Ultimate Upset?

Cody Everett vs Rex Bedford, Ultimate Upset? (88Wrestling)

Here's Dr. L's take on 88's new man Cody:

There are few greater joys in life than watching Cody Everett remove his ring jacket at the beginning of this match. It is a brief but masterfully arrogant performance that seems to anticipate the terrifying doom we hope awaits any wrestler of such amazing beauty. Of course, Rex Bedford has learned well how to fulfill that anticipation. And although the anticipation of doom does not necessarily demand defeat, Everett's ability to remain perfectly coiffed after three rounds of sometimes intense back and forth action cries out for some kind of punishment.

I sometimes suspect Dr. L is bankrolled by 88 and a few other wrestling sites to talk his pals - of whom I'm proud to count myself as one - into buying their product, not that I need much persuasion to buy anything from 88. This match holds particular interest. Beautiful, arrogant Cody is a sweet enticement, to be sure, but I got on this ride for Rex Bedford, the angular roughneck I swore my allegiance to almost two years ago, when he first arrived to the 88 ring. 

The match runs to three falls - Rex and Cody tying 1:1 at the end of the first two rounds. The online catalog description teases us with the prospect of Cody, fresh off the high-school wrestling mats, will dethrone Rex, 88's reigning King of the Ring. Be that as it may, I'm not interested in spoiling the thunderstriking climax for you - and the outcome interests me less than the torturous holds and brutal assaults these wrestlers employ along the way.

Cody is not just arrogant. He seems to know his stuff, as at home in the ring as wrestlers with two or three years of ring experience. Rex doesn't seem worried. He has his own kind of arrogance - one tied less to his physique, fine as it is, than to his meanness. When I interviewed him last year, I praised him for his "combustible temper and superb knowledge of submission holds." "I see myself as a warrior," he told me back then - and he is the very picture of a warrior in this fight. He even confessed, "Me myself, I like to hurt people." I almost piss myself remembering his bluntness.

What stands out for me in Ultimate Upset?  are the wrestlers' use of paralyzing holds, for which I have a thing. I focus on Rex because his are the more varied. The crab hold is a case in point (first GIF below), though I'm becoming somewhat meh about the hold, which has seen better days. For the crab to really work, a wrestler must throw his shoulders back. The imminent threat should be that he will fold his opponent like a napkin and snap the poor guy's spine. 

His other submission holds are more interesting - twisting Cody's arm behind his back (in the fourth GIF below), his other arm bars in the sixth and twelfth GIFs, and the neat reverse cradle in the eleventh. In all of them, I can practically feel Cody's shiver and cold sweat as he is held firmly and uncomfortably in place as Rex awaits a submission ... like a predatory bird atop its gashed and trembling prey. Cody turns the tables on him in the eighth and tenth GIFs, early foreshadowing of the rookie's toughness and cold-bloodedness to match Bedford's.

The blows are interesting, too. Rex bludgeons his opponents, putting his full weight behind almost every assault, taking advantage of the laws of gravity, turning his whole body into a missile designed to destroy on impact (as in the second, third, and ninth GIFs below). His and Cody's punches are convincing. I'm prepared to believe they are actually real and full force. Knowing Rex and reading what I can of Cody, they probably are.

Visit 88Wrestling here.