Remember WWE’s gang of evil male cheerleaders, the Spirit Squad? They’re back… in trios form! (Sorry, Brandon’s in Chicago today, so I feel like I have to pick up the slack in the Simpsons Reference department.)
Lost in this week’s news of ice bucket challenges and great movies making their way to Wizard World was the announcement of this year’s first entry in Chikara’s annual King of Trios tournament. For those of you unfamiliar with it, King of Trios is a utopian wrestling weekend where 16 three-wrestler teams from across the globe battle for the right to call themselves the most dominant team in Chikara. It’s a magical place to experience some of the finest in independent wrestling, and I’m really stupid for not selling more of my blood plasma and buying a plane ticket straight to Pennsylvania for this year’s edition in mid-September.
As you probably guessed from the headline, three members of the Spirit Squad have been chosen as team #1 this year. The representatives will be Kenny Dykstra, Johnny Jeter, and Mike Mondo. After being publically demoted on national TV via a comedy segment, we didn’t hear much from the Squad. Kenny hung around with Victoria on Smackdown for a while, but was released from his WWE contract in 2008. Johnny left wrestling altogether in that same year. Mike has been doing the most independent work of the three, including a three-year run in Ring of Honor. Honestly, I’m surprised they didn’t pick that Nicky guy, he was totally the workhorse of the group. What’s he up to these days?
It’s something of a Chikara tradition to bring in WWE alumni for King of Trios. Over the years, the tournament has seen the likes of Al Snow, D’Lo Brown, Sean “1-2-3 Kid” Waltman, Tatanka, Hakushi, Tito Santana, and the one and only MENG. We’ll keep you posted on more King of Trios stories as they happen. At the very least, I’m sure Brandon and Danielle will have an awesome live report to bring back from Pennsylvania. In the meantime, the Spirit Squad is nice and all, but I’m hoping that Chikara brings in a different Squad entirely…
Davey Vega is a genius and I will die protecting his vision.
