Verdict: Big Jim and Nicholas Carson no showed, unfortunately. Therefore, the winner, and the man who advances to the next round of the Intercontinental Championship Tournament, Akira Kobayashi!

Feedback: Good little bit of set up there at the start to bring the reader into the match. I'm always happy to see those types of introduction. It was interesting to see the two bigger men team up on the smaller man, also. I liked when Akira started slapping Nicholas, as if to say "You don't intimidate me!" However, it's the following stuff that I feel could maybe have been paced out a little better. By that, I mean the action is good, but some parts seem a little bit like they're in fast forward. For instance, the military press and low blow part, I feel, could have maybe been elaborated upon to set the scene a tiny bit better. It's not a major gripe I have, I just feel like a little bit exposition around it would have been nice, to the tune of something like "Carson has enough of Akira's swift slaps to the face, wrapping his hand around his throat. Akira struggles against the grip, but ultimately can not escape Carson lifting him into a military press" yadda yadda yadda. I saw it crop up later in the match, too. Essentially, where a moment could span across 2 or 3 sentences instead of just 1, put in a little bit about the set up. It really helps with the flow of the match. As I said, nothing major really, just perhaps something to consider for the future.

Other than that, your description is pretty good, if not a little thin, your action was entertaining, and overall it was a good match. Good move variety, though I do feel like low blows were a tad overused throughout the course of the match. Even something like throwing in a few kicks to the groin, maybe headbutts or whatever, would have been better. I feel like after too many low blows, the opponents would kind of be more wary of them and see them coming more.

Overall, not too much to pick out, apart from deepening some of the action to improve the flow, so it doesn't turn into *this happens, this happens, this happens*. Thanks for showing, and I wish you luck in the tournament!

Unfortunately, a double no show here. This match didn't happen. Move it along, people, nothing to see here.

C5 Ion Wins by No-Show.

Drake: Reading the beginning part of your match where you had Drake attack Travis via, by lunging him towards the cornered Travis whom just lifted a knee up toward the abdomen of Drake before he delivered a Uppercut towards the Jaw of Drake and the Impact that it had as he staggers towards the Ropes selling the Impact of it.-Was great selling or Realism as we would say it here. On to your Second Paragraph, "He then repeats the act again, leaving Drake with no other option but to cringe in the corner. Levitt straightens his opponent up again and kicks him in the abdomen AGAIN, these repeated blows proving to be a slower-paced variation of Daniel Bryan's corner kicks"- I loved the way how you compared the kicks that Travis does is similar to the way that Daniel Bryan does his as it gives me a good visual of how Travis is doing the kicks. Another spot that I thought you did well in was when you had Travis lock in the Dragon Sleeper. The rest of your match I thought you did well. On a Side-Note, I really enjoyed the Commentary that you had going on between Ted and Joey.

Travis: Like the Chain wrestling moves that you have going on here in the starting portion of your match. Having both of them starting at a Collar and Elbow tie-up before Levitt pulls Drake down with a Side Headlock, Drake then going onto the Ropes and then putting Travis into his own Headlock then into a Hammerlock. ", calling for D-2! Now it's The Dysfunctional One's turn to drag Levitt up off the mat. Dysfunction slams Levitt's head between his legs, throws an arm up, and then hooks Levitt around the waist. D-Double lifts Levitt high...and in mid-air, with Drake's own body blocking the view, Levitt looks straight at Drake and SPITS A FIREBALL into Dysfunction's Face!"- Reminds me abit of Dragon Ball Z

Verdict: I thought this match between these two men were equal. Both had a good amount of action going on, the selling was good, and both did well in letting there adversary take control of the other. However, Travis Levitt I thought had the better match.

Double No-Show.

Greg wins via, No-Show

I guess maybe I got careless here. I posted the grades with this labeled (by someone else) as a no-show win for Vlad even though Tyson clearly posted. This is because someone (I'm not sure who) assumed that Tyson changing the stipulation resulted in a DQ which I think is a pretty harsh treatment for a first offense. I will grade it now, (disgruntled, mind you) with that in mind.

Tyson: I'm not sure why "no DQ, no countout" meant to you it should be turned into a backstage brawl. I enjoy the creative nature of the concept, I really do, but it wasn't what I was looking for at all. As far as the brawl goes, I thought it got a bit cartoonish in points where maybe you didn't want it to. The cotton candy on the nose isn't the type of thing I'd expect from either character as, to me, it came off as a mid-card comedy act type thing. Undertaker didn't get cotton candy on Maven when he whooped his ass throughout the building, did he? In the future, I'd stick to (mostly) in ring stuff unless the stipulation calls for a lot of backstage action. The glass finish would be nice in different context. I think you over-did it in a lot of aspects.

