REVIEW: Fountain City Pro - Bombs Over Ball (2024)

A Life Professional Wrestling show held on May 10, 2024, in Olathe KS

One of the more unfortunate things about my current work schedule is that I’m usually unable to attend events during the week without taking time off. As a supervisor at my workplace, this creates issues, especially on Fridays. This is why I’ve been missing out on Kansas City’s newest wrestling company, Fountain City Pro, which primarily runs Friday shows. As a result, I’ve had to wait for YouTube releases to view the content, such as what I’ll be talking about today. This is something I plan to rectify in the future, as I will be attending Fountain City Pro – And Justice for All on July 12th. In preparation for that show, I will be releasing two bits of FCP content this week: this review you’re reading now and a preview for the next show. While it sucks that I wasn’t there from day one, I will do my best to keep up moving forward!

Fountain City Pro is ostensibly a reboot or continuation of the older, and now defunct, company Journey Pro Wrestling as it shares key members of that company’s leadership. Journey Pro Wrestling was a prominent independent wrestling promotion based in Kansas City that ran from 2019 to 2022 (although a reunion show appears to be incoming). Journey Pro gained a reputation for its vibrant shows, featuring a mix of local talent and well-known wrestlers from around the country, and the fanbase seemed very passionate about it while it lasted. That’s why many are excited for Fountain City Pro as it appears to bring that magic back.

The subject of today’s review is Fountain City’s second show Bombs Over Ball, with the name referring to the Ball Event Center in Olathe Kansas to which this show was put on. Currently, Fountain City is running a tournament to crown their first-ever champion with this show holding a handful of first-round triple-threat bouts to move to the next round. By the end of Bombs Over Ball, fans knew the final four going into the final four to be held at the next show. Without further ado, here’s what happened at Fountain City Pro Bombs Over Ball, a show you can easily also watch at the convenient link below!

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The Card:

5-10-24 at the Ball Event Center, Olathe KS.

Atlas Armstrong won a Battle Royale
Rey Leon (w/ Dickie Richards) defeated Austin Reddick – Fountain City Pro Title Tournament First Round Match
Shazza McKenzie defeated Ashlyn Alexander and Ethan Everheart and Jaxon King and Nixi XS and Xac Abstrct – Guy’s snacks invitational elimination six way scramble match
OnlyFriends (Logan Knight & Stormi Renee) defeated The Main Attraction (Calvin Aldridge & Tobias Storm)
Camaro Jackson defeats Heidi Howitzer – – Fountain City Pro Title Tournament First Round Match
Anaya & Mighty Micah defeat The O’Neal Brothers (Devin O’Neal & Steven O’Neal) w/ Nixi XS
Luke Langley (w/ Greg Jovi) defeats Scott Tyler – Fountain City Pro Title Tournament First Round Match
J Fowler (w/ Midnight Guthrie) defeats Anakin Murphy and Gary Jay – Fountain City Pro Title Tournament First Round Match

DISCLAIMER:

I make it a point to cover most, if not all, of the matches and provide reports on what happened, along with any significance they may have to ongoing feuds. You might think some of my opinions are dumb, or the way I review things is dumb, and that’s OK! Diversity in preferences is what makes wrestling so great. I strive to maintain a positive outlook because there’s already enough negativity in the wrestling community (in my view), and we can all contribute to making it better. However, it doesn’t mean I won’t offer opinions or criticisms when warranted. Let’s cut the B.S. and, as the old saying goes, “Just enjoy Wrestling!”

My Thoughts:

All Match images are screen grabs from the Youtube Video.

Originally, this match was announced as Austin Reddick VS “2nd 2 None” Kenny Alfonso, who sadly “had to cancel”, although it was implied that foul-play may have been at hand. Keep in mind that Kenny beat Rey Leon at Fountain City Pro – Light it Up, and I’m sure he’s still not thrilled about it. In head stead, manager Dickie Richards jumped on the opportunity to get his client, Illustrious Rey Leon, onto the card and into this match. This was an extremely competitive match that went back and forth for a while. Leon’s mixed martial arts background seemed like it would have given him a leg up on Austin, but Austin appears to be an accomplished submission wrestler in his own right. At one point, Reddick was about to win with a half-crab, but Dickie Richards interfered, pulling Leon from the ring, and giving him a weapon of some sort.

