Bridgeview Wrestling Association
From Bywpedia
| Bridgeview Wrestling Association | |
| |
| Details | |
| Acronym | BWA |
| Established | 2005 |
| Creator(s) | Tornado & Blaze |
| Style | Athletic and technical wrestling |
| Wrestling base | Professional ring |
| Location | Bridgeview/Justice, Illinois |
| External links | BWA Website BWA Wrestling on YouTube |
BWA started out as a basement wrestling league with no name in about 2003. It was founded my John “Tornado” Steele and Joe “Blaze” Shue and was held in Shue’s basement. Gradually, more people began to join, such as Marc “Scorpion” Denson, Mike “Inferno” Neri and others. They eventually moved all Steele’s yard in the summer of 2005 and began to wrestle on his trampoline. Still with no name, more people began to join. We saw the debuts of Nick “Matt Knicks” Almendarez, Sam “Ambition” Almendarez, James “Extreme” Thomas, and Mike “X” Rodriguez. At this time Shue and Denson were rarely wrestling and John Steele and Nick Almendarez took over as co-owners and came up with the name AAW (All-American Wrestling). After some time, AAW moved all operations to Rodriguez’s yard and his trampoline. AAW then celebrated their 1st Year Anniversary, which was main evented by Matt Knicks and X in a Bridgeview Death Match for the AAW Heavyweight Championship. Soon after this, Steele left the company leaving full ownership to Nick Almendarez. Then, soon after this, he decided to change the name of AAW, as to not confuse people with the Chicago Independent wrestling promotion of the same name. Then in the summer of 2006 he changed the name to BWA (Bridgeview Wrestling Association). With the new name Knicks new he had to add more people to his roster. With that we saw the addition of people like Kyle “Ace” Watson, Paul “Grande Pablo” Ferfecki, Dominic “Domi” Cialoni , Alex Ohlson, Brad “ Social Hazard” Shear, Justin “J-Ash” Ashley, Dan “Phoenix” Leja, Dan “ Wicked Hatchet Dan” Rodriguez, Shane “Shane O’Mac” Schmitt and Kyle “ The Impact Player” Freiberg. Then in the summer of 2007 they celebrated their 2nd Anniversary which was main evented by Domi and X for the BWA Heavyweight Championship. Also at the show, there was a performance by an up and coming local band, The Forgotten Saints. BWA then celebrated their 3rd Anniversary on July 19th, 2008. It took place at the Justice Park District and was done in a real ring rented from the NWA Underground promotion in southwestern Michigan. The shows main event was Matt Knicks defending his BWA Heavyweight Championship against Domi in a 2 out of 3 falls match. Also on the show saw NWA Underground wrestler, Hardcore Harry wrestle X. As of this writing, BWA is set to do more shows with the NWA Underground and will be having GBYWN supershows.
