Ring of Honor 10th Anniversary Show iPPV LIVE Results

Ring of Honor presents their 10th Anniversary Show on iPPV and we here at PW Ponderings have you covered with LIVE results and an instant review. Headlining the event is a tag team match titled Young Wolves Rising, pitting ROH World Champion Davey Richards and his protege Kyle O’Reilly against ‘Die-Hard’ Eddie Edwards and Adam Cole.

– Kevin Kelly and Nigel McGuinness welcome us to the show and run down the card.

All-Night Express vs. Wrestling’s Greatest Tag Team

– The ANX have new white gear and look pumped. Charlie Haas has a beard because he’s a heel.

– Kenny King was owning Shelton for a while, but Benjamin hit a pretty blatant low blow. It was called a shot to the inner thigh by the ref. King shrugs it off and the ANX double team for a bit, culminating in stereo dives.

– A cheap shot by WGTT puts Titus down and they start working his knee. Shelton teases using a chair to the knee on the outside, but instead uses a figure four around the ring post. He applies a nice little submission inside the ring too.

– Titus finally tags Kenny King and he goes bananas. Haas botches… something and the crowd let him have it. For some reason King tags Rhett back in, who is still suffering from the knee work. King tries to correct his mistake and tags back in but now it’s two on one.

– Rhett clotheslines Haas to the outside leaving King and Benjamin to go pin-crazy. King reverses one of Shelton’s cradles into one of his own for the win!

Winners: All-Night Express (King pins Benjamin with a cradle)

Review: A little bit of a bumpy opener with the botch and the non-sensical tagging, and the finish was rather abrupt. I thought WGTT were a lock though, so props for surprising me. This was kind of just there. It didn’t do anything all that note-worthy, good or bad. About ten minutes.

Homicide vs. Mike Bennett (w/Maria)

– Maria is attractive.

– More loud CM Punk chants for the Prodigy and his first lady. Bennett just made a Good Will Hunting reference… I want him to win.

– Homicide comes out to metal music wearing a jump suit. Old. School.

– They brawl around ringside with Homicide in command. Bennett fights back a little back in the ring but Homicide hits an exploder. He tried the Tope con Hilo but Brutal Bob decked him, possibly knocking a tooth loose.

– Bennett controls methodically for a few minutes. Suplexes, powerslams, a nice dropkick, that kind of thing. He disrespects Homicide’s Yankees shirt and gets an Ace Crusher for his troubles.

– Homicide gives Samoa Joe a shout-out with a powerbomb right into an STF, but Bennett escapes. They battle on the top rope as Homicide teases a Pepsi Plunge (which Kevin Kelly mistakes for the Cop Killa). Bennett throws him off the top but Homicide is up first.

– Homicide hits the Go 2 Sleep! Maria flips out on the outside, distracting Homicide and allowing Bennett to roll him up for the win.

Winner: Mike Bennett (School-Boy)

Review: This was a surprisingly good match. Homicide was more enjoyable than usual, with his costume, music and tributes to Joe and Punk adding particular flair. Bennett put in one of his best performances and while you may hate the WWE/TNA style finish, the match was still fun while it lasted and Homicide ended up standing tall.

– Homicide cleans the ring and nearly gets his hands on Maria but Bennett and Evans save her. D leads a Yankees chant and then calls ROH the best wrestling company in the world.

Eddie Kingston Interview

– Bobby Cruise introduces Kingston as ROH’s special guest and the Chikara Grand Champion. Nice reception for Kingston.

– Eddie talks about catching up with old friends and says he wanted to speak to Davey Richards. WOLF HOWL! Oh no, Kevin Steen’s music plays after the howl and he comes out with a tennis racket, eating a banana, wearing a sleeveless tuxedo t-shirt.

– Steen calls Eddie a bitch. Kingston smirks. Steen owns a fan and then points out Kingston disappeared from ROH right around when Jim Cornette arrived. He said they were cut from the same cloth and proposes they destroy Chikara and ROH together.

– Kingston refuses, saying he loves Chikara. Steen calls Chikara a Mickey Mouse promotion and Kevin Ford Kingston loses it, telling him to watch his F’n mouth before he knocks him out. Steen pretends he doesn’t want to fight but they start brawling!

– They’re pulled apart and Kingston is removed from the ring. Steen lays down the Grand Championship and goes to do… something, bringing out The Colony and Jigsaw to attack him! They all brawl on the outside and Fire Ant wipes everybody out with a flip dive. Steen is the first man up though and swings his tennis racket wildly as they brawl to the back.