As the commentary team stated, it was basically a handicap match at that point. Thankfully, senior official Nick Chinn was able to diffuse a bit of the trouble, but the odds were definitely against Reddick. After a cheap shot, followed up by a rock bottom, and a running knee it was lights out for Reddick – Ray Leon advances. Leon then made everyone mad as he appeared to even try to be sportsmanlike, only to throw a knee to Reddick’s face to add insult to injury. After the match Reddick threatened to get revenge with a tire iron. Rey Leon has seemed to make two VERY big enemies on his way through this tournament, which is definitely a choice. Let’s see how that pans out!

Next up was the Guy’s Snacks Invitational, which is a series of matches the company plans to have at each show. This particular one was an elimination inter-gender scramble match containing six challengers. There were many people that I had not seen before, including Ashlyn Alexander, Xac Abstract, and Jaxon King, and well as three that I had including Shazza McKenzie, Ethan Everheart, and Nixi XS. To start off, Shazza and Ashlyn dumped all the boys out of the ring and went at it. I was especially impressed with Ashlyn Alexander as she is very agile and dominating, even against the guys, in the ring.

The Match ended up being comprised of smaller intergender one-on-ones peppered throughout like Ashlyn vs Everheart, and King vs Nixi XS. The tactic always seemed that somebody would dump people out of the ring so as to avoid having to fight a group of people, which added a cool dynamic to everything. The final two competitors left in the match were Xac and Shazza, with the crowd firmly behind Shazza. At one point, Xac dumped Guys chips on ring to slam Shazza into, but she reversed it and hit him with her finisher. I don’t know about you guys, but eating snacks in bed has resulted in potato chip crumps that are itchy and are a nightmare to clean up, I feel bad for Xac as he will feel the efforts for a while I’m sure. 1-2-3 and Nick Chinn had to do janitorial work to clean up the ring.

For this match-up, FCP fans were treated to a tag-team bout between ONLYFRIENDS, Logan Knight and Stormie Renee versus the unlikely duo of Tobias Storm and “The Realist” Calvin Aldridge, whose name is up for dispute. While that picture up there might clearly read “Main Attraction”, Tobias Storm seems to insist that everyone refer to the pairing of himself and Aldridge as “Team Double Stuffed”, so that’s what I will be doing as well. The members of Team Double Stuffed are historically enemies, but seem to be setting aside differences, at least for now. Perhaps that shows growth on the part of Aldridge, who seemed to be somewhat humbled by his big loss to Tobias at the last KCXW show for their Season of Xcellence Tournament finals. We shall see how long this lasts.

Both teams have meshed well as tag teams, providing exciting tag team moves like Tobias and Aldridge performing a combination flatliner / facebuster at one point, or a double cannonball from Renee and Knight. ONLYFRIENDS were somewhat on the back foot for a while until Knight was able to reverse a double suplex attempt, which I feel was the turning point. Stormi is a powerhouse and at times manhandled her opponents even using them to inflict pain on each other. After a lot of great back-and-forth, Logan pinned Tobias after a massive top rope splash, and that was that.

Suddenly, Campbell Meyers and SK Bishop, better known as The Premier, invaded the company and attacked Team Double Stuffed, they were eventually scared away after the locker room cleared and everyone stood tall against them. Keep in mind that they have been slagging off Fountain City Pro on social media for months now, so I am sure that they are definitely NOT welcome.

This tournament match was originally a three-way match including a wrestler named Kevin Lee Davidson or “KLD”, who sadly had to drop out due to injury. The card was set to be reshuffled, but apparently these two specifically asked for this match. Heidi and Camaro are friends, and wanted to see who the best of the best was at this show. At times Heidi and Camaro seemed to be trading shots, perhaps as an escalating test of who had the greater fortitude. Both competitors are similar in size, with Heidi having the agility edge over Camaro, and Camaro having a strength advantage over Heidi. This honestly could have gone either way.

