{"id":27728,"date":"2018-10-09T12:25:27","date_gmt":"2018-10-09T16:25:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lwosonprowrestling.ms.lastwordonsports.com\/?p=27728"},"modified":"2018-10-09T16:21:19","modified_gmt":"2018-10-09T20:21:19","slug":"the-global-stars-in-wwes-global-battle-royal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/2018\/10\/09\/the-global-stars-in-wwes-global-battle-royal\/","title":{"rendered":"The &#8220;Global Stars&#8221; in WWE&#8217;s Global Battle Royal"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The WWE recently announced a <strong>WWE World Cup<\/strong> tournament, with the semi-finals and finals taking place at <em><strong>WWE Crown Jewel<\/strong><\/em> in Saudi Arabia in November. One of the qualifiers last night on <strong>Monday Night Raw<\/strong> featured <strong>Baron Corbin<\/strong> inserting himself in a <strong>Global Battle Royal<\/strong>, with the winner advancing to the World Cup tournament. As it would turn out, Corbin&#8217;s &#8220;global stars&#8221; were in fact a squad featuring indie wrestlers in very 80&#8217;s and 90&#8217;s ethnic gimmicks, except for the winner. And it wasn&#8217;t Corbin. Corbin was outsmarted when returning WWE &#8220;legend&#8221;\u00a0<strong>Conquistador<\/strong> upended Corbin to win the Battle Royal, only to unmask to reveal the returning former Raw General Manager <strong>Kurt Angle<\/strong>. But who were the other men representing the &#8220;global&#8221; field? Here&#8217;s a look at the other indie wrestlers who made appearances for the WWE last night in the Global Battle Royal.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Baron Corbin&#039;s 10-Man Global Battle Royal: Raw, Oct. 8, 2018\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/_HZEEQcEAi0?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<h3><strong>From Russia, Gregor\u00a0Valkan, portrayed by FLASH FLANAGAN<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-27769\" src=\"https:\/\/lwosonprowrestling.ms.lastwordonsports.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2018\/10\/FLASH_FLANAGAN.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"399\" height=\"500\" srcset=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2018\/10\/FLASH_FLANAGAN.jpg 399w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2018\/10\/FLASH_FLANAGAN-239x300.jpg 239w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2018\/10\/FLASH_FLANAGAN-335x420.jpg 335w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 399px) 100vw, 399px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>The man in the Russian hat is actually no former Soviet, but is 26-year veteran <strong>Flash Flanagan<\/strong>. Perhaps the most recognizable of the bunch, the 44-year old from Indianapolis, Indiana competed for the <strong>USWA<\/strong> in the mid-90s and even worked enhancement for the WWF various times from 1997 through 2002. He left for Puerto Rico, becoming a regular with <strong>IWA Puerto Rico<\/strong> for the next few years, and had a few stints with <strong>Ring of Honor<\/strong> in the mid-2000s. He continues to work for Midwest indies like <strong>Southern Illinois Championship Wrestling (SICW)<\/strong> and <strong>Hoosier Pro Wrestling (HPW)<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<h3><strong>From Egypt, The Sultan of Shawarma, portrayed by IDRIS ABRAHIM<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-27770\" src=\"https:\/\/lwosonprowrestling.ms.lastwordonsports.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2018\/10\/IDRIS.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"400\" height=\"400\" srcset=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2018\/10\/IDRIS.jpg 400w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2018\/10\/IDRIS-150x150.jpg 150w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2018\/10\/IDRIS-300x300.