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Excellence Personified Dominate Wherever They Go

Posted: May 12th 2010 By: CMBurnham

Discussions of powerful factions in Oklahoma independent wrestling usually boil down to a few big names. The VIP Crew dominated OPW for all of its existence and continued on into OCW and the beginnings of TPW. The P.I.N.K. Nation forced SRPW to shut down and had limited success in AACW. The Old School Assassins were long-term mainstays of MSWA and made their presence known in IZW and federations in Texas. And since the beginning of IZW, Impact, Inc. has been there cause havoc while also disrupting the happenings in MSWA.

But as great as these factions have been, none have been as dominate in as many federations simultaneously as Excellence Personified. Mike Iles has said repeatedly that this group was not forced together by management or cobbled together to hope that their collective strength outweighed their individual weaknesses. They are friends, inside and outside the ring. And that bond is leading them to amazing accomplishments in just a short period of time.

Ironically, the group almost never began. Initially, Excellence Personified was supposed to be formed in SWCW and would have consisted of Jack Legacy, Luc Lapointe, Beau Dalton and Striker. But Iles resigned from the SWCW commissioner position before all the pieces could fall into place and managed to bury that little idea below anyone's radar. Which is why he could pull off what he did in MWA this past Friday.

Those who have followed the internet reports on this site know that Iles has been in every federation that EP had made its presence known in. For most of those feds, Iles has proudly stood at ringside, leading his associates on to victories and titles, such as the ComPro Tag Team Titles held for a time by Jack Legacy & Se7en. But in MWA, Iles had a position of authourity and often seemed at odds with the members of EP. That all proved to be ruse as Iles actions proved on May 7.

EP's night started off very well as Dustin Heritage challenged Dexter Hardaway and MWA MAX-Division Champion Shane Morbid for the title in a Triple Threat Match. Morbid and Shane have a long history between each other, much of it extremely violent. Heritage's main focus was the title and that might have proven to be the important issue. After all 3 men had battled to the point of exhaustion, Morbid delivered a crushing belly-to-back suplex to Hardaway. Heritage then superkicked Morbid and covered Hardaway for the pin. Already 1/2 of the Southern Tag Team Champions, Heritage now added singles gold to his resume. But things were barely beginning for the group.

Later that night, the other half of the Southern Tag Team Champions, Jack Legacy, received the title shot he had earned at the previous show by winning the Gauntlet Battle Royal. He challenged MWA Champion Jeff Starchild for that prestigious title. And it appeared that things were going to go the way of the champion when Mike Iles came out before the match began and ordered Heritage, Michael Barry and their newest recruit, Ken Masters, to leave the ringside area. Iles said this was going to be a 1-on-1 match and to make sure there would be no outside interference, he appointed himself the special enforcer at ringside. The match began and eventually spilled outside with Starchild using the steel barricade on Legacy's crotch area. The two combatants then battled into the crowd area, trading blows with a crowd of people (and security guards) up close and personal in the action. Finally, both men returned into the confines of the ring area and reentered the ring. And then things became very interesting. EP came strolling down the ramp. Iles grabbed a steel chair and entered the ring, ostensibly to defend Starchild. But as the champion moved closer to the ropes, Iles swung the chair into the back of Starchild, allowing Legacy to roll him into a pin. Iles then stripped off his corporate shirt and revealed the EP shirt on underneath it. And the crowd stared in amazement before random objects began to pelt the ring area. Iles had pulled off the swerve of the decade. No one in Spavinaw expected it. No one saw it coming. And they were irate. But none of that mattered to EP, who proudly reclaimed control of the MWA Title and revealed the long-term member who had been there all along.

Still elated off the victory from the night before, EP arrived in Wagoner for the TAP event at even greater strength. Ken Masters (aka Kenny Campell) was in Lawton, inducting his friend Tyler Bateman into the IZW Hall of Impact, but the rest of EP, including former member Lars Manderson and new recruit Haji, emerged in full force to take advantage of an unfortunate situation. TAP Tag Team Champions The Mexecutioners had been stripped of their titles due to failing to show up and defend them. And new co-commissioner John the Encourager had announced that the titles would be filled in a Triple Threat Elimination Match. X-Rated had been entered in. Steven Sterling's regular partner, Sam Stackhouse, was competing in Arkansas that night, so Sterling recruited Angel Skycall to fill in. And EP was going to compete, but Mike Iles insisted that they be allowed to pick which members themselves and proceded to hold a blind draw. The result was that Dustin Heritage & Se7en would represent EP in the match, but that didn't mean that the rest of the membership would leave. All the other personalities remained at ringside and were impossible to ignore. Much of the match was spent with EP refusing to participate, tagging someone else if they got tagged into the match. This meant that both of EP's opponent teams wore themselves down much more quickly. X-Rated were eliminated first, and while the team of Sterling & Skycall did well for a team that had never worked together before, they didn't have the bond that EP did. Eventually, it was all over and Excellence Personified added another accomplishment to their list as Dustin & Se7en walked out as the new TAP Tag Team Champions.

About the only member of EP not to have a positive weekend was Michael Barry. Barry teamed with Tim Rockwell and lost to Blake Albright & Max McGuirk in Spavinaw, due in part to the actions of Mike McGuirk, Max's mom. Then, in Wagoner, Barry was the last man to enter a Gauntlet match and faced Shane Morbid. Morbid had already taken out ComPro Oklahoma X Division Champion The Canadian Luchadore and Maniac Mike. But Barry was several steps above those competitors. And he was rested, which was certainly not the case with Morbid. The other members of EP even tried to assist Barry by forming a 15-person chain abdominal stretch which connected all the members of EP with some of the fans sitting at ringside. It didn't matter, though, as Morbid was able to connect with two "Barnaby Jones" clotheslines and become the #1 contender to the TAP Championship.

Excellence Personified stands atop MWA and TAP as champions. They lord it over ComPro because they've BEEN champions. Now, could it be that they are poised to move on and challenge other territories? Se7en regularly wears his EP T-shirt to the ring whereever he competes and has regularly been competing in IZW & SWCW. Might he be leading an invasion? Brad Michaels is listed as their liason for the southern region of the state and has managed Se7en in GPCW. Several feds remain unscouted by the membership. But if EP do actually invade another company, the ones with the biggest factions of their own may be the only defence those feds have. Because it seems like the only way to defeat Mike Iles is to sweep everything out from under him and force him to start over.

Tags: VIP Crew, OPW, OCW, TPW, P.I.N.K. Nation, SRPW, AACW, Old School Assassins, MSWA, IZW, Impact, Inc., Excellence Personified, Mike Iles, SWCW, Jack Legacy, Luc Lapointe, Beau Dalton, Striker, MWA, ComPro, Se7en, Dustin Heritage, Dexter Hardaway, Shane Morb