About

The Start of It All: PLW & the Storms

Kyle Johnson, also known as Vertabreaker, started his wrestling career on March 3rd, 1996, for Power League Wrestling. He debuted as Ryan Storm, the younger brother of Matt & Kyle Storm. Within a year of his debut, he broke out on his own as a singles wrestler, and wanting more of his own identity, came up with the character Vertabreaker, Ryan Storm’s broken alter ego.
His first feud came was with John 3:16, which culminated in a best 2 of 3 falls match that saw Vertabreaker take the win with 1 second left on the time limit clock. After the match, John 3:16 offered Vertabreaker a spot in the Throng of Apocalypse, with the two of them becoming a team, FRYGHT.
The team eventually split, with Vertabreaker joining up with occasional rival & real life friend TJ Richter, forming the New Era. It wasn’t long for this team, as Vertabreaker defected to Unified Championship Wrestling, while Richter stayed in PLW and expanded the New Era stable.

ENTER: Unified Championship Wrestling

Upon his debut in UCW, Verte entered into a feud that would become intertwined with the rest of his career & and winning the UCW Lightweight Championship on his first show. The program he entered into was with Kevin Karizma (at the time, known as Al. T. Tude), one of Verte’s biggest rivals, eventual Tag Team partner, and his best friend. The other man in this feud was El Diablo (aka Jose Perez), Karizma’s brother-in-law and Verte’s rival & stalemate later in their career. This Championship reign saw Verte defend the title against the likes of Karizma, Kid Krazy, Derek Destiny & Suicidal Silva before Karizma eventually took back the strap.
No longer in the Lightweight picture, Verte joined up with Draven, Mad Dog Matt Storm (Verte’s Brother) & Ivan Zangvine to form the Outcasts. The Outcasts went on a tear through the company, attacking everybody and everyone, destroying every wrestler in sight. It wasn’t long before Vertabreaker was back in the Lightweight Championship picture, taking the title back from Sonny in a Ladder Match at the University of Hartford. Again, Verte defended the title against Karizma, Destiny, TJ Richter, and many others before losing the title again.
Verte at this point left the Outcasts and focused again on solo ventures.

SPREADING OUT ACROSS THE INDIES

Around this time, Verte started working for various indy promotions, including Northeast Champioship Wrestling, Yankee Pro Wrestling (Top Rope Promotions), MayheM Independent Wrestling, SouthCoast Championship Wrestling, Chaotic Championship Wrestling & many others.
He established himself as a wrestler that could grapple, brawl, get hard-core and utilize high-flying attacks, a combination that led to UCW Heavyweight Champion, Ebony Blade, dubbing Verte “the 4 Dimensional Wrestler” after their match for the Heavyweight Title.
Derek Destiny at this time became entangled in a feud with Vertabreaker that spanned across most of these promotions for the next couple years, along with Kevin Karizma.
Primal Conflict Wrestling: Verte Reborn
In 2000, Vertabreaker was booked on the first show of fledgling company Primal Conflict Wrestling, a company that was birthed from within the New England Wrestling Alliance and broke away. This inaugural show saw Vertabreaker take on Diamond Dave Donovan & LiveWire Dave Padula in a 3 Faces of Fireballs match the saw Verte light his leg on fire before hitting a top rope leg drop, and ended with Padula blowing a fireball in Verte’s face.
The second outing saw Verte and KickAss Kyle Storm brawl to a draw in a Dog-Collar Storm Bros Woodshed Death Match. The next show saw Verte take on Destiny & Butcher Brannigan in a Bamboo Shoot DeathMatch, that saw Brannigan take the victory.
After this card, Vertabreaker quietly quit Primal Conflict, with the dates disappearing from his website, and his removal from the PCW roster.
Two weeks later, while Wrestling Derek Destiny & Tavian Rave for Yankee Pro Wrestling, Vertabreaker separated his shoulder, leading to the news he would have to take a good chunk of time off from wrestling. It was around this time that Verte started to re-appear on the Primal Conflict message boards, stalking and taunting PCW owner Studdly Steve Stallion.
Vertabreaker had a scheduled date for SouthCoast Championship Wrestling to defend his SCCW Hardcore Championship, and decided to address the crows face to face, and announce jia injury before handing over the belt and vacating the title. But right before the show, Verte decided to wrestle, despite his injury, and take on Kid Krazy to successfully retain the title.