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 400px) 100vw, 400px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>The Sultan of Shawarma may look familiar to wrestling fans who watched<strong> IMPACT Wrestling<\/strong> in 2017, as<strong> Idris Abraham<\/strong>, a solid worker from the Canadian (Ontario) indies, was part of the company&#8217;s X Division for a short spell. He&#8217;s a regular performer in Ontario indies like <strong>Smash Wrestling<\/strong> and <strong>Border City Wrestling<\/strong>, where he&#8217;s part of a tag team with <strong>Joe Coleman<\/strong> called <strong>Halal Beefcake<\/strong>. The duo will actually be appearing at the next <em><strong>IMPACT One Night Only<\/strong><\/em>, filmed this past weekend in Windsor, Ontario for Border City Wrestling&#8217;s <em><strong>25th Anniversary<\/strong><\/em> show, where they faced the duo of former WCW World Heavyweight Champion<strong> David Arquette<\/strong> and <strong>RJ City<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<h3><strong>From Mexico, El Hombre Si Nobre, portrayed by EGOTISICO FANTASICO<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-27771\" src=\"https:\/\/lwosonprowrestling.ms.lastwordonsports.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2018\/10\/robert-anthony-ego-1342806915.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"392\" height=\"591\" srcset=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2018\/10\/robert-anthony-ego-1342806915.jpg 392w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2018\/10\/robert-anthony-ego-1342806915-199x300.jpg 199w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2018\/10\/robert-anthony-ego-1342806915-279x420.jpg 279w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 392px) 100vw, 392px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>The loudest pop of the bunch from the Chicago audience was given to &#8220;Mexico&#8217;s&#8221; El Hombre Si Nobre, but the man beneath the star lucha mask is actually Illinois&#8217; <strong>Egotistico Fantastico<\/strong>. A 13-year indie veteran trained by WWE Hall of Famer and 7x NWA World Heavyweight Champion <strong>Harley Race<\/strong>, Fantastico has competed for many promotions over his career, including a run with CZW as <strong>&#8220;Ego&#8221; Robert Anthony<\/strong> where he captured the CZW World Heavyweight title. In the mid-2000s, he spent some time as a WWE developmental wrestler with <strong>Deep South Wrestling (DSW)<\/strong> and then <strong>Florida Championship Wrestling (FCW)<\/strong> as well, and last year worked a TV taping for NXT as an enhancement to <strong>Velveteen Dream<\/strong>. He still works the indies, working for the likes of <strong>Freelance Wrestling<\/strong> and <strong>Berwyn Championship Wrestling<\/strong>, as well as occasional returns to CZW.<\/p>\n<h3><strong>From Poland, Stanislav the Squeezer, portrayed by CJ ESPARZA<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-27772\" src=\"https:\/\/lwosonprowrestling.ms.lastwordonsports.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2018\/10\/CJEsp-e1539101040482.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"400\" height=\"500\"><\/p>\n<p>Most definitely not from Poland (although it&#8217;s still not confirmed if he&#8217;s a squeezer), Stanislav is actually long time <strong>All American Wrestling (AAW)<\/strong> regular <strong>CJ Esparza<\/strong>, better known as one half of the tag team <strong>Zero Gravity<\/strong> with <strong>Brett Gakiya<\/strong>. Aside from AAW, Esparza is a regular wrestler fighting with <strong>Chicago Style Wrestling (CSW)<\/strong>, <strong>Zelo Pro Wrestling<\/strong>, and <strong>Wrestling Revolver<\/strong>, the latter of which he made his IMPACT Wrestling debut as part of the Wrestling Revolver x IMPACT Twitch special,<em><strong> Penta Does Iowa<\/strong><\/em>.<\/p>\n<h3><strong>From Chile, The Chilean Seabass, portrayed by ROY FLASH GORDON<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-27773\" src=\"https:\/\/lwosonprowrestling.ms.lastwordonsports.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2018\/10\/Roy-Flash-Gordon.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"500\" height=\"500\" srcset=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2018\/10\/Roy-Flash-Gordon.jpg 500w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2018\/10\/Roy-Flash-Gordon-150x150.jpg 150w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2018\/10\/Roy-Flash-Gordon-300x300.jpg 300w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2018\/10\/Roy-Flash-Gordon-420x420.jpg 420w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>More of a Chicago Seabass actually, as the Chilean was portrayed by emerging Illinois indie star <strong>Roy Flash Gordon<\/strong>, who cut his teeth early with CSW and Freelance. He&#8217;s only been wrestling since 2014, but the past year he&#8217;s become a regular with <strong>Canadian Wrestling&#8217;s Elite (CWE)<\/strong> in Winnipeg, Manitoba as well as working with <strong>Game Changer Wrestling (GCW)<\/strong>, <strong>Rockstar Pro<\/strong> and others.