The Collective: Joey Janela's Spring Break 4 recap

byDennis DuBay •
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Here's the thing about Joey Janela's Spring Break: While it's advertised as a wrestling event, it's really a love letter to the past.

With the hot start of Rickey Shane Page's open challenge, the bait-and-switch till we got Orange Cassidy to the match pitting an aging Ricky Morton and the namesake of the show, this was 80's wrestling in 2020 - with a death  match twist.

Seeing the pop that Orange Cassidy got to open up one of the most anticipated shows of The Collective really hit home how fucked up 2020 has been for pro-wrestling.


We've missed out on so much of what could have been feel good moments of the year, replaced with months of nothingness - And Janela set forth to fill our wrestling starved souls in one night.

The show was excessive in time (4 hours and change); including a ClusterFuck that saw 50 entrants in what seemed like a two hour affair on it's own.

I can't even get into all of what happened, i'll let my buddy Parker Klyn, of The Wrestling Observer website fill you in on the Cluster Fuck ... he documented it all.

I'll summarize it: Nate Webb entered number one, a bunch of crazy shit then happened, including the return of The Invisible Man - probably my favorite thing about the Cluster Fuck; it's amazing how these guys and gals sold for an imaginary wrestler. Had me cracking up.

And at the end, Nate Webb was still standing to win the Cluster Fuck. 

FEEL GOOD MOMENT of the night, Juicy Finau made his GCW debut after garnering the respect of Ricky Morton and others backstage helping out with ring crew just looking for a way in. He got that moment during the Cluster Fuck and made a HUGE impression.


Ricky Morton handed Joey Janela his third straight loss at Spring Break, defying time and gravity with Canadian Destroyers and bleeding like it was 1985 again. It's been said a million times in the wrestling community - but how fucking crazy is it to see Ricky Morton winning matches in 2020? And looking good while doing it!


In a real solid match, Lio Rush defeated ACH with an absolutely beautiful frog splash that began as a technical classic but ended in a really physical confrontation when ACH became frustrated with Rush's refusal to quit.


Chris Dickinson never loses. At least, I've never seen him lose - and that bodes very bad for Jon Moxley - whom he faces at BloodSport tonight; Dickinson teamed up with AEW stars Santana & Ortiz to defeat Alex Zayne, Blake Christian and Jordan Oliver.

Really fun six-man, with Dickinson's team playing the brawn side of things and Zayne's team doing what they do, fly fast, fly freely.

In a highly anticipated match, Tony Deppen and Alex Shelley both looked great in their match, with Deppen taking the win.

The one thing that really dawned on me as the show went on is, there were wrestlers from all different promotions on this show. AEW, MLW, ROH, Impact Wrestling ... it's really a cool thing to see all the promotions kind of working together to ensure the future of the business.

In my match of the card, Jonathan Gresham defeated Lee Moriarty after Moriarty submitted to the octopus hold. Going into the The Collective, i thought it was 
Moriarty's time to shine .. and it has been, but in a way i didn't expect. 

He's paying the dues this weekend. The future is still bright - I just didn't see him losing so many matches this weekend.

And finally ... the end. The last GCW match for death match god, Matt Tremont. While he didn't go out with a win, he did bleed. And at the end of the day, I think that's all Tremont needs.

Alex Colon is arguably the best death match guy in the business right now. I mean, Nick f'n Gage said it himself. Are you going to argue with Nick f'n Gage? 

I didn't think so. 

There was the usual ingredients: tubes upon tubes and sadistic aggression tempered only by the cuts of bloody skin and the knowledge and understanding that this was death match history on a Saturday night in Indiana.

Watch the show. Watch this match. Then thank Matt Tremont for all he's sacrificed in the ring.



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