Review: It really helps this feud that Eddie Kingston got off to a great start, getting a good reaction and cutting a nice promo. It was intense, it was funny, it was awesome. Only problem is that Steen basically handled himself against four men, including Kingston.

Roderick Strong & Michael Elgin vs. Amazing Red & TJ Perkins

– The flippy boys overwhelm the House of Truth with speed for quite a while, until Elgin flattens Perkins with a powerslam as he attempted a slingshot move.

– Perkins gets pummelled by Roddy and Elgin but evades a charge in the corner from both men and tags in Red who goes kick-crazy as the fans go wild. He tries a suicide dive on Elgin but gets caught, so Perkins hits one to topple him over. Team Flippy Boys hit stereo dives onto Roddy and Truth Martini on the other side of the ring.

– Code Red to Elgin! Strong has to save the match. Roddy hits a colossal gutbuster on Red and Elgin follows with a lariat. TJ tries to get it going on the bigger men but gets brushed aside and Martini grabs his leg while Elgin and Strong hit an Alabama Slam/Back Stabber combo for the win.

Winners: House of Truth (Strong pins Red after an Alabama Slam/Back Stabber combo)

Review: A fun little outing. The high-kicking high-flyers kicked and flew and the crowd cheered. Elgin’s still pretty strong, but he and Strong kind of took a back seat to Red and Perkins, as this was really a showcase for Red as a special attraction. They protected the contracted star and the House of Truth put Red away with a nice finisher without ever really breaking a sweat.

ROH World TV Title Match

Jay Lethal (C) vs. Tommaso Ciampa (w/ Embassy LTD.)

– They take it slow and it’s all even for the first couple of minutes before Lethal turns up the pace and sends Ciampa to the outside with a springboard dropkick. He followed with a suicide dive but instead hit R.D. Evans, and Ciampa goes to work on him at ringside.

– Ciampa takes it reaaaal slow, using nothing but kicks and punches for several minutes. Eight minutes left in the time limit. Lethal starts fighting back but Ciampa creams him with a dropkick in the corner and then the multiple running knees. Lethal springs to his feet and hits a superkick as Ciampa goes for another!

– Lethal hits a running forearm, spin kick and handspring back elbow but Ciampa prevents Hail to the King. He teases an Avalanche Air Raid Crash but Lethal knocks him off the top and hits Hail to the King for two.

– They fight on the apron and Ciampa hits a DANGEROUS Air Raid Crash! Lethal may be dead.

– One minute remains in the time limit and they both barely make it back inside the ring. Lethal Combination! Lethal knocks down Osiris and then Evans, and then pulls Mia Yim’s skirt up. Ciampa tries Project Ciampa but Lethal fights out of it and unloads in the corner (with the crowd screaming YES! YES! YES! with every strike). Time runs out.

Result: Draw (Time Limit Expired)

Review: Far too slow. Things got decent in the last two minutes with the dangerous apron spot, but really? ANOTHER draw for Lethal? It protects Ciampa’s win streak, but this was the time to move the belt in my opinion, and I don’t think anybody would have minded if Lethal lost the strap. Boring followed by crazy followed by irritating.

– Lethal wants five more minutes but it isn’t given and Ciampa hits Project Ciampa to lay the champion out before stealing the belt and leaving.

ROH World Tag Team Title Match

The Briscoes (C) vs. The Young Bucks

– Both teams brawl to start with the Briscoes naturally winning the exchange and they double hip toss one Buck out of the ring and onto the other! Wow. They fight around the ring as the fans go crazy for Dem Boys.

– The Briscoes absolutely wear out Matt Jackson for around three minutes until Nick distracts Jay as he runs the ropes and the Bucks double team their way back into the match. The Bucks use some kicks but Mark blocks a suicide dive and unleashes Red Neck Kung Fu.

– Mark lands on his feet out of a back body drop but gets superkicked right in the face! The Bucks aren’t in control for too long though as Jay tags back in and goes to work on both Jacksons. The Briscoes are just owning right now.

– Nick hits the moonsault off the apron on Mark and then the Bucks double team Jay in the corner, followed by a rope-hung 450 Splash. Jay tries to fight both Jacksons but gets double superkicked and Mark has to break up the pin. Superkick to Mark puts him back down.

