With Lethal Leap Year quickly approaching our closed circuit systems, it’s time for your crackpot preview writer from Cageside Seats Weekly to break down the announced matches and give a guess on who will come out victorious with the winner’s purse that every wrestler desires.

Southpaw Regional Wrestling has a barnburner of a card shaping up - the likes I’ve never seen before in my time as a wrestling columnist. So with no stalling, let’s break this card down.

Tex Ferguson vs Chad 2 Badd

In professional wrestling, never have I ever seen a feud as personal as this feud going on between Tex Ferguson and Chad 2 Badd (Tully Blanchard and Magnum TA, eat your hearts out). Tex and Chad weren’t just friends - they were brothers. They did everything together: drinking, meeting ladies, and drinking.

All this changed when Tex started earning more winner’s purses. He started splurging on fast cars, expensive clothing, and the finest restaurants to wine and dine his many female conquests. As Tex got richer, Chad was left by the wayside as a poor, broken man. He started to lose his genuine smile and charm, replaced by jealousy, insanity and bloodlust in a man with nothing to lose.

This all came to a head last week when Chad claimed he sent Bad News Allen, Freddie Blassie, and Greg Valentine to maim Tex by blinding him and destroying his arm after a two-hour armbar. All of these vicious attacks have left Tex as a rich yet broken man, so now he has nothing to lose either.

They say that money can fix anything, but it cannot fix a destroyed brotherhood.

Look for Tex to channel every ounce of his blind rage toward Chad. However, Chad will just sit back and taunt Tex until he wears himself out, allowing Chad to get his first winner’s purse after a quick 1-2-3.

Big Bartholomew vs “The Banker” Mr. Mackelroy

On a night of huge, personal matches, this one is no exception. Big Bart, who is just trying to live his simple, American farm life with his lover/cousin Christian Joy, has been harassed by Mr. Mackelroy for weeks on end.

Why? Simple. Mr. Mackelroy is a greedy excuse for a man who just wants another buck to his name. So much so that a couple weeks ago, he foreclosed on poor Big Bart’s farm.

Foreclosure. A tactic so rare to see, yet so slimy. Only the worst bankers in the world have used this tactic, and each time it was used, it brought utter ruin on a family.

Big Bart, however, will not see his livelihood destroyed by some petty banker with a godawful moustache. Therefore, upon presentation of the match contract by Clint Bobski, Bart immediately signed and joined his lover in a “USA” chant despite reporting from those so-called “dirt sheets” that Bart might actually be from Europe.

But hold on there, sport. Mr. Mackelroy was going to take advantage of the fine print that Bart couldn’t read. Instead of Mr. Mackelroy taking on Big Bart, Mr. Mackelroy’s frightening SEA CREATURE was going to be unleashed on the world.

This is all tentative though. A source in the SRW locker room told me that management was looking into this Sea Creature. Rumor has it that Mr. Mackelroy made a deal under-the-table with a fledgling territory in New York. If this happened without consulting management, then this match won’t happen, and Mr. Mackelroy will never again wrestle in SRW.

Whatever happens, expect Big Bart to channel all of that American energy into a victory at Lethal Leap Year so he can use his winner’s purse to get his farm back. His lover will be at ringside, so expect her to play into the victory somehow...

...unless Mr. Mackelroy paid her off as well...

12 Man Battle Royale for SRW World Championship

Although Lethal Leap Year is quickly coming together and is less than a week away, we still don’t know much about this 12 Man Battle Royale for the SRW World Championship. We do know about three of the participants.

John Johnson, the current SRW World Champion, is one of the most charismatic performers on the roster today. He may possess a visceral fear of speaking on a microphone, but his fear makes him charming for the ladies in the crowd. He has a moveset that is to be reckoned with, including a dangerous belly-to-back suplex that has sent many wrestlers to the hospital with spinal damage (apparently my Utica source tells me that management may ban the move). However, in an over-the-top Battle Royale, that suplex won’t help him to get his opponents over the rope. He’s going to need a new strategy for this, and quickly.

The second announced participant in the Battle Royale is “Impressive” Pelvis Wesley. For the last few weeks, he’s been “jobbing” to more well-known wrestlers such as Tex Anderson and “Rambunctious” Robbie Richards (look for him to get a title shot soon). I honestly have no idea why they picked “Impressive” Pelvis Wesley to be in this Battle Royal other than to entertain the children with his offensive dancing. If he wins the Battle Royale, then I will eat some of that Georgia Gold chicken that they’ve advertised for weeks now.

The wild card in all of this is our third participant, La Barba Grande. I don’t know much about this guy, and neither do any of my sources. However, what I can tell you is that he’s from Mexico and is famous for something called “Lucha Libre” - Mexican wrestling, if you will. From what little I’ve seen of it, “Lucha Libre” involves a lot of acrobatic moves and flips. This is something that the SRW fans may not accept, but we will have to see.

I can’t place a prediction on this one yet because the rest of the field is yet to be announced (“Rambunctious” Robbie Williams” and “Hellacious” Harold Hunter are among the rumored names). However, expect an exciting Battle Royale.

That concludes this match preview column for Lethal Leap Year. Check your mailboxes or newstands next week for the next Cageside Seats Weekly where we will preview the completed card and list betting odds from Las Vegas.

_________________________________

EDITOR’S NOTE

We regret to inform you all that, as announced on this week’s Southpaw Regional Wrestling tapings, Lethal Leap Year was cancelled due to a scheduling error in the office.

Per multiple sources, the head of scheduling, one Vincent McDonald, was using a new electronic calendar which had not been programmed properly, causing it to show 1987 as a leap year, which it is not.

Lethal Leap Year’s cancellation has thrown the territory into chaos with its wrestlers demanding answers from management about this turn of events. Rumors are rampant that many of its wrestlers have entertained offers from the aforementioned territory in New York.

The most exciting card in professional wrestling history is gone, just like that. This is a truly sad day for the sport of professional wrestling.