

Axel vs Skip Vance, Match 527 5(UCW)

Axel's codpiece upstages not only his opponent, Skip Vance, but also Axel himself. In fact, as much as I love wrestling, for the 31-minute match I'm only occasionally aware that there is wrestling here I should be paying attention to. It doesn't help matters that the pouch, along with the rest of Axel's body and gear, and Skip's, is so steeped in oil that it appears to float in space surrounded by liquid streaks of lightning only occasionally recognizable as glimmering human bodies.

As far as I can tell, Skip is unfazed by the rod that thrashes left and right and up and down, hypnotically, except that for the first five minutes he appears to think that IT, not Axel, is the adversary who must be controlled. Notice, for instance, the firm handle he has on it in the second screen grab above. Or the fifth. Or the seventh. In those rare moments when the interesting object is eclipsed from view, as when Axel traps Skip in a camel clutch, I can't help but wonder where it has gone, what is it doing now, when it will be coming back, whether it thinks of me sometimes.

Fortunately, the not entirely foreign object does not hinder the two athletes from wrestling, though I would imagine it would be like wrestling somebody with a pogo stick in between. I'm not sure that the match benefits from the distraction, but as distractions go, this one has its own sort of star power.