Canadian wrestling fans of a certain vintage may fondly recall Maple Leaf Wrestling. This was the promotion run out of southern Ontario back in yester-decade.

Every Saturday afternoon, grappling aficionados would tune in to Hamilton-based CHCH-TV channel 11 to witness the antics of awesome pro wrestlers such as Angelo “King Kong” Mosca, Tiger Jeet Singh, The Sheik, and Tony “Cannonball” Parisi.

This all came to an end by the 1980s when Vince McMahon started buying up wrestling territories all over North America and putting them under one big umbrella, the World Wrestling Federation (WWF).

A trademark dispute with another WWF, the World Wildlife Federation, resulted in the wrestling colossus changing its name to World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE). Today, the WWE is a global wrestling behemoth. Alas, WWE tickets are priced out of reach for many fans and house shows in small cities and towns are now a thing of the past.

But as the saying goes, nature abhors a vacuum. And so it is that smaller independent wrestling organizations are filling a void when it comes to accessible and affordable pro wrestling cards.

This would include Maple Leaf Pro Wrestling (MLP), a Windsor, Ont.-based resurrection of the iconic Canadian promotion.

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We recently dropped by St. Clair College to take in a Saturday night show and to interview MLP’s president, Scott D’Amore, himself a former professional wrestler.

D’Amore and his team were able to acquire the Maple Leaf Wrestling trademark in late 2024. They then went on to sign a deal with TSN; the first broadcast is slated for June.

Of note, there would appear to be quite the appetite for Maple Leaf Pro Wrestling: both the Friday and Saturday night cards in Windsor last weekend were “SRO” — Sold Right Out/Standing Room Only.

And for good reason: the quality of the wrestling was outstanding.

Keep your eyes peeled for the next MLP show. And as the late great Canadian wrestler/commentator Billy “Red” Lyons used to say: “Don’tcha dare miss it!”