– The Jacksons go for More Bang For Your Buck but Jay gets his knees up to block the 450, Mark shoves Matt off the top to the outside and then takes his place on the top rope…. Doomsday Device. Done.

Winners: The Briscoes (Jay pinned Nick after a Doomsday Device)

Review: Wow. The Young Bucks barely looked like a threat. This was nothing but a Briscoe showcase. It was fun to watch, but I honestly expected the Jacksons to get more offense in and perhaps have some false finishes. Even when they double teamed a Briscoe they ended up losing the exchange as Jay and Mark just walked through their offense. The finish just came out of nowhere. Disappointing if you expected a clash of the world’s top two teams.

No Disqualification Match

Kevin Steen vs. Jimmy Jacobs

– Steen uses the Wolf Howl intro once again and is going to wrestle in his tuxedo shirt. Jacobs is wearing street clothes and is accompanied by Steve Corino who tells Steen that enough is enough and this match isn’t happening. Steen insults Corino, so Jacobs attacks him and then removes his big coat and pants to reveal his Age of the Fall tights and coat. Yes, that coat. Match underway.

– Jacobs beats Steen down around the ring and attacks with a chair. He sits Steen down and then hits a dive from in the ring to wipe him out… although he barely caught him.

– Steen hits a codebreaker while Jacobs is holding a chair and then hits a fallaway slam into the guard rail. Steen beats Jacobs down on the ramp and tries to jump on him off the rail but Jacobs throws him down onto the ramp!

– Steen is back up though and hits a body slam onto a guard rail twice and makes a female fan fall over. Evil. Jacobs reverses a third body slam attempt into a tornado DDT on the guard rail.

– Jacobs takes too long setting up a table and Steen powerbombs him into the ring frame twice but can’t hit a third and Jacobs spears him from the ring off the apron through a table! He tries to hit the Contra Code through a chair but Steen slams him through the chair instead.

– Steen went for a Swanton but Jacobs got his knees up. Railroad spike! He swings and misses and it impales the turnbuckle. F-5 by Steen! But he doesn’t go for the pin and instead sets up two chairs back to back (Necro Butcher backbreaker style). Jacobs escapes and spikes Steen! Jacobs has a ‘what have I done?’ moment and drops the spike as Steen flails around bleeding.

– Jacobs continued to look remorseful as Steen laughs covered in his own blood, grabbing the spike and stabbing Jimmy in the crotch! F-5 through the chairs! Jesus. It’s over.

Winner: Kevin Steen (F-5 through two chairs)

Review: It was a little odd how Steen kept getting hit with big moves on the outside only to just bounce right back, and to be honest it took me out of it a little. But then they started putting each other through furniture and it got awesome. I missed the railroad spike a little and though I don’t like the whole “What have I done?’ thing, it’s consistent with the storyline. Steen essentially triumphs because he embraces the hate while Jacobs tries to rise above it.

Young Wolves Rising

Davey Richards & Kyle O’Reilly vs. Eddie Edwards & Adam Cole

– O’Reilly and Cole want to start but Davey wants Eddie. Cole blind tags back in though making the whole thing a waste of time. Davey and Cole grapple around for a while and then Cole punks the world champion out with a superkick attempt.

– Edwards and O’Reilly take a spin next and after holding hands battling in a test of strength and head-butting each other a little they each go for submissions, O’Reilly with a Kimura and Edwards with an STF but both escape and tag out.

– Lots of tags but the match finally settles into a groove as Cole and Edwards isolate Davey… until he manages to take both on single-handed. O’Reilly flies in and goes nuts with evasions and strikes. Back Superplex by O’Reilly! He tries for a cross armbreaker but Eddie turns it into the Achilles… but O’Reilly turns it into a Crossface and the fans go nuts (YES! YES! YES!). Eddie escapes.

– Cole tags in and he takes it to O’Reilly for a moment, but a blind tag allows Davey to take him down and Team Ambition go to work. O’Reilly hits the Rolling Butterflies and turns the third into a cross armbreaker but Cole immediately reverses. Richards accidentally kicks O’Reilly and then Cole hits a neckbreaker that makes O’Reilly DDT Richards on the way down.