Vladimir: Talking about past fed accomplishments by the name of the fed doesn't generally go well for a variety of reasons. First of all, no one, for the most part, knows what those accomplishments mean because we have no concept of those feds. With Ric Flair, he can reference WCW and NWA because those are all things accepted under the WWE canon. I hope you understand what I mean. You won't be punished for doing it, obviously, just some friendly advice. I will say out of direct context, I really thought the pre-match build up would have really established interest in Vlad in a short period of time, which I think is an accomplishment. I'm not sure if you wrote to the circumstances, but I thought your match was pretty short. Your description is quite good.

Verdict: Vladimir Strife wins. Like I said, I thought your match was pretty short. You wrote about 2600 words bell to bell, but with your description being excellent it still made for quite the short read-through. In the future, that will really harm your chances because not only is action and entertainment a big factor in grades for most graders, but with such little material it's really hard to create the tone you want. As far as Tyson goes, I just think it was a case of not understanding what I was looking for. I think Tyson fits in really well in the hardcore division and would do really well in a stipulation-heavy atmosphere.

Abdel quit the fed about a week ago. I would be lying if I said I didn't see it coming. You're welcome to return whenever you feel like it, but it hasn't seemed like you felt like fedding for a while. Have fun buddy.

The Pirate wins via, No-Show.

In canon, this match never happened.

Azrael: I must say, ever since I gotten this spot as GM and I've grade several matches in the past few months since gaining this spot, but the Opening of your match I gotta admit, was something special then the other matches that I've had read. The trading of words and the exchange of Chairshots the two men have I would say, makes your match Tense. More Tense then it was already before. The biting to Jared's hand also made Azrael look like a Monster...I read abit more down and I see that Azrael is now biting Jared's head. Now I know he's more than a Monster. "The Masked Man takes a moment to spit some of the blood that got into his mouth onto Jerusalem’s face, who now has a hand on his forehead in an attempt to lessen the bleeding."- What a Jerk. Moving down a Paragraph and I notice Azrael sure does love to laugh a lot. Loved how you had Jared come back abit and use the Baseball bat on Azrael. it keeps Interest in the Match and doesn't kill the Flow of it to being one sided. The Winning Edge onto the Tactics was I would say, Awesome! Just to kill this long read, Overall I found your match to be a good read.

Jared: With the countdown only reaching to one and before it could hit zero, the light's come back on and Jared is already in Street Clothes, ready to go and running down the Ramp towards the Ring to take Azrael down with much emotion built inside him since The Wedding. I would have had Jared come through the Crowd and attack Azrael from behind but that's me personally. I thought you did a good job on having Azrael work on the leg of Jared after he Dropkicked the Steel Steps on Jared's legs causing him to trip. and did a good job on selling the impact of the move. "However the masked menace isn’t finished yet with his dastardly deeds. He wraps The Tag Champ’s legs around the steel post. Azrael jumps up resting his feet on top of each sides of the top of the apron and galls back while grabbing the injured leg of Double J, locking in a figure four from steel post of the corner." - I thought you did well in writing this spot in.

Verdict: Both Men did a Good Job on making this match a Street Fight Match. More then a Street Fight actually like a Hardcore Match. Both Matches had great detail, selling, and Action. Azrael takes the win. I'm really looking forward to what you guys have next planned in this Storyline.

I want to note how fucking pissed off I am that we had six matches to grade and after volunteering for the two hardest ones I still got fucking stuck with this.

I normally state, at least to myself before grading, what I'm looking for. I honestly have no clue what I'm looking for. Hopefully one of these matches stands out in some way.

Effy: Quick notes: 1 good, 1 bad. First, Effy's character has developed brilliantly. The psychotic with her shrink at ring side is awesome. Second... What the fuck is this shit? "Dr Stone tells Effy to keep her temper. In most cases, losing your temper in a match could actually help you immensely, yet Dr Stone isn’t allowing her patient to lose it." thanks for that, dickwad. There are a few more examples of that... Don't do that. As for your match, I enjoyed it to an extent. I really got into the characterization, but I thought you missed a big opportunity there. When Nicole Johnson kicked out of the TSS and you wrote that Effy was losing it, I was completely on the hook. I'm a sucker for great characters. Effy calming down and regaining her cool to survive another false finish, I thought, was a big mistake on your part. That said, I still really enjoyed your characterization. Your match was OK. Nothing special. Lots of false finishes but none, outside of the one I mentioned, that I thought would have 'got' the audience.

