Referee Dallas Edwards Suffered Brain Injury During Match at 3/12 OVW Rise Show

Mar 13, 2026

Thursday’s Rise show for Ohio Valley Wrestling in Louisville, Kentucky featured referee Dallas Edwards suffering a serious head-related injury during a multi-man tag team match on the show.

Edwards suffered the injury following a spot where he replaced the initial match referee after a ref bump spot. Edwards was shoved by Tony Evans into the way to take a Phenomenal Forearm move from OVW Rush Champion Brendan Balling that went wrong resulting in Edwards hitting his head hard on the mat and was knockout out. Edwards remained down on the mat and started convulsing as the match continued around him. One of the wrestlers in the match moved Edwards out of the way instead of checking on him.

After some time had passed, the match was finally stopped and the show went off the air as Edwards was receiving medical attention.

the spot pic.twitter.com/cten69IXBS
— swerve (@swerve383658) March 13, 2026

Edwards was then taken to the hospital but he was said to be awake, coherent, and in good spirits. OVW wrestler Jake Lawless shared a photo of Edwards in the hospital giving a thumbs up.

In an official statement to Fightful’s Sean Ross Sapp, Edwards’ girlfriend was asking everyone to keep him in their thoughts. She also stated that Edwards had suffered a brain injury and is being monitored at the hospital.

“Please keep Dallas in your thoughts as your day begins. I am not going to provide much more information at this time except to the parties who already know, but last night resulted in a brain injury that is being monitored and will continue to be monitored by doctors here.
Seeing all the support you guys have already given is amazing and I didn’t want to leave everyone without some kind of update.”

Following the incident, ROH wrestler BEEF (Gnarls Garvin) responded on Facebook about his anger over everyone who did not help Edwards as he was suffering a medical emergency. BEEF stated that while accidents do happen, he was ashamed in all of the wrestlers in the match who did not put safety first for all involved.

“This is a very serious post from me. Dallas Edwards is one of my best friends in this world. I spend time with him almost every single day. What happened last night at OVW Wrestling was and is complete total negligence and 100 % avoidable. I am beyond anger right now and everyone involved with not helping him while having a seizure, needs to burn their boots or go back to training day one.
Accidents happen, what we do is very dangerous. I am very ashamed in all of the wrestlers who didn’t put safety first of all involved. Say a prayer for Dallas today.”

WWE referee Jason Ayers also responded on Facebook to BEEF’s post about Edwards’ injury situation and lack of care from those in the match.