Welcome to another edition of The ROHbot Report – the only article you need for all the Ring of Honor news you have to know. ROH held a pair of events in preparation for its “18th Anniversary” weekend that ended in in grand fashion. Lets find out what happened in Nashville and St. Charles.
Bound By Honor Results; February 28th, 2020; Nashville, TN
– Triple Threat Match: Marty Scurll defeated Slex and Bandido
– Four Corner Survival: Joe Hendry & Dalton Castle defeated PJ Black & Brian Johnson, LifeBlood, and Vincent & Bateman
– Nicole Savoy defeated Angelina Love
– Brody King & Flip Gordon defeated RUSH & Kenny King
– ROH World Tag Team Championship Match: Jay Lethal & Jonathan Gresham defeated 2 Guys 1 Tag to retain
– Alex Shelley defeated Rey Horus
– The Briscoes defeated Jeff Cobb & Dan Maff
– ROH World Championship: PCO defeated Dragon Lee to retain
Ring of Honor’s return to Nashville was a solid one capped off by, arguably, the best match in the World champion’s time thus far in ROH. The opening contest set a standard of quality that was almost unmatched until the last third of the show. As expected, the pace was strong & fast throughout with everyone getting a bit of shine until the very end where Bandido’s 21-Plex on Slex was turned into an opportunity for Marty Scurll to execute the Black Plague on him for the pin fall. It’s amazing how much the Six-Man champs have struggled since winning the gold in singles competition while Slex still hasn’t won a ROH match (post-match Slex was attacked by Shane Taylor again; setting up a match between the two sooner than later) and Scurll getting a much-needed victory. The Four Corner Survival tag and the women’s matches were fun with the right people winning including Nicole Savoy using Mandy Leon’s attempted interference against Angelina Love to cradle her for a victory that could be a precursor to the end result of ROH’s upcoming Women’s Championship tournament following one of the better women’s matches ROH has produced in the last few months. The women’s match was made better by the fact Session Moth was on commentary being Martina at her best. The feud between La Faccion Ingobernable and Villain Enterprises moved along wonderfully here with a highly entertaining brawl of a tag that resulted in a not-so-satisfying finish as RUSH choked Brody King with a camera cord for the disqualification. The post-match antics resulted in everyone involved forced security to remove them from the building, but left so much on the table for what should be one incredible feud in the coming months. Though it wasn’t the best match of the show, the crowd loved every bit of it and definitely made the tag match more enjoyable than it would’ve been in front of an apathetic audience.
On the opposite end of the spectrum was Bully Ray intervening and ruining the last-minute addition of LSG versus Eli Isom. Then Ray went about destroying Isom and Cheeseburger until Caprice Coleman made the save similar to what happened just a couple of years ago when Colt Cabana was doing what Coleman did here featuring the same other “kids” being bullied. Thankfully the show didn’t go downhill completely as the Tag Team Championship encounter featuring two teams who know each other pretty well was highly enjoyable. And like their previous outings, everything was crisp & entertaining with the champions being one-step ahead of their challengers including at the very start where the champions attacked their challengers during their entrance & injured Silas Young’s knee. The champs were meticulous in their destruction of Young’s legs; setting up a small package in favor of Gresham following a wonderful series of near falls. As if that wasn’t enough high quality of action, Alex Shelley and Rey Horus nearly stole the show with a grappling contest that soon upped the pace and saw Horus attempting to win not on the strength of his catch-as-catch-can abilities, but speed & agility. In the end it was Horus’ daredevil style that ruined his chances as he missed a 450 splash and left himself open to the Border City Stretch for the submission victory in Shelley’s favor. While it’s still shocking another loss came to one-third of the Six-Man Tag champs, it’s great to see Shelley get a win heading into the Pure title tournament.
What was the closest thing to a hoss battle on paper was exactly that when the first bell rang as The Briscoes faced old & new adversaries alike. Slowly but surely the action picked up with more hard-hitting collisions and Dem Boys wrestling much bigger opponents in the same manner as anyone else who shares a ring with them. By isolating Jeff Cobb during the match’s closing moments, Jay pulled off his patented Jay Driller topped by Mark’s Froggy Bow to end this one in The Briscoes’ favor. Beyond the obvious fact that The Briscoes are gearing up for a future Tag Team opportunity is Dem Boys defeating two men who recently earned a future Tag team Championship shot against the tandem of Lethal & Gresham who most recently dethroned the history-making Jay & Mark Briscoe.
