Ring of Honor – October 26th, 2016

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Let’s watch some wrestling, shall we?

Ring of Honor TV – 10/26/16

We are TAPED from Lowell Memorial Auditorium in Lowell, Massachusetts! Your hosts are Kevin Kelly and Steve Corino. Tonight, our main event will be the Motor City Machine Guns against Los Ingobernables de Japon, specifically Tetsuya Naito and EVIL! Have they recovered from Ladder War? We’ll find out!

But up first, we’ve got ourselves some tag team wrestling, as the Tempura Boyz make their way to the ring! I know what you’re thinking; WHO? Well, they’re Sho Tanaka and Yohei Komatsu, that’s who!

Oh, more information is probably needed here, isn’t it? Well, they’re former Young Lions from NJPW, having been in the Dojo together during training. Right now, however, they’re part of the 3 promotion talent exchange, as they’ve been working in CMLL since early 2016, and now they’re here in ROH. And who will their opponents be?

Why, that’s the music of Colt Cabana! The Cubs suck, by the way. And his music quickly gives way to the music of his partner, one Dalton Castle! The current #1 contenders to the ROH World tag team championships make their way to the ring with the Boys, as Kelly tells us that Dalton and Colt will get their shot at the ROH World tag team titles against the Young Bucks this Saturday at the national TV tapings! Woohoo! I don’t think they’ll win!

Dalton Castle & Colt Cabana (w/ The Boys) vs The Tempura Boyz (Sho Tanaka & Yohei Komatsu)

Yohei and Colt start us off. Wrestling sequence results in a snapmare by Colt. They do it again as Colt continues to chain, but Yohei goes over the top to avoid a charge by Colt in the corner and they run the ropes, with Komatsu knocking Cabana to the mat with a flying forearm. Tag to Tanaka, and the Boyz get a double flapjack on Colt, following that with seated dropkicks in tandem. Sho with the Irish Whip, but Castle makes a blind tag and in comes Dalton. Castle ducks a few clotheslines and hits the leanback pose, and now Colt comes in to ping-pong Sho between them posing. I dunno why, but when Castle does this type of comedy, I respond to it. Anyway, Sho runs for his life to the corner to escape the deadly posing and tags in Yohei. He charges and gets hung up in the corner, as Castle and Cabana keep whipping each other round and round until Cabana finally sends Dalton to splash Yohei in the corner, and follows that with a bionic elbow to the head of Yohei. Castle with a waistlock takedown and a bridge for two. He keeps Yohei in a full nelson and tags in Colt, who chops away on on Yohei. Cross-corner whip is reversed by Yohei, but Colt comes back out of the corner with a sunset flip for two as the announcers tell us that later in the hour, we’ll see Kyle O’Reilly vs Jonathan Gresham! That’s awesome! Can it be later now? I mean, this match is fine and all, but still. Eh, I bet the Bullet Club ruins the match anyway. Tag back to Castle, and it’s a double armwringer from C&C, followed by a double trip and the ARROGANT COVER~! from Castle, which gets two. Dalton slaps on a chinlock now, Yohei elbows out and hits Castle with a superkick, buying him enough time to make the tag to Sho. Tanaka in now, and he gets a kneelift, then spins Castle around into an elbow to the head. Tanaka follows that with a clothesline in the corner, then another one off the ropes that Corino calls an ‘Axe Bomber-type clothesline’, which makes no sense whatsoever. Castle manages to get away to make a blind tag to Colt, and he rocks Tanaka with an elbow, into a belly-to-back suplex from Castle, and Colt jumps across him on the mat with a bridge. 1,2, no! Tag to Castle and a slam by Colt, Castle goes up, Sho moves out of the way of a big splash from Dalton! Tanaka with the tag to Yohei, but Dalton manages to fight both guys off and goes corner to corner with forearms on each. He follows that up with an exploder to Yohei and a deadlift German to Sho, and he finishes with a Bangarang to Yohei. (Dalton Castle & Colt Cabana over Sho Tanaka & Yohei Komatsu, pinfall, 5:16)

WORTH WATCHING? – It’s basically a squash for Cabana and Castle here, albeit a pretty entertaining one. Castle is almost always worth it, in that I really like his charisma and watching him work, but I gotta go with a NO on this one, as I don’t totally understand why you want to squash these dudes from CMLL and NJPW in their debut match on TV. There’s plenty of jobbers for that. Anyway, this one was just for Colt and Dalton to show off. Skippable.

