I’ve been bemoaning the idea of Ring of Honor not giving Kyle O’Reilly a big singles push, for a long time. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy reDRagon as much as anyone, and they’ve proven their greatness as multiple, long reigning, ROH tag team champions, but that’s all the more reason to get Kyle out on his own. To this day, one of the best Ring of Honor matches, of the current era, was Adam Cole versus Kyle O’Reilly in the infamous “Hybrid Fighting Rules” match at ROH, Best In The World, 2012. For some reason though, after that match, Cole went on to be a major singles star, and Kyle went into reDRagon. I’m very happy that both men are prominent ROH champions. I just think it’s well past time to see Kyle get the singles success he deserves. So imagine my excitement when ROH announces that next Saturday, January 25th, at “Wrestling’s Finest,” in Pittsburgh, Pa. Kyle O’Reilly will face Kevin Steen, one on one!
I have no idea who will win this match, but it’s a chance for Kyle to showcase his wrestling ability. If you’ve only seen Kyle in Ring of Honor, you really don’t know just how great he is. Kyle is legitimately one of the best pure wrestlers on the indy scene today. His match at “PWG’s 10th Anniversary card, against TJ Perkins, was unbelievable. I honestly rank it in my personal top ten matches of all time. If you enjoy matt based grappling, smooth chain wrestling, and back and forth hold, after hold, near fall, after near fall, match ups, then this match will rank way up there for you as well. I long for a rematch between the two, and hope we get one in 2014. Kyle had many great singles matches in 2013. Kyle vs. Sami Callihan, Kyle vs. Davey Richards, and Kyle vs Adam Cole, for the PWG title, ruined by a run in at the end, to name just a few. However; the match that really stood out for me, was on AAW’s “Windy City Classic IX.” Kyle wanted anyone that he could get, and AAW gave him Louis Lyndon. I was expecting a good match, maybe even a very good match, but what I got was an amazing match, that stole the show! While not as good as his match with Perkins, this was damn close. These two went back and forth for around twenty minutes, and hit each other with everything each of them had. I was exhausted from watching them!
If you look back at 2013, and rank the top twenty indy wrestling matches, I am confident you’d find Kyle in at least five of those. What does it say about a man to be ranked in 25% of any given year’s greatest matches? It says what I’ve been saying, and that’s that Kyle O’Reilly is one of the greatest single performers on the indy scene. Kyle may not be the greatest on the mic, but he’s pretty sufficient, and if you’ve ever seen “sleazy Kyle,” you know he can have fun as well. He doesn’t tout the MMA gimmick like he once did, because he doesn’t need to, he’s one hell of a wrestler, so that’s one complaint the smarky fans no longer have against him. After his match next week against Steen, win or lose, I don’t think anyone will have anything negative left to say, about Kyle O’Reilly. One thing I hope we all say about him in 2014, is that he’s someone’s heavy weight champion.
