Pro Wrestling Guerrilla

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Pro Wrestling Guerrilla
Details
Acronym	PWG
Established	2003
Folded	no
Style	Professional wrestling
Location	Southern California
Founder(s)	Disco Machine Excalibur Joey Ryan Scott Lost Super Dragon Top Gun Talwar
Owner(s)	Disco Machine Excalibur Joey Ryan Scott Lost Super Dragon Top Gun Talwar ^[1]

Pro Wrestling Guerrilla (PWG) is a professional wrestling promotion that is run by wrestlers themselves as it was created and is operated by Southern California wrestlers Disco Machine, Excalibur, Joey Ryan, Scott Lost, Super Dragon, and Top Gun Talwar.

The promotion debuted on July 26, 2003 and is known for its unique mixes of humor and professional wrestling, as well as their over the top press releases and show titles, which include: "Kee_ The _ee Out Of Our _ool!", "Taste the Radness", and "Free Admission (Just Kidding)."

1 History
2 Roster
3 Current champions
4 Tournaments
5 See also
6 References
7 External links

[edit] History

In May 2003, Pro Wrestling Guerrilla announced its first show that would take place on July 26. The promotion released an online press release announcing the show's main event that would feature what would have been the first match to take place between AJ Styles and Samoa Joe. PWG announced more matches in the weeks leading up to their debut event, featuring a mix of well known independent wrestlers and many local Southern California stars. Due to injuries and booking conflicts, the card ended up being changed several times. Samoa Joe was unable to compete in the promotion's debut show because of an injury he suffered in a match with Paul London at a Ring of Honor event a few weeks earlier. He ended up being replaced by Frankie Kazarian.

Over the next few months, PWG's popularity began to grow among the Southern California wrestling community and was considered the top independent promotion in California. Despite running six shows in its first year, PWG was voted "Promotion Of The Year" in the 2003 SoCalUncensored.com Year End Awards. PWG's DVD commentary, which features Excalibur, Disco Machine, and on occasion TARO, along with various comedy skits won over many fans along with storylines between Adam Pearce and Frankie Kazarian for the PWG World Championship, and the Super Dragon vs. Joey Ryan rivalry. Along with putting local wrestlers in many of their storylines, PWG also brought in many out of town talent that weren't booked on other local shows. During its first year, PWG brought in wrestlers such as AJ Styles, Christopher Daniels, Samoa Joe, CM Punk, Homicide, Chris Hero, Brian Kendrick, Colt Cabana, and many others.

In July of 2004, PWG moved to the Hollywood/Los Feliz Jewish Community Center in Los Angeles. The first show in the new building saw AJ Styles take on Rocky Romero, CM Punk vs. Super Dragon, Samoa Joe & Ricky Reyes vs. Bryan Danielson & Christopher Daniels, and a loser leaves town, steel cage match between Adam Pearce and Frankie Kazarian where Adam Pearce ended up losing the match and left PWG. After this event, PWG would run at the Hollywood/Los Feliz JCC for the next two years, and was nicknamed "The Sweatbox" by its fans due to the heat that the building would generate during warm nights. PWG's popularity continued to grow in the Southern California area, and across the world thanks to PWG distributing their own DVDs on their website, and through various reviews posted on many popular internet wrestling message boards. As PWG went on, their normal attendance numbers would begin to grow from 150-200 fans a show, to 250-500 in a span of two years.

In April of 2005, PWG ran its first All Star Weekend shows during the weekend of WrestleMania 21 and drew their biggest crowds at the time. PWG booked several stars such as AJ Styles, Christopher Daniels, James Gibson, Chris Sabin, Jonny Storm, Kendo Kashin, Samoa Joe, and many other TNA and ROH stars to participate in the weekend's events. In September 2005, PWG ran the first annual Battle of Los Angeles tournament, featuring AJ Styles, Christopher Daniels, James Gibson, Super Dragon, Kevin Steen, El Generico, and several others. Chris Bosh would end up winning the tournament by defeating AJ Styles in the finals.

