The month of January in Ring of Honor brought us highlights of the record setting 80-minute match from North Carolina, the return of Kevin Steen, tensions between Eddie Edwards and Kyle O’Reilly, some entertaining Briscoe moments and the foundation of Embassy LTD. All of this and more on ROH TV.
Let me preface this by saying I’m very sorry for being so negligent of my duties as the man in charge of Ring of Honor coverage on PW Ponderings. I’m not going to make excuses about being busy due to work and such and so forth. I’m going to be honest. Ring of Honor has been pretty dull for several months now, and it’s been incredibly difficult to find the motivation to sit through weeks upon weeks of episodes of ROH TV, especially after how Final Battle ended.
But as I said, it is my responsibility to provide coverage of the company and it’s about time I got my act together. Now I’m just simply not going to get individual reviews of all the shows I’ve missed done in time for the 10th Anniversary Show. Instead I’m going to give you the highlights, starting with the January episodes.
ROH TV 1/14/12 – The 80-Minute Match
– Instead of this week’s show we get extended highlights of the record-setting 80-minute match from Northern Aggression pitting Charlie Haas, Shelton Benjamin, Eddie Edwards and El Generico against The Briscoes, Roderick Strong and Michael Elgin. It’s elimination style, there’s no time limit, and the winning team gets $10,000.
– WGTT, Edwards & Generico agreed to split the money evenly whereas their opponents bickered on the nature of the split. Tension between the Briscoes and House of Truth was teased ahead of the Briscoes face turn at Final Battle. Roddy claims he’ll take 50% for himself and Elgin apparently will get nothing. Nice.
– They condensed the first fifteen minutes of the match so that it flew by in less than five. Everybody felt each other out and the fans were desperate to see the Briscoes and WGTT go at it. From there we skipped ahead to a very ugly ringside brawl that lasted at least ten minutes. The fans loved it, but it just looked like an uninteresting mess sitting at home.
– 48 minutes in Jay attacks Shelton’s injured ribs with a chair, allowing Mark to hit the Frog-Elbow off the top and score the first elimination. Shortly thereafter Charlie Haas eliminates Mark Briscoe with the Olympic Slam. Haas then wanted a piece of Jay who instead trash-talked him from the outside, allowing Strong to hit the step-up enzuigiri to the back of the head and roll Haas up for another elimination. Haas got even though, hitting Jay with a chair while the referee was distracted, letting Generico eliminate him with a Brainbuster. No eliminations for nearly 50 minutes and then four in a row. Crazy.
– El Generico weathered the storm of some House of Truth double-teaming for a while, but got eliminated by Elgin around the one hour mark after a flying shoulder tackle from the top rope and the Spiral Powerbomb. Edwards then got pummeled for several minutes before fighting back, avoiding an Elgin charge that instead hit Strong, allowing Edwards to roll Elgin up to eliminate him at the 73 minute mark.
– Roddy hit a uranage off the top rope through a table at roughly 77 minutes into the contest. Dangerous looking spot, but awesome nonetheless. Eddie makes it back in the ring and gets put in the Strong Hold for a long time before escaping and they lay each other out. Truth Martini gets in the ring again so Eddie takes him out for the second time, and moments later locks in the Dragon Sleeper to win the match.
Show Review: This is a very easy show to review as there was only one match, and I’ll say right now that editing the heck out of it for TV really hurt it. Some of the moments of action were literally five seconds long and the clock was shown inconsistently, so one moment it’s 15 minutes and we’re wrestling, and the next it’s 40 minutes in and we’re brawling around the ring. The first 50 minutes of this contest seemed like a total waste of time, but the last twenty or so were actually pretty good, with Edwards adding another chapter to his complete dominance of the House of Truth. Strong came off looking pretty weak though, tapping in seconds to the Dragon Sleeper while Edwards was able to not only best Strong and Elgin by himself, but also swatted away Truth Martini twice. Ah well, at least we got to see the Dragon Sleeper get treated like a serious threat before Final Battle… except we didn’t get to see it until after Final Battle. Bummer. I give tremendous credit to the crowd who stayed with the match through all 80 minutes, and as I said the last twenty minutes – most of which were shown unedited – were actually pretty decent, but I was far from entertained by the first two thirds of it.
ROH TV 1/21/12 – King vs Jackson
– Highlights were shown of the Final Battle main event to make it seem more epic than it was. Steen’s post-match promo was given some emphasis too. Interesting.
– Mike Mondo cuts an awful promo on Eddie Edwards. He then got faaaar too much offense against ‘Die Hard’, working his arm a lot before Edwards won out of nowhere with the 2K1 Bomb. Why on earth wouldn’t you let Edwards bounce back from another one-sided loss against Davey Richards by slaughtering Mike Mondo? Why?!?!
– Highlights of the WGTT/Briscoes double-turn from Final Battle were shown. Haas and Benjamin then actually cut a somewhat babyface promo to explain their actions, with Shelton attacking the New York fans for turning on them. Jim Cornette almost admonishes the fans for cheering the Briscoes but states he’s fined WGTT for their chair attacks.
– The Briscoes are invited to the ring by Cornette and Jay immediately asks who gets the money that Haas and Benjamin were fined. Good point. The Briscoes want the money for themselves and actually offer to let the entire locker room hit them with chairs so they can retire rich. Awesome. Cornette continued to treat the fans’ support for the Briscoes as strange and points out they have a lot of challengers. The Briscoes aren’t afraid and lead a chorus of Man Up chants.
– Roderick Strong beat Ricky Reyes by reversing a roll-up and pulling the tights. Reyes controlled most of the match for some reason unknown to me. Roddy has added the Back Stabber to his arsenal of backbreakers, bringing the total to infinite million.