Post-match, Castle and Cabana shake hands and celebrate their victory, much like the victories we’re sure to see in these great ads!

We’re back and Kelly is on the stage with the Briscoes! And we see that after the previous match, there was a bit of a confrontation on stage between the Briscoes and Castle/Cabana; would you call that a bit of tension, Jay Briscoe? “Well yeah, I guess you could call it that!” They already beat those boys! Mark Briscoe wants to explain something to all of us; they already beat the Young Bucks in the last few months! They already beat Castle and Cabana too! So it doesn’t matter who it is, because whoever wins those belts is going to Final Battle, and Mark lays down the challenge; at Final Battle, the Briscoes want those belts, so they can become 9-time ROH World tag team champs!

As expected, and that’s not a bad thing. Bucks/Briscoes have good chemistry, and I suspect that’s what we’re getting. I hope, more and more, that they start to tie in the Bullet Club angle here as a more cohesive ‘ROH vs Bullet Club’ type thing, especially considering that the Briscoes are the standard bearers of the company.

Hey, let’s go to the back to see what Adam Cole and the Bucks have to say about this! Adam Cole is up first, and he tells us that Jay Lethal gets what he wants in London, a rematch for the ROH World title, but he won’t get what he truly wants, and that’s revenge. And now here’s Jay, where he talks about how the chance is at hand to regain the title that means so much to him. Back to Cole, who tells Lethal best of luck, because he’s going to need it. Back to Jay, who says he NEEDS the ROH World championship, and in London, he’ll get it! Cut to Kyle O’Reilly, who says that he and Lethal have unfinished business; they’ve fought 3 times for that title, and each time, outside factors have determined the result. Now, Kyle doesn’t hate Jay; he just has something to prove, that he can beat Lethal when it counts. On the other hand, there would be nothing sweeter, in this life or the next, to actually rip off Adam Cole’s head and be rewarded for it! Whoa, tiger. Murder, while justified in this case, is still illegal. But he can put revenge on hold for the ROH World title; no matter who walks out with the title, their days are numbered, because come Final Battle, Kyle is walking out the ROH World champ!

That was fun. Promote the big show in England, start planting the seeds for Final Battle, put Kyle O’Reilly on the screen; yep, checks off all the boxes.

And now we’re back to the ring, and there’s the music of Jonathan Gresham! Yay, I dig him! And here comes Kyle O’Reilly! Kyle, man, I love you, but I really need you to get some new merch out there, because I hate that shirt. I’m totally sure that Cole and the Bucks won’t ruin this for me.

Kyle O’Reilly vs Jonathan Gresham

Code of Honor is followed. Kyle controls early with a wristlock, cranking away on it. Gresham tries a takeover, but Kyle hangs on through it and keeps the hold on. Gresham snapmares out, but Kyle goes right back to it. Gresham tries it again, same result. A third time, same thing as Jonathan is frustrated. Gresham backs O’Reilly to the corner and tries to monkey flip him out, but Kyle STILL hangs onto the wrist and keeps the hold. They’ve been fighting over this hold for more than a minute, and it completely works as they’re telling a nice little story of Kyle just being better. Gresham finally does a slick reversal into a headlock on the mat, which Kyle breaks with a headscissors. Kyle with a European uppercut and a headlock on Gresham. Gresham whips him off, but gets knocked down with a shoulder. They run the ropes and do a hiptoss reversal sequence that winds up with both guys getting tossed to the floor. They face off, then slide back in together. Back in, they criss-cross and do the hiptoss sequence again, this time getting hung up in the ropes. Clean break, but Kyle’s upset that Gresham went after the shoulder and starts throwing kicks to Jon. Gresham responds to that by catching a kick and wringing the arm, then hitting a straight strike to Kyle’s injured shoulder. I’m DEEPLY into this so far, so I’m kind of sad that we’re going to have to watch these great ads now!