In February of 2006, PWG held two shows in Europe. The first event was held in Essen, Germany. The second show was held the night after the Essen event in Kent, England. Both shows featured the majority of PWG's regular roster, along with several European wrestlers. In July of 2006, PWG announced that they would be leaving the JCC due to the gym being turned into a gymnastics training center for young children. The final match in the building saw Joey Ryan defend the PWG World Championship against B-Boy in a steel cage match. PWG would go on to run in Reseda, California for the next few months at the local American Legion post. In February of 2007, PWG moved to the Van Nuys Armory, which is located a few minutes away from the Reseda venue, where PWG continues to run at to this day.

In March of 2007, PWG's Commissioner Of Food & Beverage Excalibur stripped Cape Fear (El Generico & Quicksilver) of the PWG World Tag Team Championship when Quicksilver was unable to compete because of a class two concussion he suffered during a match with Davey Richards & Roderick Strong. A tournament was held on May 19 and 20 to crown new tag team champions, with Roderick Strong & PAC emerging the victors.

On May 3, 2007 PWG released a statement via the PWG Message Board at PWG's official site announcing they would no longer be working with Total Nonstop Action Wrestling after TNA presented them with a contract that would prevent contracted TNA wrestlers from appearing on DVDs sold through any third parties, including PWG's long-time partner Highspots.com. PWG stated that after looking at several solutions, including ending their contract with Highspots, releasing their DVD solely through their website, and removing all matches featuring TNA wrestlers from their home releases, they made the decision to end their relationship with TNA and thus were no longer able to book TNA wrestlers. This resulted in the loss of Frankie Kazarian, the first holder of the PWG World Championship, The Motor City Machine Guns of Alex Shelley and Chris Sabin, who were already booked to compete in the tournament for the vacated PWG World Tag Team Championship, and Samoa Joe, AJ Styles, Low Ki, and Christopher Daniels, all of whom had been booked to appear on upcoming shows. [1]

PWG celebrated their fourth anniversary with a show on July 29, 2007 at the Burbank Armory in Burbank. The event was scheduled to have the Briscoe Brothers on the card, but the team did not appear at the event which caused the card to be changed. The show ended up seeing Bryan Danielson defeat Necro Butcher in a Street Fight, Kevin Steen & El Generico defeat Roderick Strong & PAC for PWG World Tag Team Champions, and Bryan Danielson defeat El Generico to become the new PWG World Champion after issuing a challenge to him that ended up leading to an impromptu match to close the show. The show drew 500 fans, which tied the record for the largest live crowd to witness a PWG event. The show also made Southern California wrestling history, as five matches from the event were ranked in the Top 5 of the SoCalUncensored.com's monthly rankings, an accomplishment no other promotion had been able to achieve. [2]

[edit] Roster

See: Pro Wrestling Guerrilla roster

[edit] Current champions

Championship:	Champion(s):	Won From:	Date Won:	Location:
PWG World Championship	Human Tornado	Vacant	February 24, 2008	Reseda, California
PWG World Tag Team Championship	Roderick Strong & Jack Evans	Kevin Steen & El Generico	May 18, 2008	Burbank, California

[edit] Tournaments

The following is a list of the tournaments held by the American professional wrestling promotion Pro Wrestling Guerrilla, along with their winners.

Tournament	Winner(s)	Date(s)	Location(s)	Notes
Badass Mother 3000	Frankie Kazarian	August 29, 2003 August 30, 2003	Eagle Rock, California City of Industry, California
Tango & Cash Invitational	Homicide & B-Boy	January 24, 2004 January 25, 2004	Santa Ana, California	Tournament was held to crown the first PWG Tag Team Champions
Battle of Los Angeles 2005	Chris Bosh	September 3, 2005 September 4, 2005	Los Angeles, California
Battle of Los Angeles 2006	Davey Richards	September 1, 2006 September 2, 2006 September 3, 2006	Reseda, California
Dynamite Duumvirate Tag Team Title Tournament	Roderick Strong & PAC	May 19, 2007 May 20, 2007	Burbank, California	Tournament was for the vacated PWG World Tag Team Championship
Battle of Los Angeles 2007	CIMA	August 31, 2007 September 1, 2007 September 2, 2007	Burbank, California
¡Dia de los Dangerous!	Human Tornado	February 24, 2008	Reseda, California	Tournament was for the vacated PWG World Championship
Dynamite Duumvirate Tag Team Title Tournament	Roderick Strong & Jack Evans	May 17, 2008 May 18, 2008	Burbank, California