– Kevin Steen says Generico’s injury is actually Jim Cornette’s fault and he’s going to hold the entire company hostage until he gets a shot against Davey Richards. It’s truly bizarre how the heel/face lines are being blurred with him. I’m enjoying it, but it’s strange that they’re presenting him as both.
– The Embassy changed it’s name to Embassy LTD. with R.D. Evans claiming a multi-national corporation were investing in the group due to Tommaso Ciampa’s potential. I’d love it if it were the WMD group. Unfortunately that’s probably the most microphone time Archibald Peck R.D. Evans has had in quite a while.
– New backstage interviewer Veda Scott debuted in very wooden fashion, asking Davey Richards if he was looking forward to teaming with Kyle O’Reilly next week against Coleman & Alexander. He is. O’Reilly claims Adam Cole is cool with the teaming and then asks if he and Richards will be the new American Wolves. Wow.
– Matt Jackson defeated Kenny King in a nice little main event thanks to his brother Nick stealing one of Rhett Titus’ crutches and hitting King with it while the referee was distracted. King controlled most of the match and it’s good to see him getting a chance to work on his babyface singles game here and in PWG. It does need work, but his athleticism will allow him to get there. He can certainly work as a solo heel and in my opinion it’s that act that should get him the ROH World Title some day.
Episode Review: They squeezed in quite a lot in their Baltimore debut, with a lot of plot lines from Final Battle continuing on and every major player getting some face time. None of the matches were very long, and the main event was good, but why the first two weren’t out and out squashes I don’t know.
ROH TV 1/28/12 – Team Ambition Has Arrived
– Embassy LTD. talk about how Ciampa needs more competition. He receives just that from TJ Perkins but the result is the same as ever. Perkins gave Ciampa a few scares, but ultimately Project Ciampa got the win. It’s odd hearing Kevin Kelly refer to Embassy LTD. as a different entity from The Embassy, and they made a point of Ciampa shaking hands for the first time ever.
– A touching vignette was shown about Grizzly Redwood’s struggles and they ignored the fact he was ever Mitch Franklin, not that I blame them for that. His scheduled opponent Devon Storm was paid off by Truth Martini and instead Michael Elgin wrestled the Littlest Lumberjack and promptly destroyed him. Martini made a comment about Grizzly wishing he’d died as a child which might have been a little bit over the line. Meanwhile Nigel got away with calling Truth a Helen Hunt… I’ll let you all figure out what that’s cockney rhyming slang for.
– Highlights of Kevin Steen destroying Steve Corino, Jimmy Jacobs and El Generico with Package Piledrivers were shown. Steen then talked about his in-ring television debut next week and reiterated his desire to beat Davey for the title so he can control the company. Jim Cornette responds, saying he will have a message for him next week that he won’t like.
– A video package is shown about the problems between Eddie Edwards and Kyle O’Reilly. Eddie claims Kyle was jealous on Davey’s behalf after he won the world title, while Kyle claims Eddie changed after winning the belt. They disagree over Edwards’ decision to train with Dan Severn, and Eddie claims that Kyle abandons Adam Cole when Davey asks him to because he wished he was an American Wolf. Davey has a hard time choosing between his lovers friends, but then picks Kyle. Splendid.
– Mike Bennett claims he’ll win the TV Title from Jay Lethal next week. Maria nods and looks pretty.
– Charlie Haas and Shelton Benjamin want a rematch against the Briscoes but don’t like that they have to earn it. Meanwhile the Young Bucks are given the title shot they earned at Final Battle for the 10th Anniversary Show.
– Team Ambition of ROH World Champion Davey Richards and Kyle O’Reilly defeated Caprice Coleman & Cedric Alexander in a pretty darn good match. Kyle locked in a Guillotine Choke and Davey added a double stomp off the top for good measure. It was Caprice Coleman who hit the move of the night however, executing a running spin kick in the corner on Richards and then immediately moonsaulting to the outside onto O’Reilly in one motion. I still think they needed a better explanation as to why this match happened instead of a Future Shock tag match or a Davey singles match, but never mind because I’m about to make a very bold claim; I think Davey Richards and Kyle O’Reilly could become a better team than Richards and Edwards. Their styles are more compatible and some of the double teams they were pulling off were pretty slick. I’d be fine with them putting the belt on Steen and letting Team Ambition run wild.
– Eddie Edwards came out and applauded the victory. What are you up to Edwards?!
Show Review: Much like the previous week I liked how much they crammed into the hour. The matches were good, though Grizz got too much offense against Elgin. The main event in particular stood out as the best match of the month of episodes.
Final Thoughts
– After a somewhat dull close to the year from the televised product, and the bitterly disappointing Final Battle 2011, ROH has kicked off this year in pretty good shape. There’s a lot going on all at once and they’re doing a good job of covering it all on TV.
– The Briscoes have been spectacular for quite a while now and I’m happy to see them back on top with the belts, cutting fantastic promos and wrestling at a high level once more.
– Kevin Kelly’s commentary has gotten worse and worse. “Ricky Reyes has always been one of my favourites.” Also Eddie Edwards acquiring his Die Hard name is apparently one of wrestling’s most famous stories. Seriously, in the entire history of pro-wrestling.
– I’m still sick and tired of the product being dressed up as MMA. Kevin Kelly’s making a lot of football analogies as well, with Jim Cornette waxing lyrical about how their wrestlers are warriors and this is a sport and yadda yadda yadda. The wrestling is still good, but if ROH is going to continue to market itself to rednecks who love MMA and college football then I’m out.