ROH On HDNet Recap – 11/22/10

This week on ROH On HDNet Davey Richards prepares for his World Title match at Final Battle by taking on The Embassy’s Shawn Daivari in the main event. Meanwhile the Kings of Wrestling learn who their opponents at Final Battle will be, ROH’s premiere Women of Honor collide as Sara Del Rey battles Daizee Haze, and Colt Cabana and Erick Stevens collide with the winner getting a TV Title shot. All this and more this week on ROH on HDNet.

Opening Segment

A recap of the set-up for Steen vs Generico at Final Battle, with Generico’s mask and Steen’s ROH career (sort of) on the line. I’ll re-use this picture from now until the end of time if I have to, Generico looks ridiculous.

Segment 1 – TV Title No. 1 Contender Match

Erick Stevens vs. Colt Cabana

Recap: Colt overcame the shenanigans of the Embassy to earn the number one contender status. Just as Stevens flew in for the Choo-Choo, Colt exploded with the Flying Apple and locked in the Billy Goat’s Curse but Ernesto Osiris distracted the referee. Colt took him and Nana out but Stevens looked to nail him with the Doctor Bomb to steal the victory. Unfortunately for Stevens, he overlooked Colt’s playbook of pinning combinations, as Cabana rolled through and caught Erick with a flash pin.

Review: This was a very WWE-style match to me, with Colt’s chicanery thrown in for good measure. What I mean by that was it was very formulaic with the babyface starting out on fire, the heel cutting him off and working a body part (in this case the ribs and back) with a rest hold, only for the babyface to come back and win it in the end. I know this is the formula of almost every wrestling match, but it felt far more paint by numbers than most. Still, boring and formulaic aren’t the same thing, so it’s only a minor criticism. Colt’s botched his springboard moonsault so many times I’ve lost count, but he nailed and nailed it good this week. Also, there aren’t nearly enough Samoan Drops in wrestling these days, so that may end up being Stevens’ last major contribution to ROH given his hiatus. Why is Stevens on a hiatus? Honestly I think losing all that weight hurt him more than it helped. Sure, he got faster, but he also seemingly lost some strength, and definitely lost some of his look. He doesn’t look as scary, and his gimmick has always been ROH’s resident powerhouse. I’d rather have the gut and the Mohawk back than this trim Ben Stiller lookalike. All this being said, I feel sorry for Erick. He committed so hard to The Embassy, a notorious quagmire for ROH wrestlers, and it burned him just as it burned all that came before him.

Segment 2

Kings of Wrestling Contract Signing

Recap: The Kings and Shane Hagadorn state they’d defend the titles only against worthy competition, but would take on anyone on the roster in non-title action. Jim Cornette then brought out The Briscoes with their father, Mike. Cornette states Mike has grounds for a civil lawsuit against Hero to counter Hagadorn’s threats of suing, forcing the Kings to sign on for a six-man tag match at Final Battle.

Review: I did wonder how they’d get around Hagadorn’s threats to sue, and this wasn’t a bad way of doing it, though does Mike Briscoe count as a senior citizen? Really? Kay. I still don’t like The Briscoes essentially calling the title worthless, but if it keeps them away from the belts I’m begrudgingly cool with it. This was the sort of segment you didn’t see in ROH a few years ago, and while some hardcore purists may hate any semblance of WWE style content invading their beloved promotion, I’m in favor of it. You can’t just have all-wrestling all the time. It was a well executed segment, though Hagadorn and Claudio massively oversold it, with Shane almost falling out of the ring and Claudio stamping his feet and shaking the ropes. Is Mike Briscoe really that scary? They were totally game when it was just two on two, but the prospect of having the trained wrestler Hagadorn and the “senior citizen” Mike Briscoe involved really that big a threat to them? Strange.

Segment 3

Sara Del Rey vs. Daizee Haze

Recap: ROH’s top (and only) two regular female wrestlers battled to a ten-minute time limit draw.

Review: This was the best womens match I’ve seen in quite a while, though unfortunately the competition there isn’t that stiff. It did seem however that time ran out on them slightly earlier than expected. The modified Gory Special was sickening, and the counter into the Octopus was pretty nice. On a more epic stage that would have gotten a big pop. This leads me to the elephant in the room here. In an ideal world they’d book a rematch of this at Final Battle and everyone would care, but unfortunately I don’t think the fans connect with Daizee anymore. She used to be over huge but when she’s in the ring these days the fans are fairly silent. Death Rey gets a reaction, largely because she’s absolutely brutal in the ring with her kicks, power and submissions, so it’s not just women generally that the fans don’t respond to. They have to be trying to put something together for Final Battle otherwise what’s been the point in all these Women of Honor matches and stressing competition? It has to be building somewhere, but I can’t think where unless it involves Amazing Kong in a rubber match with Del Rey. Perhaps a triple threat?

