Five potential opponents for Sami Callihan at ICW Fear & Loathing 12
If you bring in a big name like Sami Callihan, you need a big opponent. Scott Mcleod looks at five names from ICW’s past and present he’d like him to face.
ICW’s biggest show of the year, Fear & Loathing 12, is fast approaching. Like previous years, the event will see many big international names appear. The first one announced was the leader of oVe Sami Callihan, who will compete in ICW for the first time ever on night one of the weekender.
When you look outside of the UK, there are few who fit ICW as perfectly as Callihan. His history in CZW shows he’s not afraid to get violent, whilst he’s also not shy to speaks his mind and makes no apologies for it.
What makes this an even bigger coup for ICW is that less than a month before F&L, Callihan will compete for the Impact World Championship at Bound for Glory.
So The Draw could walk into SWG3 as the Impact World Champion.
So a name as big as this needs one hell of an opponent. Here are five of the my dream opponents I’d love to see step up to the plate.
5. Jimmy Havoc
A seemingly obvious choice given both men’s background and their history against each other. They first clashed at Manchester Media Con in 2018 in a barbed wire baseball death match before having a Monster’s Ball during Mania weekend. Now seems as good a time as any to complete this trilogy.
What prevents Havoc from being higher on this list is his status with AEW. By the time we get to F&L, we’ll be a month into AEW being on TNT. It’s unclear how exclusive a lot of the AEW roster members are or if they will be allowed to make occasional Indy appearances.
So this pick is more one I’d love to see, despite it being highly unlikely at this point in time.
4. Chris Renfrew
Card subject to change!
We haven’t seen Renfrew in ICW for over a year. So if the company were to ever bring him back, where better to do it than at their biggest show.
Think about some of the more violent moments in the early days of ICW and most of them involve Renfrew.
Renfrew was always someone who wanted to represent ICW and could easily challenge Callihan in the unapologetically outspoken department.
You only have to look back at his feuds with Grado and Drew Galloway to see that always shoots from the hip.
The former NAK leader recently announced he was taking a break from wrestling, so the chances of this may be slim. But the beauty of wrestling is you never know what might happen.
3. Mikey Whiplash
Speaking of people we haven’t seen in a long time.
Whiplash and Callihan have history competing in deathmatches but they’re also very versatile in the ring.
Whiplash spent much of last year showing he was more than just a deathmatch wrestler, culminating in him putting over Joe Hendry at the Hydro.
He’s a veteran of the UK scene and given his position as a trainer, there’s no doubt this would be a great match. Whiplash is another man who’s not afraid to speak his mind so the promos leading up to it would be must watch.
Whiplash’s main focus north of the border is driving Source and Fierce Females. It is such commitment that might make this a one night only thing if he is the man to face Sami.
2. Kay Lee Ray
Who says Callihan’s opponent has to be a man? Why can’t we have the Callihan Death Machine vs the Queen of Insanity?
Kay Lee doesn’t currently have a spot on the card, and it doesn’t look like she’ll be in the mix for the Women’s title.
You just need to look at anytime Ray has gotten in the ring with men or Callihan’s main event against Tessa Blanchard from Slammiversary to know how good this match would be.
It would be even more special if Callihan comes in as Impact champ as Kay Lee is the current NXT UK Women’s Champion.
We’d love to see a rare WWE Champ vs Impact Champ match, even if both those companies might not be keen on the idea.
1. BT Gunn
Out of everyone in ICW, I think BT is the most likely option.
For similar reasons to Renfrew, BT is someone who represents what ICW is all about.
He’s already faced Walter last year at Shug’s was a part of team ICW against British Strong Style at the previous F&L, so he’s got previous for challenging imports.
It definitely would be a hard-hitting match and Gunn is still enough of a fan favourite that fans could buy him in this position.
It would be weird to leave him off the card, especially with the rest of Bad Company being in Marquee matches.
If want the perfect opponent for someone as well traveled as Callihan, you could do worse than an ICW Grand Slam winner.
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