We’re back with Kyle nailing Gresham with strikes and a legsweep. Kyle charges Jon in the corner with a forearm, then snaps the arm of Gresham across his shoulder, following that up with a belly-to-back suplex. He grabs a leglock on the mat, which Gresham tries to escape by kicking the shoulder of Kyle. No dice there, but he is able to roll to the ropes to break anyway. More kicks from Kyle, then kneelifts; he goes for the big roundhouse, but Gresham ducks it and ‘ranas him over, which Kyle reverses to a sunset flip. They do a pinfall reversal sequence ending in a Gresham crucifix for two. Kyle gets back to his feet and goes nutso with kicks, dropping him to the mat and following that with a straight knee to the face of Jon. Kyle rips off the tape on his shoulder and goes for the brainbuster, but Gresham blocks, so Kyle goes to a front facelock, really working it. Gresham tries to fight out of it, but he’s fading, and that allows Kyle to load him up for the brainbuster to get the 1,2,3. (Kyle O’Reilly over Jonathan Gresham, pinfall, 7:21)

WORTH WATCHING? – I don’t know about this one. This was basically a squash for Kyle, as Gresham got very little offense that was shown and Kyle just outwrestled him and fought for the move that got him the pin. My obvious homerism for Kyle notwithstanding, that’s really what the match was, a way to show off for O’Reilly. I dug it, but I’m BIASED beyond all belief on that. Regardless, if you want to see an almost Cliff’s Notes version of Kyle O’Reilly, this is a decent enough way to do it. I’ll give it a YES, but with the full acknowledgement that Gresham is good and probably could have had a better match than what we got, although I understand that they want to keep Kyle as strong as possible for Final Battle.

Post-match, Adam Page attacks Kyle from behind, stomping away at Kyle’s shoulder. He loads O’Reilly up for the Rite of Passage, but Bobby Fish runs down to put a stop to that. Fish and Page hook it up, with Bobby winning until Adam Cole runs down and starts beating on Fish; Kyle pulls Page out and attempts to send him to the barricade, but Page reverses that and Kyle tastes it instead. Cole stops to give his approval to Page, which allows Fish to come back, but that’s short-lived as Page is back with a chair to the ribs of Fish. Cole holds Bobby up for Page, and there’s another shot to the ribs of Bobby, and Page keeps at it, just burying the chair into Fish’s midsection. Security finally comes down, but the damage is done as the Bullet Club stands tall.

Hey, at least they waited until after the match was over! And with that installment of this week’s ‘It could have been WORSE’, let’s check out these great ads!

We’re back a recap of the beatdown we just saw. We’re told that security had to carry Fish to the back. But hey, let’s take a very special look at what’s going on with Corino and BJ Whitmer and Punishment Martinez!

Shitty video airs about this shitty feud. Next.

We see that we’ve been joined in the ring by Will Ferrara and Cheeseburger. Oh boy, I’m sure this is gonna be a classic. Cheeseburger has a mic: “BJ! Martinez! Sullivan!” Before he can say anything else, Will grabs the mic. They’re sick and tired of these guys attacking them, so if they want to dance with the devil, well, he doesn’t think they have the balls to come out here and fight them again! Yeah! I mean, they’ve only been beating these two up for something like 5 years or so, I’m sure they’re gonna quake in their boots NOW.

Eh, never mind. The lights go out, and here comes Whitmer, Martinez, and Sullivan. Oh man, I just can’t wait to watch this! And Kevin Sullivan has joined us on commentary! It just keeps getting BETTER!!!