Johnson: A good effort from you. Nothing really sticks out for me about characterization, the one area I thought your opponent excelled. Your finish stood out to me as strong because through a quality back-and-forth contest it created a clear image who the better wrestler was, even though Effy was made to look strong.

Verdict: I'd advise both of you to go read even just a few passages from Chilly's post and notice how little narration he puts into his matches. The Effy character can be something special with some work. I really, really enjoyed the opening and there were times when something special was there. With that said, I hope you can continue to work on it through a loss, because nothing else held up to the standard set by the women's champion. Nicole Johnson's match, in my opinion, had superior action, flow, and finish.

Rob Chapman: You continue to be one of the best writers I know, with your descriptions up there alongside Kani's. Nice technical start to the match. It's not anything really quick in pace, which I like. It's refreshing to see somebody go at things from a technical stand point instead of big spot after big spot. Plus, your descriptions are just too beautiful. One thing I love about your post is your attention to detail. For instance, mentioning that DC sits up while in the Headlock to avoid being pinned is something you don't often see in eFedding. The two wrestlers trying to one up the other is another thing I enjoy about this post. Seems fitting for their characters and it makes for good action, technical in this case. There aren't many people that can make a Headlock seem interesting, but you manage to do it numerous times in this post. The F5 into a Slingshot Suplex was a very original move and I quite liked it. The DDT reversal to the Phenomeplex was beautifully done. My only complaint is the ending. It just seemed a bit rushed, in my opinion. This epic back and forth contest and then Rob just gets pissed and hits his finisher and that's it. It wasn't a bad finish, by any means. I just don't feel it did your match justice. Your post was still very good, however. It was much more of a technical match than anything else and didn't really have all that many big spots, but that isn't a bad thing. We need more good technical matches. I feel like the only people who can really pull them off are the ones with descriptions like yours.

DC Hennig: I've heard a lot of good things about you as far as your writing is concerned and, early on, I've got to say I'm not disappointed. Your description is very good. A good start to your match as well, with DC being caught off guard by Rob and realizing he has a challenge. The Full Nelson Facebuster was absolutely brutal. I quite liked the Suplex reversal, as well. Something innovative, that I've never personally seen before. That's one thing I like to see in eFedding; innovation. When giving feedback on Rob's match, I noted that there aren't many people that can make a Headlock interesting. It takes the right descriptive ability. That goes for Chinlocks and other basic submissions as well and you're doing a good job of it yourself. One thing I wanna point out, I don't think this match is actually for points in the tournament. I think the tournament officially begins next week. I'm not gonna take any points off of you for that, but I just felt like you should know. The set up to the Missile Dropkick was very well done. The missed attack by Rob, DC pulling himself onto to the top rope, all of that. It was very well done. But, also, the description was a big factor there. You described it so well that it felt like a really big moment in the match, despite not being that huge or innovative of a move. The Outer Limitz Elbow reversal was pretty cool and I always love a good Piledriver. Oooh, a Tarantula. Don't see that often. I really liked the Suicide Dive. It was unique how you had Rob connect shoulders with DC and crash instead of DC completely missing. The whole Robbinsdale Vice moment was amazing. The description, the intensity of it all, and the reason DC let go was truly incredibly done. I'm not sure how I feel about you using both of their submission finishers in the match, though. It is a relatively big match, being a high card PPV return match for DC, but they don't have a personal feud going or anything like that. Seems like something better suited for a bit of a more high pressure match. That said, the way you did both of the finishers and the escapes were both very well done. The ending to your match was great. DC lands his finisher but he can't live with himself after letting go of his submission finisher earlier, so he goes back to it. Plus, you made Rob pass out instead of tapping, keeping him looking great. I have to say, I was very impressed with your post and I can now see why people talk to highly about you.

Verdict: Well, fuck. This is a very hard match to grade. Both of you produced grade A quality stuff. Rob, I felt, had the edge in description, but only barely. You two were about equal in entertainment. DC, I felt, had better storytelling and a better finish. You two produced greatly different styles of matches. Rob's was much more technical, while DC's was more fast paced. I do feel DC kind of over-did it a tad. Like, I feel like his post may have been a tad too intense for a match that had no build up. That said, I gotta give the win to him. Rob, you put forth an amazing effort and you shouldn't be disappointed. DC may have over-done it a bit, but his post was just too good. His ending was incredible, whilst I felt Rob's was a bit lackluster. Like I said in his portion of the grading, I didn't find Rob's ending bad, it just seemed a tad rushed and kind of a disappointment for such a great match post. Congratulations on the win DC and welcome back to the fed.

Ru no showed, so I guess this match never happened.

Can I say, before I write this, I'm so sad to see this go. I've never been more enthralled with an E-Fed feud before.