It was time for the main event as PCO defended his ROH World Championship against the current Television titleholder. Unlike the previous bout, the ROH title match didn’t have that same level of anticipation for being a great encounter. Instead, PCO and Dragon Lee presented a wonderful power versus speed encounter with Lee attempting to literally chop & stomp PCO down while the champ utilized his brawling to regain moments of control whenever he cornered the masked man. As NWA World’s champion Nick Aldis added commentary to the match, PCO won following the tombstone topped by his PCO-Sault – a maneuver that didn’t put Lee away when PCO hit it the first time in the match. To close the show was PCO and Aldis having a face-off to hype their upcoming “Supercard of Honor” bout. The main event was, arguably, the second best match of the night (following the semi-main event) featuring two people with distinct opposing styles that somehow worked wonderfully together. Overall, this was a strong offering from the men & women of Honor that didn’t shake up the world or will go down as an early Event of the Year candidate, but is easy watching and worthy of anyone’s time looking for nearly three hours of exceptional action.
Gateway to Honor Results; February 29th, 2020; St. Charles, MO
– Villain Enterprises (Marty Scurll, Brody King & Flip Gordon) defeated The Briscoes & Slex
– Dan Maff defeated Alex Shelley
– The Rightous (Vincent & Bateman) defeated 2 Guys 1 Tag
– Angelina Love defeated Session Moth Martina
– Four Corner Survival: Dalton Castle defeated Jeff Cobb, Kenny King, and Tracy Williams
– ROH World Television Championship: Dragon Lee defeated Dak Draper to retain
– Proving Ground Match: ROH World Tag Team champions Jay Lethal & Jonathan Gresham defeated MexiSquad (Bandido & Rey Horus)
– ROH World Championship (Triple Threat Match): RUSH defeated PCO and Mark Haskins to become the new champion
ROH’s return to the St. Louis area in nearly three years proved to be another solid show that, like their presentation in Nashville, started off hot & heavy with Villain Enterprises victorious against the odd looking, yet very cohesive unit of The Briscoes & Slex. Slex actually had Flip Gordon on his heels during the match’s closing moments, but ran into that slingshot spear topped by the Flip 5 to end Slex’s night once again to put his overall record at 0-3 thus far. Shane Taylor attempted to pick the figurative bones afterward, but Slex was ready and avoided sure doom at the hands of the former Television champion. The first-time clash between ROH veterans Alex Shelley and Dan Maff was everyone one would expect considering the competitors involved with Shelley trying to hit, move & takedown his opposition while Maff muscled him around with relative ease. Maff eventually made a big mistake by going for his patented senton and Shelley took control while displaying impressive strength. But Maff’s tank was a lot fuller than Shelley’s and he eventually executed the Burning Hammer to win another strong encounter.
Unfortunately the show took something of a stutter in quality as the next two bouts were okay, but ultimately forgettable with the former ROH World Tag Team title contenders 2 Guys 1 Tag failing to win two nights in a row as Brian Johnson entered the arena to verbally distract Josh Woods; leaving Silas Young prone to the Acid Drop by Vincent. Unlike the previous outing, interference was a part of the match, but didn’t result in the end as Mandy Leon was ejected from ringside while Angelina Love shut down Martina with the Botox Injection. The fans were definitely into Session Moth a lot more here than in Baltimore, so they were disappointed with the result especially after some nice fire from Martina during her comeback. Martina’s connection with the fans was helped by the fact there’s a budding relationship between herself and The Bouncers with Martina seemingly fancying Beer City Bruiser over Brian Milonas.
As with most Four Corner Survival encounters, this show’s iteration was fun from bell to bell with everyone getting some shine including eventual winner Dalton Castle who had tag partner Joe Hendry by his side as well as the return of uneducated Boys to disrobe him. Tracy Williams, who had a nice run at the start of the match, actually fell to the only former World champion involved in this one as he took a ride on the Bang-A-Rang after Jeff Cobb speared Kenny King to the floor to debilitate them both. Before the Television Championship match featuring 2019 Top Prospect winner Dak Draper finally getting his earned title shot, Bully Ray came out to cut a promo where he promised to leave ROH if someone could beat him. Caprice Coleman took him up on the offer, but it didn’t work out as planned in favor of Coleman; as well as two-thirds of Shinobi Shadow Squad. Isom got power bombed through a table, Cheeseburger got wiped out, and Caprice was pinned. Another day at the office for Bully.
The TV title match was similar to the night before featuring Dragon Lee as he used his speed & unique offense to run circles around his opposition a majority of the match. Even Draper’s power-based offense only kept the masked man reeling for a short time before the Incinerator Knee Strike helped Lee retain the gold via pin fall. This could have been an early breakout moment for Draper, but felt like a grand showcase for Lee instead with Dak being outclassed even during portions of dominance as they grappled.
