The elaborate entrance of Swerve Strickland with extra dancers to accompany Prince Nana may quickly go for naught, as Hangman Adam Page shows how motivated he is by swiftly attacking Swerve outside the ring. Page goes under the ring for duct tape, but pauses to throw a chair in Strickland’s face.
After quickly taping Swerve’s hands together, Page uses a stapler to put several staples into Strickland’s pecs. He staples a piece of paper to Swerve’s left arm and follows with staples to the other arm and back.
If that wasn’t enough, Page staples a note to Strickland’s face, pulls it off and then drinks the blood for a second. Yes, really.
When Hangman goes for a barbed wire-wrapped chair, Swerve finally fights back … but he starts no-selling staples and turns it around and staples Page in the forehead. Strickland grins through a face full of blood and staples himself.
Page gets tossed into the barbed wire chair in one corner. Swerve takes some barbed wire and grinds it across Hangman’s face, then looks for more weapons underneath the ring. He finds a cinder block and places it on the edge of the ring as both men land strikes. They fight to the apron, where Swerve bites Page and hits a Death Valley Driver onto the cinder block.
Strickland hits a piledriver on top of the barricade, even as blood continues to cover almost every part of his face. Back in the ring, Page hits a couple of fallaway slams but doesn’t spring up as quickly as he usually does. Fortunately he has barbed wire close at hand, wrapping it around Strickland for a fallaway slam with the wire. Damn.
Page connects on a moonsault to the floor with the barbed wire chair, getting the fans to their feet again. But that same chair gets kicked into his face, and Swerve goes for a piledriver onto the chair. Page reverses it, and only Nana can save Strickland from the ref’s 10 count.
When Hangman looks for a DeadEye off the turnbuckle, Strickand is able to reverse it into a powerbomb, followed by a Swerve Stomp … all on the chair. Not quite satisfied, Strickland dumps glass shards onto his foe and hits a 450 splash, then the JBL Driver. Page somehow pulls himself up on the ropes before the 10 count.
Strickland clotheslines Page to the floor and grabs a chair while Nana gets out a board studded with barbed wire. The board is set across two chairs, but Swerve may regret it when he goes up top. A flipping powerslam sends Swerve through the board, and it’s followed by a powerbomb and DeadEye into the barbed wire.
Once again, Page wraps his foe in barbed wire and connects on a Buckshot. Nana pulls his boss out to the floor to save him, then does his dance to motivate him.
That gives Brian Cage a chance to run down and destroy Hangman with several power moves. Cage sets up a table on the floor, but Page is lying in wait with barbed wire wrapped around his fist. There’s a clothesline for him too.
Page finally has enough of Nana and gives him a DeadEye off the apron through the table, but that gives Strickland a chance to break the cinder block over his upper back. When it becomes clear Page isn’t going to stay down, Swerve wraps a metal chain around his neck and tries to choke him out.
Will this finally end it? Page tries his best but can’t beat the 10 count, and even in victory, Strickland slumps down beside his rival before crawling over him and stumbling to his feet.
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