PCW: the Return

Shortly after this, Verte returned, unannounced, to Primal Conflict when he took on Thrash in a Thumbtack Match that resulted in a draw, and the entranceway set getting torn down. Something was different about Verte this time around, and that was evident right away.
His next match saw him take on Kevin Karizma, the Puerto Rican Kid & Tiger Khan in a Fatal 4-Way for the PCW Light Heavyweight Championship. This match would mark the beginning of Verte’s feud with Tiger Khan, seeing the two exchange green & red mist, as well as Verte hitting the flaming leg drop. This spot resulted in Verte getting 3rd degree burns, when the fire wouldn’t go out after the leg drop was hit, yet somehow he finished the match.
After this match, Verte was scheduled to face Tiger Khan for the title, one on one. This match started off with chain wrestling that resulted in a standing ovation from the PCW crowd, before getting wild with a flaming leg drop, broken glass, a leap across the entire ring, and a clean pin-fall victory over Tiger Khan, before Studdly Steve came to ringside and declared the pinfall invalid. Vertabreaker raged, punching out Sandy Starr and busting her open before storming out of the ring.

Two Anniversaries, One Night

On the 1 year Anniversary of Primal Conflict wrestling, Vertabreaker was also celebrating his 5th anniversary of his professional debut. This event saw Vertabreaker defeat the likes of Angel, Kevin Karizma, TJ Richter, Derek Destiny & Tiger Khan to finally win the PCW LightHeavyweight Championship. The end of the match came when the last two combatants were Khan & Verte, with Verte hitting a legdrop through a table on the floor.

During this time PCW ran a poll online for fans to vote for the Wrestler of the Year. By the end of the poll Vertabreaker & Jose Perez were neck and neck. This led to the two facing off to decide Wrestler of the Year. The two went to a time limit draw that saw them brawl through the entire venue & bar, Jose put Verte through a support beam of the building, a waitress’ serving tray get taken from her hands and smashed over Jose’s head, a barbed-wire wrapped Santa Claws & the ring post get set on fire. After chants for 5 more minutes came from the crowd, the bell rang and the two went at it again, before Verte was able to score the victory with a small package on Jose.

Enter Combat Zone Wrestling

During a cross promotional event with Primal Conflict & Combat Zone Wrestling, Vertabreaker was set to defend his title in an impossible Gauntlet Match. This match saw him defeat the Puerto Rican Kid, Tiger Khan, Kevin Karizma & Minoru Fujita. After his victory, Verte was attacked from behind by ZBarr the Superstarr. Zbarr hit Verte with the Fluff & stole his belt to bring back to CZW.

The following month saw Vertabreaker face ZBarr in a match that started in the locker room before the ring announcer could do the intro. To add to all of this, the show was outdoors, and it had started to pout. Verte & ZBarr brawler through the crowd and the Pavillion before ZBarr’s Softcore Connection partner, Nick Berk come out to assist him. The two beat down on Verte, until Jose Perez came out to aid Verte. And the match was now officially a tag match. Slams on the concrete, picnic tables and the use of fan-made weapons were commonplace in this match until it made its way back to the ring, where ZBarr got the.pinfall on Verte after throwing salt in the eyes of Perez and double-teaming Verte.

It was around this time that Vertabreaker joined up with Jose & Kevin Karizma to become Impact Inc. Impact Inc made appearances on almost all the independent shows across the territory,

The very last Primal Conflict show saw the final showdown between Vertabreaker & ZBarr, for the official PCW Light Heavyweight Championship. This match was brutal, seeing Verte get busted open, a gore through a table that caused Verte to puke blood on the side of the time keepers table. Verte corkscre DDTd ZBarr through a panel of rebar, a fan throw a chair at Barr and Verte finally win after a roll up on ZBarr.

NWA New England

While Vertabreaker maintained long healthy run as Light Heavyweight Champion in PCW, he enjoys almost the same success in NWA: New England. His second show saw him join forces with Damian Darkside’s the Seven, losing to Beau Douglas, Jason Rumble & Jimmy “Superfly” Snuka.

Verte then entered a program with Apocalypse that came to a head with a tables match. That match ended with Apocalypse throwing Vertabreaker off a balcony, through a table in the ring. Post match, Apocalypse offered his hand and his partnership to Verte.

The team of Vertabreaker and Apoclypse went on to win the NWAne Tag Team Titles, which they held for 13 months before losing them to Jason Rumble & Beau Douglas, and then breaking up.

The Book Closes

Verte continued to wrestle for Unified Championship Wrestling, North East Championship Wrestling, Suicide Pro, & PWF North East, a faction of the Premier Wrestling Federation. He made appearances for Jason Knight’s Assault Championship Wrestling and returned to PLW & YPW before disappearing in 2004….