By Trapper Tom
With William Patrick Corgan’s purchase of the National
Wrestling Alliance this year, the NWA has been a topic of conversation for the
first time since Shane Douglas tossed the famed “Ten Pounds of Gold” down.
Over the past few weeks, current NWA World Heavyweight Champion
Tim Storm, has had more title defenses than any WWE World Champion. However,
overall details of the “new” NWA’s future plan have been more secretive than
anything at Area 51. However, a “Busted Open” podcast from October 9 revealed
something that almost no one knew. Hosts Dave LaGreca and Larry Dallas
interviewed Corgan, who announced that the main arm of the NWA has cut off all
affiliates.
“We’ve let all of the affiliate programs lapse,” said Corgan
in the telephone interview. “There will be no more NWA affiliates.” Corgan went
on to say that he “empathizes with everyone else,” including those who have created
their own “kingdoms,” championship belts and the like in affiliate program.
However, the current NWA President, who is best known as a musician and Smashing
Pumpkins front man, said “to the victor goes the spoils” and the program is now
a thing of the past.
While no definitive, current and active list of affiliates currently
exists, numerous searches find dozens of federations from all over the United States
laying claim to the NWA in some fashion (with seven promotions in Texas alone).
While most of the current list shows promotions that date back to only the year
2000, a few dates back later than that.
According to cagematch.net, Western Pennsylvania, McKeesport’s
PWX was the NWA East flag-bearer from 2001-2012 (with PWX on the books beginning
in 1999 and the NWA name last officially being listed in January, 2011). During
its final few years, NWA East had a number of “affiliates” outside of PWX. None
exist in 2017.
Since PWX dropped the NWA East banner, no promotion has
maintained the same kind of prominence.
Many independent federations claim to be NWA affiliates, yet
a number don’t figure the iconic letters in their promotion. “Innovative
Wrestling” from Tennessee and “Irish-Italian Wrestling” based in New England
were just two.
It’s interesting to note that current NWA Champion has defended
the vaunted “Ten Pounds of Gold” in some of the Texas-based affiliates this
year.
Corgan promises NWA wrestling “content” in the spring, and
Storm continues to defend the belt and make appearances celebrating the belt’s
lineage. Storm attended Tommy Dreamer’s “House of Hardcore” recently and “The
Innovator of Violence” told the current champion that he’d love a shot at the
title. Storm said he’d be willing to defend against Dreamer at any time. Meanwhile,
NWA’s “Ten Pounds of Gold” documentary team took video of Shane Douglas in the
background near the belt. Filmmakers noted that Douglas refused their request
for a comment.
In a separate podcast, Douglas said he’d like to challenge
for the NWA belt, and if he won, he would run the belt over with some heavy equipment
and throw the trophy in a river.