<\/p>\n<h3><strong>From Antarctica, Winston Von Voorhees, portrayed by PAT MONIX<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-27774\" src=\"https:\/\/lwosonprowrestling.ms.lastwordonsports.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2018\/10\/pm1-e1539101467556.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"406\" height=\"500\"><\/p>\n<p>One of the Chicago indie scene&#8217;s bright young stars, <strong>Pat Monix<\/strong> portrayed the Antarctic doctor on Raw. Beginning with<strong> GALLI Lucha Libre<\/strong> in 2016, he&#8217;s now a regular performer with <strong>IWA Mid South, Black Label Pro<\/strong>, GCW and Freelance, as well as other area indies.<\/p>\n<h3><strong>From Belgium, The Belgium Waffler, portrayed by CHRIS THOMAS<\/strong><\/h3>\n<figure id=\"attachment_27775\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-27775\" style=\"width: 600px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-27775\" src=\"https:\/\/lwosonprowrestling.ms.lastwordonsports.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2018\/10\/AAPWMadmanvsWyatt148-e1539101848445.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"400\"><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-27775\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Chris Thomas (right), Photo: Mike Van Hoogstraat<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p><strong>&#8220;Bad Boy&#8221; Chris Thomas<\/strong> isn&#8217;t from Belgium, but actually Nashville. A 17-year veteran of Southern and Midwest indies, he&#8217;s worked for the likes of <strong>Main Event Championship Wrestling (MECW)<\/strong> in Indiana and Illinois&#8217; <strong>All American Pro Wrestling (AAPW)<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<h3><strong>From Luxembourg, Thunder Montgomery, portrayed by AARON ORION<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-27777\" src=\"https:\/\/lwosonprowrestling.ms.lastwordonsports.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2018\/10\/oD4uK7A4_400x400.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"400\" height=\"400\" srcset=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2018\/10\/oD4uK7A4_400x400.jpg 400w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2018\/10\/oD4uK7A4_400x400-150x150.jpg 150w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2018\/10\/oD4uK7A4_400x400-300x300.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 400px) 100vw, 400px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>An 11-year veteran of the Michigan indie scene, <strong>Aaron Orion<\/strong> portrayed the biggest member of the troupe, Thunder Montgomery. A regular with Detroit&#8217;s <strong>Xtreme Intense Championship Wrestling (XICW)<\/strong>, he also works with Canadian indies like <strong>Superkick&#8217;D<\/strong> and <strong>Barrie Wrestling<\/strong>, as well as Freelance, <strong>Glory Pro<\/strong>, and various other Midwest promotions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The WWE recently announced a WWE World Cup tournament, with the semi-finals and finals taking place at WWE Crown Jewel in Saudi Arabia in November. One of the qualifiers last night on Monday Night Raw featured Baron Corbin inserting himself in a Global Battle Royal, with the winner advancing to the World Cup tournament. As [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":649,"featured_media":27766,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2,25,3],"tags":[359,3579,2722,3577,3578,245,51,47],"class_list":["post-27728","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-raw","category-wwe-universe","tag-baron-corbin","tag-egotistico-fantasico","tag-flash-flanagan","tag-global-battle-royal","tag-idris-abraham","tag-kurt-angle","tag-raw","tag-wwe"],"modified_by":"Jamie Greer","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27728","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/649"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27728"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27728\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27766"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27728"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27728"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27728"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}