Segment 4

Steve Corino Backstage Promo

Recap: Corino states his plan for Steen was to take out Generico in only a few weeks as a stepping stone for bigger things, not expecting the war to take this long. He states he can’t stop or control Steen anymore, imploring Generico to back out of the match. Steen was revealed to be sitting in the corner wearing Generico’s match.
Review: Since his return to ROH in January, we haven’t had an awful lot of face time with Steve Corino on his own, and even though Steen was revealed to be sitting in the corner the whole time, this was nice. It gave me hope that Corino could do things without Steen in 2011 and I’d welcome that. It was intriguing to see that Corino has almost given up on Steen, and when you pair it with Steen snapping at Corino in the recent video wire it seems that their relationship may be over and Corino could call it a failed experiment. Cabana has walked away from this feud, and it seems Corino is too, so there’s probably not going to be any interference from either side at Final Battle.

Segment 5

The Prodigy Vignette

Recap: The same promo from last week but with Cary Silkin now stating that other companies were after Mike Bennett but ROH signed him. Jim Cornette talks about Bob Evans, his trainer, being a veteran who never made it big and runs a shady training camp that most don’t survive, but Bennett thrived and will be dangerous in ROH.

Review: I still don’t like them comparing him to Mozart and the like, but this was better than last week’s version. Silkin and Cornette’s comments didn’t seem as over the top and it was good to get some insight into who the hell Bob Evans is too. The fans also got to see the pair in non-silhouette form, though if they have memories they saw Bennett in a six-man tag match a few months ago. I really hope he takes off because a powerhouse breaking onto the scene and being an immediate threat to the world title is something ROH could use. Bison Smith was looking like he’d do it but went back to Japan after losing to Dragon.

Main Event

Davey Richards vs. Shawn Daivari

Recap: Despite a strong challenge by Daivari, Richards was able to secure the win by submission. Daivari’s attempt to escape the Ankle Lock ended up being his downfall as Davey transitioned into a Cloverleaf, earning him the tap-out victory.

Review: Why do fans STILL chant USA at Daivari when he’s from Minnesota? Why wasn’t Osiris ejected for tripping Richards right in front Todd Sinclair? Why would Davey release a grapevined Ankle Lock to switch to a standing version? We may never know. What we do know is this was surprisingly good. Daivari brought his A-game here and it made for a decent match. In fact, if he throws more German suplexes he may turn me around to him at long last. I’m sure he’s been losing sleep over my lack of support for his endeavours. He also hit the sickest lungblower ever. Davey was legitimately launched into the air by it and it was awesome. Despite his great effort I’m not happy with Daivari being in the main event, even if it is just to feed him to Davey so he can look strong before Final Battle. Is there no-one else he could have beaten? Someone more credible? They’ve got three weeks left to continue building this match, and I can’t help thinking they need to take full advantage of that time as not everyone is on-board for the match. Still, good effort, and if it occurred a few weeks ago I’d like it more.

Closing Segment

The announcer asks rhetorically “Who is the Prodigy?” Kind of stupid given we were told it’s Mike Bennett and shown his face earlier in the show. Either way, he’s debuting next week. We’re also reminded that next week will see Homicide take on Necro Butcher in a Butcher’s Rules match. Woo! Violence!

Overall Thoughts

– This wasn’t a brilliant episode of ROH, but it was still an improvement on last week’s. It just made better use of time, and for the most part, everything was more significant. The opening match determines who will face Eddie Edwards for the TV Title in the future. Corino’s promo furthered the Steen/Generico war and took any possible interference out of the equation. The Kings/Briscoes contract signing was good and I think we’re all looking forward to the match. The Women of Honor match was better than the crowd response suggested, and it continues the idea that these two are the top ladies in the game, giving a little intrigue into the future of their crusade to make womens wrestling more prominent. The Mike Bennett promo was the best one for him so far and we were promised we’d see him next week. All of this is good stuff and advances the product rather than keeping it precisely where it is. The main event was well-wrestled and Davey looked strong ahead of his title match, but I would have rather seen someone a little above Daivari in the rankings to truly make him look like a title threat.

– So all in all, this was a solid if unremarkable episode. I accept there need to be some of these peppered into the mix, and that’s fine, as long as we get less of the ones like last week. My dream is that by this time next year, episodes like this are the worst it gets, because that would mean they’re almost always firing on all cylinders.

– Until next week folks, take it easy, and feel free to comment. Oh! And I FINALLY received my copy of WWE’s highest fliers so expect a review over the weekend. Ordering it from the states to try and get it early turned out to be a terrible idea as it faced all number of customs issues. I could have just waited until it was released here in the UK and had the review up a few weeks ago. Sorry about that.