MexiSquad looked to pull a Cobb & Maff by overcoming the ROH World Tag Team champions in a Proving Ground match. As per the norm with the champs as of late, the focus was breaking down the legs of their opponents with Bandido being the recipient of their ferocious, precise attacks. Rey Horus attempted to be his team’s saving grace, but the damage done to Bandido throughout the match prevented them from capitalizing on certain advantageous moments; resulting in Bandido being unable to spring off the ropes for his 21-Plex and got yanked into Lethal’s figure four leg lock for a submission victory. Easily this match stole the show with MexiSquad losing yet again outside of Six-Man action while Gresham & Lethal prove to be one of the best teams in not only ROH, but across the world today.
It was main event time with a Triple Threat encounter for the ROH World Championship. Mark “Ever-Changing-Nickname/Preacher’s Son” Haskins was fired up as ever taking on the rivals from two different factions. It didn’t take long before PCO found himself being abused by both opponents, clubbing his way to an advantage so he could potentially retain the gold. RUSH actually saved Haskins from PCO’s senton off the top while “Overkill” was stuck across the apron; controlling the match’s tempo going into the closing stretch where he isolated Haskins in entertaining fashion. By ignoring PCO, RUSH allowed for the champ to recover and choke slam Haskins in position for the PCO-Sault. NWA World’s champion Nick Aldis arrived to clobber the champ & his “Supercard of Honor” opponent with the World title belt after RUSH broke up the sure pin following the aforementioned PCO-Sault. RUSH had the referee distracted during the interference; taking advantage of the situation when Aldis left by almost breaking PCO’s neck with Bull’s Horns. RUSH made the cover to become a two-time ROH World champion following a good, though somewhat paint-by-the-numbers three-way. After the match, Haskins was beaten down by LFI as he reminded RUSH that it’ll be him and the new champ at the “18th Anniversary” due to the fact Haskins wasn’t involved in the deciding fall as per the pre-match stipulation.
Overall the show was definitely a lot more consistent than the night before, though the latter half of night one was better than what was seen here. A relatively easy two-and-a-half hour watch with a monumental finish that ends PCO-Mania.
The new ROH World champion RUSH has his first challenger in the form of Mark Haskins at “18th Anniversary” in Las Vegas on March 13.
For RUSH wrestling is in his blood as he’s a second generation grappler who certainly reached a level of success expected of him including title wins that saw him hold CMLL’s Light Heavyweight, Tag Team & Trios championships as well as forming Los Ingobernables, earning the Most Hated Wrestler of the Year, and having a perfect record in Hair vs. Hair matches. RUSH added another credential to his impressive resume in Las Vegas when he defeated Matt Taven to become the new ROH World champion. So it was definitely a shock when the man who couldn’t be stopped for a year fell to fifty-one-year-old PCO at “Final Battle” to put an end to RUSH’s World title reign. RUSH didn’t take the loss lightly, immediately gathering his troops in the form of Kenny King, brother Dragon Lee, and adviser Amy Rose to form La Faccion Ingobernable. RUSH’s target was set and PCO had to bear the brunt of RUSH’s assault until they finally clashed for the ROH World Championship yet again during “Gateway to Honor”. But PCO versus RUSH in St. Charles also involved someone too chomping at the bit to earn ROH gold.
After winning the inaugural ROH International Cup, Mark Haskins challenged for the ROH World Championship against then-titleholder Jay Lethal. The exceptional encounter didn’t end the way “Overkill” hoped, but opened a lot of eyes as to the potential of Haskins as a ROH champion. After forming LifeBlood at the top of 2019, Haskins marched toward another World title shot. Unlike against Lethal, Haskins’ title loss came due to interference from Bully Ray. On the same night PCO dethroned RUSH as the ROH World champion, Haskins also went to war with Bully Ray; surviving & winning a brutal Street Fight featuring barbed wire, tables & even a cheese grater. Wins in singles & tag team action secured him a World Championship opportunity for the third time with Haskins going toe-to-toe-to-toe with RUSH and PCO.
Haskins unknowingly saw his chance to finally become ROH World champion slip away at “Gateway to Honor” as RUSH obliterated PCO with Bull’s Horns after PCO had knocked Haskins’ wind out of the “Preacher’s Son’s” body with the PCO-Sault. But Haskins wasn’t completely out of luck. Thanks to the pre-match stipulation, the person not on the losing end of the deciding fall would face whomever is the World champion at ROH’s “18th Anniversary” pay-per-view. Haskins has proven he has all the skills to win ROH gold on his own, but circumstances haven’t been in his favor; the same may be the case here as LFI may be lurking and ready to ensure RUSH doesn’t lose the prize he just attained at PCO’s expense. If RUSH and Haskins’ interactions in Missouri were any indication of the quality of match they can have in a singles environment, this has all the makings of being an exceptional encounter with Haskins, unfortunately, succumbing to another loss.
And there you have it. Show that love, or like, for The ROHbot Report on its Facebook page. Here’s to a great week for you and yours; and as always, thanks for reading.
