During his time in the UK independent wrestling scene Kris Travis was extremely well liked and respected by both fans and peers alike. He unfortunately passed away from stomach cancer on March 31st 2016, he was 32 years old.
Preston City Wrestling (PCW) was one of Kris’ favourite promotions to work for and since his passing a number of tributes and events have been organised by the company to honour his memory, both in and out of the ring, including the Kris Travis Memorial Tournament, set to take place later this month.
It was recently revealed that the proceeds from the event would not be given to charity, something that while not confirmed by PCW was largely expected as previous events by other companies across the UK had seen charitable donations made to cancer charities.
PCW have released a statement (see below) on this unfortunate situation and tournament competitor Pete Dunne has also confirmed via Twitter that he will be donating his fee for the event to the Cavendish Cancer Care charity in the UK.
PCW (based out of the UK) have signed a deal to showcase their ‘Tribute To The Troops’ show on HD iPPV. PCW have partnered with 247.TV for a history making event as this will be the first iPPV shot in HD from Europe.
Scheduled to appear at the event are EX WWE/TNA talents including: Rob Van Dam, Billy Gunn, Ken Anderson and Drew Galloway, the confirmed bouts for the event are:
PCW Championship: Sha Samuels vs. Drew Galloway
Iestyn Rees Alpha Lock Challenge: The U.K. Hooligans vs. Ken Anderson & Billy Gunn
Joey Hayes vs. Joe Hendry
PCW Tag Team Championship: The London Riots vs. Team Single
Dave Mastiff vs. Martin Kirby vs. Charlie Garrett vs. Sammy Smooth
The cost for viewers will be around 5$, this event is a major milestone for both PCW and British wrestling in general so the success of the show could have a huge effect on the company moving forward.
Next weekend, while most of the notable talent on the American pro wrestling scene (and a lot of names from elsewhere, as well) will be in Dallas for WrestleMania weekend, TNA’s Ethan Carter III was set to go to England for bookings with both Southside Wrestling and Preston City Wrestling. The promoters of the two groups are friends and generally split the transportation costs of international talent, so they tend to share each other’s outside names. Today, via nearly identical statements from both Southside and PCW that were posted on their respective websites, it was announced that TNA has pulled EC3 from both dates, telling PCW that ”Unfortunately nothing can be done. This is a network commitment and something he had no control over.”
As of this writing, it’s unclear exactly what kind of “network commitment for Pop TV (or perhaps an international partner like Sony Six in India) came up. The same goes for why it necessitated EC3 being pulled from his WrestleMania weekend bookings on eight days’ notice. The Southside statement said that they were told EC3 was needed to do “media work.”
Being that the show is WrestleMania weekend and just about every suitable replacement you can think of is already booked in Dallas on at least one of the many area independent shows, this is a much more difficult to solve problem than even a normal short notice pull-out for an international guest star. In his statement, PCW wonder Steven Fludder noted this issue, but promised the fans that “I have worked hard to secure somebody and subject to him finding his passport we may have another guest from the USA.” The other international fly-ins who are booked on the show (Ken Anderson , Cedric Alexander , Angelico , Eddie Kingston, and Jade) are still appearing.
This is the second time in the last several months that TNA has pulled EC3 from UK bookings on short notice, the previous occasion being so he could go do promotional work for TNA’s tour of China. You may remember that TNA’s tour of China ended up never happening. At PWInsider.com, Mike Johnson explained that according to his TNA sources, the latest cancellation was complicated by EC3 being booked directly instead of through the TNA office. Apparently, TNA took the stance that there was nothing they could really do, whereas they tried to make the situation right when James Storm (who must be booked through TNA per the terms of his new contract) had to be pulled for similar reasons this week.
Of course, just because TNA felt no obligation to help PCW and Southside doesn’t mean they couldn’t have tried to find out who was available this week that would be a suitable replacement for EC3. That said, as Dave Meltzer noted at F4WOnline.com, the most suitable replacements under TNA contract are already booked. The Hardys and Drew Galloway will be in Dallas. Bobby Lashley will be in Mexico, but that’s on Wednesday so he might be able to be freed up.
The TNA Slammiversary pay-per-view main event could be in jeopardy, as MVP has apparently suffered a knee injury on Friday night while working for Preston City Wrestling. MVP later explained that he heard his knee “pop” during the match.
MVP was scheduled to work another match on Saturday, but came out at the beginning of the show and cut a promo explaining that he was injured. He said he went to the hospital and got an X-Ray that came back inconclusive. He said he needs to undergo an MRI.
Whether or not the injury is serious enough to affect his pay-per-view match with Eric Young in two weeks is a serious question.
