Polska Akademia Wrestlingu
PAW, whose full name translates to Polish Wrestling Academy, is the wrestling school associated with MZW.
Basic info
- Years active: 2017-current
- Location:
- Głuchołazy (2017-2018)
- Wrocław (2018-2024)
- Kępno (2024-)
- Coaching staff:
- Shadow - Coach (2017-2019) / Head Coach (since 2019)
- Asmund - Coach (2017-2019)
- Justin Joy - Coach (2017-2019)
- Jędruś Bułecka - Coach (2017-2018)
Notable alumni
- Jacob Crane
- Axel Fox
- Aron Wake
- Gabriel Queen
- Madman Charlie
- Rafael Kid
- Apollo Anderson
- Olgierd
- Boro
- Rafi Rarytas
- Sambor
- Michael Payne
- Chris X
- Leo Zayde
- Prince Striker
- Referee Sewi
- Isnorr
History
2017-2018: Rebranding MZW Academy
PAW was created in 2017, after Maniac Zone Wrestling reorganized itself with the goal to have separate legal entities for the organization itself, and its wrestling school. The goal of this split was to allow training both complete newcomers, as well as people connected with other wrestling organizations and backyards, without linking them to MZW itself. At that time, the coaches were Justin Joy, Shadow, Asmund and Jędruś Bułecka. PAW held training camps regularly (for 1-2 weekends a month), in Głuchołazy, a small town near the Polish-Czech border. Despite the remote location with limited transport connections, these sessions had decent attendance numbers, and attracted both people new to wrestling, and talent from backyards like PpW or DFW, of which some would later join MZW's roster.
American Dream, a documentary feature from 2017, shows Jędruś Bułecka training rookies in Niedźwiedzica, another remote location near the border. Events shown in the film took place in 2014-2015, and therefore show the precursor to PAW.
2018-2019: Moving to Wrocław
In May 2018 MZW and PAW moved to Wrocław, holding most of their events and training sessions in Czasoprzestrzeń, which significantly boosted attendance, and improved the frequency of training. After the summer camp of 2018, Jędruś Bułecka retired from his coach duties, leaving the trio of Shadow, Asmund and Justin Joy in charge. That lasted for almost another year, until the summer training camp of 2019, after which Justin and Asmund also retired from coaching (the latter also from wrestling in general).
This period is also when a social group, later called "The Greens" formed, composed of both rookies and some of the coaches. The group's members would later become important talent in MZW and other organizations.
2019-2023: Shadow's solo run, PTW
After Justin and Asmund left, Shadow became the single permanent coach in PAW. This reduced the training sessions' frequency down to about once monthly or bimonthly. The academy itself relocated to a much smaller venue, located at Aleksandra Ossowskiego street, which was also the place that the COVID-era Project Basement series was recorded. Despite that, PAW continued to hold summer camps in 2020 and 2021, which had worse attendance numbers than before.
PAW suffered its biggest setback when multiple MZW talent and PAW rookies decided to join the newly created PTW in 2021. This also caused another decline in training session frequency. In the later months of 2021 and early 2022, PAW moved its training sessions temporarily to Toruń.
