OVW has commented on an incident that saw one of its referees have a seizure in the middle of a match.
During an OVW Rise taping on March 12, 2026, wrestler Brendan Balling collided with referee Dallas Edwards as he attempted a flying forearm from the turnbuckles. Edwards ended up having a seizure in the middle of the ring, but the wrestlers didn’t offer medical help or stop the match, and continued to perform a spot after kicking Edwards out of the way.
Many wrestling personalities and fans have criticized everyone involved, including OVW, for their negligence during the incident.
OVW comments on Dallas Edwards incident
OVW has now issued a statement on the incident, posting the following statement on social media:
“Last night during Rise, referee Dallas Edwards – a member of our OVW family – experienced a medical emergency during the broadcast. OVW takes the health and well-being of all our performers extremely seriously, and as a company we are all distraught to see an injury to one of our own,” OVW wrote.
“Dallas is alert and doing much better. We ask everyone to keep him in your thoughts and prayers and respect his and his family’s privacy at this time. We will provide an update as soon as it is available, but in the meantime, we wish Dallas a speedy recovery and we can’t wait until he’s back with our OVW family very soon.”
OVW removed the episode of Rise from its YouTube channel, but it’s still available on Triller TV.
Fightful’s Sean Ross Sapp also provided an update with a statement from Dallas Edwards’ girlfriend. She asked the fans to keep Edwards in their prayers and revealed that the referee sustained a brain injury and that doctors are monitoring him.
“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.”
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