BJ Whitmer & ‘Punishment’ Damian Martinez vs Will Ferrara & Cheeseburger

No Code of Honor. Burger and Will try to double-team Martinez, but he levels both of them with a double clothesline, then splashes Will in the corner a few times, then forearms. Across the knee backbreaker by Martinez on Ferrara, and he tags in BJ. He beats on Will in the corner, then chops him in the back of the head and gouges at Will’s eyes. Sullivan and Corino are being unbelievably stupid on commentary, by the way. There’s no need to type it out, it’s just dumb bullshit. Whitmer keeps beating on Will in the center of the ring, but taunts Burger and Will rolls him up, then hits him with a jawbreaker before tagging Cheeseburger in. Burger gets some forearms in off the ropes for some offense that looks like the joke it is, then Will comes back in for some double-teaming in the corner. Ferrara eats a boot on a blind charge and Burger gets alley-ooped to the apron, where he fights back a bit as Will knocks Martinez to the floor. Cheeseburger comes back in with a flying knee on Whitmer and Will follows that with a tornado DDT, Burger covers for one. Martinez comes in and threatens to chokeslam Burger, but Will prevents that. Will springs off the second rope in the corner, but gets hit in the face by Martinez. Punishment catches Burger trying to spring in and slams him into Will, then finishes Cheeseburger with a springboard Superman Punch. (BJ Whitmer & Punishment Martinez over Cheeseburger & Will Ferrara, pinfall, 4:02)

WORTH WATCHING? – My feelings about Cheeseburger are known. My feelings about this dumpster fire of an angle are known. Will Ferrara deserves better. NO, run far away from this.

Post-match, Whitmer and Martinez beat down Cheeseburger and Will some more as Kevin Sullivan whispers something to Corino, and whatever it is, it causes Corino to run to the ring and get in the face of Martinez, who is prevented from beating Corino down by BJ, which makes no sense whatsoever. I’m going to start drinking now, see you after these great ads!

During the break, Whitmer apparently tried to get Steve to use the golden spike on Will and Cheeseburger, which Corino refused to do. Because, reasons. Anyway, our main event is next, so let’s stall for time with a quick video on Ladder War that we’ve all seen before!

And there’s the music of the Motor City Machine Guns! They make their way to the ring as Kelly reminds us that this is the first time we’ve seen one of the teams from Ladder War in action since. Sabin takes the mic; he admits they’ve been beat up, but that isn’t going to stop them from continuing to be the best tag team in the business. Nigel offered them the night off, but they said hell no, they love the company and the fans way too much to take the night off! Shelley says that all six of the men in Ladder War walked out and went straight to the hospital, and they did it for the fans. Ring of Honor is the best professional wrestling on the planet, and there are no off days! So Naito and EVIL, come on out!

And there’s the music of Los Ingobernables! Naito gives Corino a fist bump on his way out, and we’re going out for these great ads!

We’re back! Ring the bell!

The Motor City Machine Guns (Chris Sabin & Alex Shelley) vs Los Ingobernables de Japon (Tetsuya Naito & EVIL)

Sabin and EVIL look to start us off. Sabin turns his back to Naito’s corner, so of course Tetsuya comes in from behind and nails Chris as EVIL nails Alex on the apron. They stomp away, but Sabin ducks a double whip and sends EVIL crashing into Naito. Sabin sends EVIL into a Shelley kick from the apron, then goes to work. He tosses EVIL and tags in Shelley, and the Guns double-team Naito. Kicks from the Guns put Naito on the mat, and Shelley follows that with a double-stomp, with Sabin hitting a bulldog afterwards and a dropkick from Alex sends Naito rolling to the floor. The Guns spring to the apron, where Alex comes off with a flying knee onto Naito and Sabin does a cannonball onto EVIL. EVIL gets tossed back in and Shelley comes off with a flying kick. Corner forearm follows from Alex and he comes off the ropes, but Naito trips him up. Sabin tries for a running kick from the apron, but Naito catches that and sends Sabin to the apron ribs first. Back in, EVIL gets a side slam while Naito sends Sabin to the barricade. With Sabin’s taped-up ribs, the story’s pretty easy to get here; the Guns are wrestling hurt. EVIL tosses Shelley out and follows with kicks. EVIL wrenches a plastic chair around the neck of Alex and throws him to the ringpost. My God, a plastic chair? I haven’t seen that level of violence on television since the Walking Dead premiere. Sabin is still out on the floor as EVIL tags Naito back in, and Tetsuya does my heart good by grinding his elbow into Alex’s face during a chinlock. Elbows to the top of the head in-between, then back to grinding away on Shelley’s face. Tag back to EVIL, who comes in with a kick to Alex’s ribs. He puts on a surfboard and stomps Shelley to the mat as the commentators compare Naito to Kevin Steen in the way that Naito angers NJPW management, just like Steen did in ROH. That’s….not a terrible comparison, actually. EVIL with a standing senton and he covers, but Sabin breaks up the count at one. Speaking of breaks, how about an ad break?

