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Gunnz vs. Reed: The Feud That Never Ends

Posted: Jul 18th 2024 By: Michael Hunt

Shari Lewis once popularised a song titled "The Song That Never Ends".

In NAW, Ryan Reed and NAW Tag Team Champion Mike Gunns seem to be having the feud that never ends.

September 2023 saw Reed and Gunns come to blows when they both were in a Triple Threat Match with Manico for the NAW Title that Reed held. Manico won that match and successfully defended the belt in against Reed in a rematch while Gunns won the NAW Openweight Title, which allowed him to cash that in at any point for an NAW Title match. Gunnz would do just that to take the belt from Manico in a TLC match in February, leaving Reed out in the cold. And feeling slighted by this, Reed turned on Gunnz in an 8-man tag team match, restarting the issue between them. But by that point, Gunnz was no longer the NAW Champion. Marlboro Slim had won it from Gunnz and then lost it when J. R. Orullian cashed in the NAW Openweight Title.

Now, Mike Gunnz found himself as 1/2 of the NAW Tag Team Champions with Stephen Nitro, a person he doesn't even really like. But he dislikes Ryan Reed even more. And at the NAW event on July 13, Gunns aimed to spoil the day for Reed. During an NAW Title match between Gunnz and Orullian, Reed whipped Orullian into the referee, knocking him out. Sensing treachery afoot, Gunnz ran out and caught Reed with an Unprettier, the helped revive the referee so he could count to 3 and Orullian could retain the title.

After that, Gunnz had to worry about retaining his own title as he and Stephen Nitro faced off against the debuting Drake Gallows and Mr. Nabors. Accompanied by the managerial prowess of C. M. Burnham, this duo came to play no games. Gallows already has over 40 different titles to his name but there is always room for more and it appeared he would get to log another title to his record when, after about 30 seconds in the match, Gallows schoolboyed Nitro and put his feet on the ropes to secure the pin. But the bell did not ring and despite the protests from Gallows and Burnham, NAW Commissioner Rolling Thunder came out and declared that it was a 2-out-of-3 Falls Match. This did nothing to calm the challengers down as that stipulation had not been announced, but since they had secured one fall so quickly, they believed they could repeat that feat.

And they were wrong, as Nitro rolled up Nabors to even the match at 2-falls each.

The third fall saw Gallows and Nabors isolate Nitro for quite a while until he made a tag to Gunns. Gunns came in and cleared house, then after a superkick to Gallows, Nitro was shoved by Gunns into Nabors and after the collision, fell back onto Gallows for the pin. Gunnz and Nitro retained the belts, but Ryan Reed then came out for revenge as he delivered Stunners to both the champions.

Nothing was resolved. And after almost a full year of interaction between the two, the question stands: How CAN this be resolved? Are these two destined to continue fighting until the end of NAW's existance? NAW Commissioner Rolling Thunder might need to think up a drastic stipulation to bring this feud to an end before someone's career (or life) is put in jeopardy.