During the match, Heidi seemed to lose herself in playing around in the crowd a bit, like slapping Camaro in the face and humorously almost hitting a fan, but Camaro seemed to hit a point where all bets were off, and he was determined to win. He hit Heidi with a big boot to her face, hit an absolutely MASSIVE lariat, and secured the win – Camaro ensured both hands were raised, and both got an ovation from the crowd. can tell this was a really fun match for the crowd, and everyone definitely was having fun.

To fully understand what was going on with this match, one has to look back at a springtime Central States Wrestling show from Kansas City. Anaya and Hoodie Howlett, better known as The Tribe, had a massive falling out and seemed to be in an unrepairable situation, this was days after this match was announced and put FCP on the back foot slightly. Anaya ensured that the match would go on according to plan, but NOBODY had talked to Hoodie about his thoughts on the matter. Hoodie just outright seemed to disappear after the incident. The pairing were set to face off against The O’Neal Brothers and Nixi XS, and to no shock to anybody, Hoodie was a no-show. Apparently, Anaya had a plan – Mighty Micah, who was back from injury, and sometimes known as an unofficial “third Howlett”, was there to help. It’s been since 2022 since Micah has wrestled as far as I know, and factoring in things like “ring rust”, he looks good. Micah has even seemed to have gained some muscle mass since last appearing.

I’m not certain, but I believe this is the first time The O’Neal Brothers have wrestled in Kansas City, and they definitely stood out as an intimidating force in this match. Not only do they have a large size advantage, but collectively they meshed very well, from all of their tag experience as a unit, which is not something I can say about Anaya and Micah. Honestly, Anaya was not very serious, even using Micah as a weapon at one point – imagine a human lawn dart. At one point. Mighty Micah hit a huge crossbody on Steven O’Neal, “Hulked it up”, and hit Devin with one, essentially taking care of the match and getting a surprise roll up pin. Anaya, likely annoyed that Micah got the win, attacked and ripped up his Howlett shirt. I’m not sure I’m surprised to be honest.

Langley vs Tyler was cut from the video due to Tyler being banned from the company for an undisclosed reason. Good for Langley, I will always rep that dude.

The main event for the evening was the final Fountain City Pro Title Tournament First Round Match. Before anything even got started, the match was bookended by one of the area’s most insufferable managers, Captain Midnight Guthrie, laying into senior official Nick Chinn and calling out his family for some reason. Guthrie did everything he could to provoke him, even pulling him out of the ring, punching him, and throwing him through curtain to seemingly waste time. At one point, later in the match, Guthrie was about to dive on people, and Nick Chinn heroically speared him and did a dive of his own. Chinn vows it’s not done with them, so we shall see where that goes.

The match proper consisted of a three-way bout between “All Steel” J. Fowler, Anakin Murphy, and “Robo Ginger” Gary Jay. It’s been a while since I’ve seen Anakin Murphy (a 2022 CSW show I believe), and I’m happy to report that he has definitely improved since then. That’s not saying he was bad before, or anything, Murphy is just very agile now and has gained skill since I last saw him. Fowler seemed to somewhat target Murphy, likely due to their size differences, often throwing Anakin around like a bag of laundry. J. fowler attempted to ground the match and go for submission holds most of the time, and eventually capitalized on nature of three way matches by using his opponents against each other. He hit a gigantic jackhammer to Anakin for the win after a big release German suplex that incapacitated Jay. Fowler moves on to the final four.

After the dust settled, Gary Jay refused to shake hands with Anakin, thus angering him. Apparently, Gary had his back when others told him he couldn’t wrestle, but not at this show. Gary Jay mused, “what exactly did Gary Jay gain from helping him out?” The follow-up ought to be a crazy match!

Conclusion:

This was a pretty solid show, and had some solid improvements over the first. Overall, the production was better, with things like instant replays standing out to me as something you don’t see too much on local shows. Perhaps my only gripe was that I couldn’t hear promos at times, whether it be due to commentary or mic levels, if they could straighten that out the end result would rival some of the bigger promotions in the area quality-wise. Be sure to look into the next show which is coming up this week, and I hope to see you there!