We’re back with Naito hitting a basement dropkick to Shelley and covering for two. They go for a double gorilla press, but Shelley fights out with elbows. He kicks EVIL to spring off and hit a tornado DDT on Naito. Shelley rolls over, tag to Sabin! He runs across the ring and dropkicks EVIL’s legs to take him off the apron, then a running forearm to Naito. Another one! Irish whip and Naito gets a sunset flip, but Sabin rolls through and kicks him in the chest. Chris runs across the ring and leaps to the apron, then goes down the line with the punt on EVIL. Sabin goes up, missile dropkick to Naito! EVIL is back in now to break up a fireman’s carry, and they send Sabin to the corner. Blind charge #1 from Naito eats a boot from Sabin, and blind charge #2 from EVIL eats an elbow from Sabin. Sabin goes up, crossbody takes out Naito and EVIL! They duck a double clothesline from Chris, but Alex went up and now he comes off with a crossbody! EVIL and Naito roll to the floor, and Shelley holds the ropes open so Sabin can come through his legs with a tope to take them out. Naito gets tossed back in, but he moves out of the way of the double-stomp from Shelley, then fends off both Guns on separate blind charges with a double boot and an elbow, respectively. Naito comes off, but gets caught with the inverted atomic drop from Shelley and the Guns double-team, winding up with the dropkick to the face of Naito while he’s being held in the bridging chinlock. The Guns hit kicks to the head of Naito and go for Skull and Bones, while Corino says that he wants to apologize for what happened earlier with Kevin Sullivan: “Something that shouldn’t have even been on TV.” See, ROH? Even Corino knows that this angle blows goats. Naito manages to shove Sabin off, causing Shelley to crotch himself on the top rope. EVIL comes back in and hits a discus corner clothesline on Sabin into an inverted atomic drop by Naito. EVIL finishes that with a lariat and Naito jackknifes a cover onto Sabin, but Shelley manages to barely save it at two. Shelley gives it a go against EVIL, but gets caught with an STO. Sabin tries to fight off Naito and EVIL, but an enzuigiri by Naito puts a stop to that. Kick to the chest from EVIL and Naito gets an inverted DDT on Sabin. 1,2, NO! But that’s Sabin’s last stand, as Naito gets Destino while EVIL holds back Shelley. 1,2,3. (Los Ingobernables de Japon over The Motor City Machine Guns, pinfall, 7:51)

WORTH WATCHING? – This was more angle than match, as the whole point of it seemed to be to prove that the Guns were alright after Ladder War. Still, they were clearly in a lot of pain out there and it showed, as they weren’t really hitting as hard or fast as I’ve seen them do in the past. That’s perfectly understandable, as this was taped the night after Ladder War. Regardless of that fact, the match wasn’t particularly great or anything, so I’m going with a NO on this one; it wasn’t a BAD match, per se, but it isn’t worth going out of your way to see.

Post-match, Naito and EVIL celebrate while Kelly tells us that next week, the Addiction returns to face off against the Briscoes! And the 6-man tournament continues, as KUSHIDA, Jay White, & ACH take on the Cabinet! And that will do it for this week of ROH TV.

FINAL THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK: This was a mediocre episode, to be honest. Yes, it did a lot of things right, as they laid the seeds for the tag title match at Final Battle and kept the Bullet Club vs reDRagon feud going, that much is so. But the ringwork really wasn’t anywhere close to recent episodes of the show; 3 squash matches and a mediocre main event isn’t going to cut it. Also, more time given to the Corino/Whitmer/Sullivan bullshit is always going to drag a show down. I wouldn’t have ever thought I would say that a show with Kyle O’Reilly vs Jonathan Gresham was skippable, but here we are.

As always, thanks for reading this thing I wrote,

Rick Poehling
@MrSoze on Twitter