When I first heard we had a new roster for NZPWI editorials, I thought I’d write about the New Zealand wrestling scene when it was my week. It’s kind of my forte, why I joined the NZPWI team back in August of 2006, and seeing as I cover both KPW and NZWPW and can watch IPW Ignition on TV, it’s something I feel pretty confident writing about.

However, one of our newest staff writers, Stevie McCleary, joins the team with a dedication to the NZ scene that rivals my own, and covered the state of local wrestling around the country in depth in his debut editorial  last week. This sent me back to the drawing board somewhat. But don’t worry, this week’s editorial isn’t going to be a dud – at least, I hope not – because I’m coming at this from another angle. You see, while things have been thriving in New Zealand for most of the year, 2010 has also been a big year for New Zealanders wrestling outside of New Zealand, with many of our finest reaching a stage where they’re ready to test themselves internationally in one form or another.

Take KPW’s Max “The Axe” Damage, for example. Damage based himself in Los Angeles, California for two weeks in March, training at Jesse Hernandez’s School of Hard Knocks and wrestling for the Empire Wrestling Federation on March 7 and 14. If you don’t know who Jesse Hernandez is – I didn’t before Max went to the United States – he’s trained a few prominent names in the industry, including Awesome Kong, Kazarian, Melina and Rico Constantino.

But that’s not all Max got up to in the United States. With WWE Raw in San Diego and SmackDown in Los Angeles, Damage and a selected few from the EWF roster were invited to wrestle tryout matches before the shows – Max’s second WWE tryout in the space of two years. Max was even visible on the live broadcast of Raw, hanging out backstage while Triple H walked to the ring. While there, Damage met nearly everyone on the WWE roster, from Bret Hart to Zack Ryder and many more listed in his Damage Gauge blog.

After returning to New Zealand and losing the KPW Championship, Max has been overseas once more this year, this time wrestling with PWAQ in Brisbane, Australia in August. While in Australia, Damage wrestled 12 matches over 10 days at The Royal Exhibition of Queensland, an “almost two week long carnival with rides, food, shows, and this time around wrestling” as the man himself puts it.

IPW’s “Double D” Davey Deluxeo and brother Dils Deluxeo have recently returned from an overseas excursion of their own this year, training at the Team 3D Academy in Kissimmee, Florida! Run by TNA’s Brother Ray and Brother Devon, the Team 3D Academy teaches its students all the aspects needed for success in pro-wrestling, from in-ring work to all-around entertaining and fitness training, according to the Academy website. As an aspiring tag team, the Deluxeos couldn’t hope to learn from anyone better – TNA recognises Team 3D as 23-time world tag team champions!

Davey Deluxeo has prior experience in the United States too, having visited Booker T’s Pro Wrestling Alliance in Houston, Texas. With the input of some of wrestling’s biggest names, “Double D” is on his way to becoming an internationally recognised name, flying New Zealand’s flag in the United States. In fact, Deluxeo received some of that much-deserved recognition earlier this year when he placed #437 in the annual PWI 500.

Every year since 1991 Pro Wrestling Illustrated has compiled a list of who it believes to be the best 500 active wrestlers in the world. The 2010 edition of this list, the PWI 500, features three New Zealanders (that’s a whopping 0.6 percent!) in “The Deal” Dal Knox, “Te Tahi” Vinny Dunn and “Double D” Davey Deluxeo. I have no idea what sort of circulation Pro Wrestling Illustrated gets, but if we can get it in New Zealand then it’s got to be available in pretty much all of the western world, which equates to massive exposure for our three ranked IPW wrestlers.

While Dal Knox coming in at #327 despite not wrestling a single match all year undermines the legitimacy of the list a little, it’s still very cool to see a somewhat credible international publication keeping an eye on the New Zealand scene. Names of interest ranked lower than Deluxeo and Dunn include ECW’s Colin Delaney, NXT season two rookies Titus O’Neil and Eli Cottonwood, and WCW’s Prince Iaukea.

Rhys Ali is a name on the FCW roster that not too many people are familiar with, but more New Zealanders should be seeing as he’s one of our own! Rhys came to my attention at NZPWI earlier this year when he applied for an AMP “Do Your Thing” Scholarship. Ali has managed to bypass the New Zealand pro-wrestling scene and wind up in Florida with a WWE developmental deal, making him arguably New Zealand’s most successful wrestler right now, depending on your definition of success.

NZWPW’s “Shining” Nick Silver is abroad as you read this in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, the home of Lance Storm and the Storm Wrestling Academy. Silver will stay in Canada training under the guidance of Storm for close to three months, working his way up “from square one, all the way through to ring psychology and having matches” according to the SWA website. SCW rookie Sammy V will be joining SNS in the 12-week training program at the SWA starting tomorrow, September 7.

Now, I’m not sure who exactly will be reading this – let me know with a comment below or e-mail me at – but it’s possible that you’ll be thinking that a lot of what I’ve just covered is old news, or not that big of a deal, right? That’s the big deal! The fact that it’s not mind-blowing for someone who wrestled their first match at the Lower Hutt Horticultural Hall to be backstage at WWE Raw in California, or for a former World Heavyweight Champion in Booker T to be calling Davey Deluxeo a “ring general” is mind-blowing in itself.

I may have only been writing for NZPWI for four years, but I’ve been following the New Zealand scene for a lot longer, to the point that I can remember when Tommy Combat meeting RVD was our greatest claim to fame outside of The Bushwhackers. Now, not only have we exported talent around the globe, but we’ve had several international names like Chris Masters, Disco Inferno and Raven arrive in our country to wrestle our wrestlers in our promotions.

Every now and then it’s nice to take a step back and evaluate what we have in the New Zealand wrestling scene – it’s simply phenomenal stuff. I’ve not heard of anywhere else in the world that’s gone from essentially nothing in 2003 to a thriving local scene where our top names are rubbing shoulders and even trading headlocks with some of the best in the business just seven years later. If you don’t frequent local shows held by IPW, KPW, NZWPW and SCW I suggest you make an effort to do so, so you can catch our best wrestlers live and in the flesh before television becomes the only way for you to see them as they showcase their skills on a much-deserved worldwide stage.