– Eddie tags in and cleans house. He assists Cole on a dive to the outside and then hits an Asai Moonsault. They double up on Davey back inside the ring but once again he’s able to fight off both men and gets Adam Cole into the Ankle Lock. Eddie tries to break it up but Davey won’t let go. O’Reilly locks in a Guillotine Choke! Eddie reverses and both Wolves have half-crabs while looking each other in the eyes and start trading slaps. They drop their holds and start going at it but Future Shock hit german suplexes on them both.

– Cole and O’Reilly try and kill each other but the Wolves interrupt and suplex them to the outside so that all four men tumble to the floor. Davey and Eddie take turns to chop their partners while looking at each other and then kill each other some more.

– Cole and O’Reilly remove their wrist tape and take turns to bicycle kick each other, and then suplex each other, and then rolling elbow each other. O’Reilly goes full retard on Cole’s face but then gets Superkicked.

– Edwards hits the diving codebreaker followed by Cole hitting a backstabber. Avalanche Doi 555s from Edwards! Pimp slap! Superkick! Davey breaks it up. O’Reilly manages to make a tag and Davey hits two double stomps on Cole. Dragon suplex! Eddie breaks it up.

– Davey moves in for the kill on Cole but he won’t stay down. Alarm Clock! Brainbuster/High Kick combo! Ankle Lock! Cole reverses and tags Eddie who double stomps Davey. Achilles Lock! Davey kicks his way free… but runs into an Alarm Clock Superkick! They hit the German Suplex/Jackknife combo, Wolves style, but Davey kicks out.

– Super duper frankensteiner from Edwards! Powerbomb/Back Stabber combo… but they really blew it and the crowd let them know. O’Reilly makes the save. Eddie sets up for the diving version of the move but O’Reilly and Cole get tied up on the top rope… Tornado DDT through a table!

– Davey gets Eddie in an Ankle Lock but he escapes. He tries the flying codebreaker again but Richards turns it into an Ankle Lock! Eddie manages to kick his way free and tag Cole… Flying Crossbody! It’s over!!!!

Winners: Eddie Edwards & Adam Cole (Cole pinned Richards with a Flying Crossbody)

Review: It was a real slow burn but I was fixated on it throughout rather than bored. Cole and O’Reilly worked well and Eddie and Davey managed to not use the same stuff they always do. It never got to the point of oh my god! But it was a really solid wrestling match. The crowd clearly weren’t as into Future Shock’s exchanges as the Wolves’ ones, but that’s what you get when you break a tag team up way too early and without a real break-up. I was genuinely surprised when Cole got the pin and it’s a pretty huge message considering how invincible Davey’s been for the last year. Nicely done everybody involved.

– Davey shakes hands with Eddie and Cole but O’Reilly says he respects neither man. Kevin Steen interrupts them and says he respects none of them, references Colt Cabana, says Young Wolves Rising is the worst name he’s ever heard and that Richards is scared of him and that the show should have been him wrestling for the world title. He calls Davey a Jiu Jitsu Jack-Off and then says “By the way… Jiu Jitsu Jack-Off, trending worldwide.” His music plays and everybody laments.

Show Review

This was probably the best iPPV in terms of top to bottom since Death Before Dishonor. There were no Match of the Year contenders, but that shouldn’t be the sole measure of an event’s worth. I’ll take a consistent, well paced card over a mediocre one with a single five-snowflake effort. They kept things moving along nicely and nothing really outstayed it’s welcome in my opinion. Sure they could have easily trimmed the main as they did a lot of ‘back to square one’ spots, but that would be trimming just to trim as I enjoyed the main event.

Reactions to the match from my peers on Twitter seems to be mostly negative though, so I’m going to go ahead and say if you didn’t enjoy it then the whole show was probably pretty meh for you. It wasn’t really the electric ten year anniversary some might have hoped for, but realistically the Wrestlemania weekends and each year’s Final Battle are the main shows now, and this was more a respectful nod than a giant celebration of ROH’s history. The opener was kind of just there and the Lethal/Ciampa match was a bit of a waste of time, but neither was Davey vs Eddie bad or anything.

The bottom line is this: What are you looking for out of an ROH event? When you expect nothing less than a supercard full of five star matches then you’re setting yourself up for a fall. If you want it to be 2005 or 2006 again then I’m sorry, but it’s not going to be. Joe, Punk, AmDrag and Nigel are gone, and politics have shrunk the free agent market.

I’ve started to compare ROH to the big two, and quite frankly, production values aside, this was a better show than you’ll see out of either of them for the majority of the year. I feel I got my money’s worth and that’s all that really matters.