Obliteration

Jordan Devlin vs Kyle Fletcher, Super Strong Style 16 (Progress Wrestling)

Jordan Devlin (in black trunks) turned 30 at the beginning of this week. For over half those years he's been a pro wrestler. He's been on my radar for 10 or so years, pre-WWE. I love the strong, energetic, and somewhat rude energy he brings to the squared circle. Having had my longest steady relationship with an Irishman - by which I mean to imply that it did not last very long and was hardly steady - I have a soft place in my heart for Irish men, especially those who enjoy a good fight (most of them, I would suppose).

In this match from last spring, Devlin and Kyle Fletcher alike show enough respect for a real fight to make this match as gritty an imitation of one as possible. They fearlessly and literally lob their bodies at each other in a 12-minute suicide brawl that pushes roughhouse to the limit. This is stunt work, of course, but it is not just the flippy high jinks we commonly see in the ring. (It is not grappling either, which I would love to see Kyle and Jordan engage in, too.) The enervating action closely follows the wear and tear of a real fight, stretching it out and embellishing it with hyperrealist thrusts and recoils.

The final third gives evidence of the wear and tear on the wrestlers' bodies and minds. They slow down, but with occasional bursts of violence that seem to be dredged up by sheer willpower. Fatigue draws their bodies together to something that vaguely resembles grappling - or else the tight clinches boxers and MMA fighters sometimes find themselves in. Their assaults end in collapse - of both the attacker and the attacked. The numbed lethargy that occurs as the aftershock of extreme exertion is, for me, the sexiest point of any fight - whether in a ring, or on a mat, or behind the locked door of a motel room.

WARNING: SPOILER IN THE GIFS BELOW 

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