Hope: It's not the best effort I've seen from you, but definitely a quality match. Nothing really stood out as 'great' from you but nothing really stood out to me as poor. Maybe doing more ground work to start the match with the right tone would have helped. I really enjoyed the 'action' in your match. The finish would have been a bright spot had your opponent not had the same idea and, in my opinion, done it better.

Michaels: Like I said to Snoopz in the chat, it wasn't long into your match I got the feeling I was reading a better match than any of the three in the main event. That might change by the time I get to the end, but I thought it was worth noting. You sure understand how to write with a flow that keeps a reader interested. You sold big-fight-feel right out of the gate in a way I was really hoping to see from the main event, but never really got... Read to the end. Nope. One of the best matches I've ever read. From start to finish, it was great. The story was great, and damned if it wasn't better than I had hoped to end the story. Hope fighting off the stretcher after going through the cell would be one of those "once in a lifetime" moments, and it was brilliant. My only, singular complaint is that a few times in the course of your novel I thought description got a little ambiguous. I'm really splitting hairs here, but I know how much you guys look forward to my feedback.

Verdict: This one wasn't really close for me. It was a strong effort by Robert Hope, but David Michaels' Hell in a Cell match is probably the best match I've graded since becoming GM. It was excellent, by all measures.

What I was looking for:
Emphasis on the world title, creation of a big fight feel
Proper building/working of a world title match as a PPV main event
Characterization and maintaining overness for all three
Creating closure for all involved. Don't leave anything hanging on.
Use of the triple threat

Riley: I always complain about this, but it really hurts the flow of the match for me when there is so much crap my brain tries to skip through. "The triple chime of the ring bell does very little to quell the tension within the squared circle, each competitor tensing up as his eyes darted from one opponent to the next. Sanu slowly takes a step back as the three gladiators began to slowly circle the ring, the trio rotating nearly a quarter turn before the first blow was struck." is pretty useless in my opinion. There about a hundred other examples of equally useless passages you've used to create the illusion you've written a long match. You always reply back that it's description, but it's not. Description is describing action in the detail to help create the image for the reader, it's not about going to thesaurus.com and finding the longest way to write something out. That said, you hit on pretty much everything I was looking for. The world title certainly felt important. The action was logical and built up a logical, if unspectacular finish. You used the triple threat stipulation really well. My complaints, outside of your infuriating writing style, starts with characterization. I don't think you did anything really worth noteworthy.  Other than that, the only problem I had was the finish was underwhelming for me. To put Paine away in that situation I thought you should have did something a little more spectacular... or you should have pinned the heel. Definitely not an unbeatable match, but it was a strong effort from you.

Hitman: What a finish! Your match was all about Riley Williamson finally winning the big one and getting over the main event hump... and it was done excellently. Riley hit the superkick and the fans go wild. It's his time! He goes for the F5, but the veteran counters in mid air. He did everything he could to pull out all the stops, but at the end of the day he just couldn't fight two wars. Brilliant stuff. Your flow was about normal for you, not good but nothing that bugged me too much. Your action was excellent and despite a lower word count I thought you had more action than Riley. The only thing I was looking for that you didn't hit on was "closure for all three" because you left everyone so over. The match ended with the impression that all three could have won and it really was just a bit of luck for Hitman Alex to come out on top.

Maddox: Nice back and forth action to start. The strength test caught me off guard. I could imagine the cocky young fella looking to prove himself, but how Maddox didn't just throw him across the ring to me seemed sketchy. That was an incredibly rushed finish but I liked the idea. The characterization of Hitman Alex really stood out for me and I thought you did well to keep Riley over as well. He looked the part but didn't get the job done. It wasn't your best effort but based on how you were talking, I thought it wouldn't be as good as it was. I think because of the rushing at the end it never really got into the groove a main event should.

Verdict: I graded Razor's match first so you might have gotten the wrong impression from my write-up above... Razor played virtually no role in the outcome as it was clearly the worst of the three. (No offense buddy.) Both Hitman Alex and Riley Williamson's matches were fantastic. I complained about Riley's writing style but it was not a deciding factor at all, just as I ignore poor grammar in other posts. The deciding factor to me was the finish, and I thought Hitman Alex did better in that factor. Both guys hit on most of what I wanted to see but I thought Hitman Alex's overall story was better. I thought writing Riley over Maddox in the way that Riley did was... shortsighted? I don't know how to put it. It just didn't gel with me. Great matches from both of you. I'm sure Riley will get another chance somewhere down the line as he's clearly one of the five or six best writers on the site, but this angle should be put to bed for the time being.