On Friday night (15th February), Riptide Wrestling served up a belated Valentine’s Day gift to the south coast wrestling fans in the form of Deep Six. Though the show delivered in the end in terms of action, it was the behaviour of some fans in attendance that had more than a few in the crowd shaking their heads in disbelief.
Having rode the storm of a difficult 2018 that saw the knock-on effect of some shows being cancelled towards the tail end of the year, it was great to see Riptide make its way into 2019. A sold out crowd spoke volumes about the interest in having a wrestling product in Brighton, but the atmosphere on the night took a while to get going. This can be attributed to a mixture of things: competition (Rev Pro ran York Hall the same night) and contracts perhaps meaning Riptide regulars weren’t available; the introduction of several newer wrestlers because of this; the more casual nature of the audience when compared to companies like PROGRESS.
Whilst this meant an occasionally muted atmosphere to begin with, matches like TK Cooper versus Candy Floss and Cara Noir against Ashmore definitely got the crowd going in places, and you had what felt like three guaranteed wrestlers to get a reaction: Jack Sexsmith, Spike Trivet, and Chuck Mambo. For what they represent, or how they carry themselves, you don’t really need to have a deep affinity for wrestling to either love or hate them.
Chuck Mambo naturally had the crowd behind him in a successful defense of the Brighton Championship against Mark Haskins. The Sexsmith/Damon Moser match was hurt by what I feel is confusion about Sexsmith’s seeming heel turn on social media, yet the expectation that he is the good guy (as he should be) in Riptide. Fans wanted to cheer him, but didn’t really know if they should.
In between these two contests was Spike Trivet going up against Wild Boar Mike Hitchman. At a time when the show had lacked genuine heat towards a wrestler due to the aforementioned, Trivet was exactly what was needed. At a base level, he represents an ideology at odds with most of the people that are likely to be at a wrestling show in Brighton. Also, he holds himself like a cocky twat. Perfect heel.
As the two men began to tussle in the ring, attention was somewhat diverted by a group of five or six fans cheering on Trivet. At one point, Hitchman drew attention to it with something of a point and a shoulder shrug; Trivet effectively told them to stop doing it halfway through the contest. I’m rarely a man who believes that you should or shouldn’t chant something and don’t often draw myself into those type of debates. However, I still am somewhat of the belief that you should cheer faces, boo heels.
Now, if the booking of the wrestler means their disposition is wrong, I can get why you might want to boo a face or cheer a heel – look at Becky Lynch and WWE’s initial attempts to have her as the heel in her conflict with Charlotte Flair. However, Trivet is very much presented as a repugnant guy who wouldn’t piss on you if you were on fire. He doesn’t warrant cheers, and more importantly, I’ll assume that the guy who plays the gimmick of Spike Trivet also doesn’t want cheers. He is a bad guy; his job is to make us hate him, and it is a job he does well. It harkens back to Jimmy Havoc’s mega heel run in PROGRESS – he got legitimately pissed off if even one fan showed him signs of support.
I get that it can be difficult because Spike does his job so well that he becomes likeable to watch be the arrogant dick that he portrays. I’ve spoken before about how he is legitimately funny in his put downs, generating laughs even from the multitudes who boo everything else he does. He is a great heel to watch and to help knit together the overarching storylines that play out in Riptide. To show my appreciation, I bought a t-shirt, but I still boo the fuck out of him every time he walks out.
The biggest problem with supporting Trivet in that contest was that it threatened to suck the atmosphere out of the room at a time when it felt like it should have been reaching its zenith. It all came across as too knowing, whilst showing little awareness to the detrimental effect it threatened to have on the match itself. The focus became those fans rather than the action inside the ring all too often.
You pay your money, you have a right to get involved. However, I think people need to take a step back and consider whether what they are doing is actually supports the wrestler they like and the promotion they want to support. If that’s what you are looking to do, the only real option is to boo Spike.
