Official ROH Discussion Thread

[LaGoosh]

Lantern, out of interest, now you've seen his stuff, what's your opinion on Davey Richards?I personally feel that in ROH he comes across as very bland and by the numbers, while in PWG his intensity really stands out and has had fucking incredible matches while nothing he has done in ROH so far has really inspired me.

[stylesclash05]

Lantern, out of interest, now you've seen his stuff, what's your opinion on Davey Richards?I personally feel that in ROH he comes across as very bland and by the numbers, while in PWG his intensity really stands out and has had fucking incredible matches while nothing he has done in ROH so far has really inspired me.

I quite enjoy Richards' matches. His series against Jimmy Rave was very enjoyable especially their Unified match. Got his tag with Sydal and the Briscoes to watch tonight shoud be decent match. He still looks much a very green product who can only get better which is a big plus.

[Adam G]

I saw his match with KENTA and it wasnt anywhere near as good as I thought it would be.

[alexander]

Lantern, out of interest, now you've seen his stuff, what's your opinion on Davey Richards?I personally feel that in ROH he comes across as very bland and by the numbers, while in PWG his intensity really stands out and has had fucking incredible matches while nothing he has done in ROH so far has really inspired me.

His two matches with Jimmy Rave were both jaw droppingly awesome if you ask me. Two really smartly worked, believable fights that both came out of looking great. Other than that, I think I've only seen w/Jerrelle Clarke Vs Rave/Rianauro (where he looked OK) in the eight man at Generation Now (Where no-one looked good) and against AJ (which I can't remember much about, so it can't have been that good) Overall, I think he's been brilliant so far and I'm looking forward to seeing his more high profile matches.

[edgecrusher]

The four way where he was in the ring with Joe was pretty good, except that I appear to be the only guy who likes the four ways.

[LaGoosh]

I liked the Joe/Davey segment in the four way. They had a singles match in PWG last year which was incredibly awesome. It was Joe beating the shit out of Davey and cutting him off at every turn as Davey is just getting more pissed off and pumped up after every stop. Then Davey eventually just goes fucking nuts and hits Joe with about 6 big running forearms and then in classic Davey-style hits a huge clothesline while screaming "DIE!" which takes Joe flying out of his boots. It's a great match, when they face off in ROH it's going to be huge.I wish Gabe would book Davey in a proper fued though.

[dopper]

This is a wonderful topic. Very helpful for a chap like myself who is becoming more of a ROH fan and wants to see their best shows/matches.Interesting to see so many varied opinions too. Browsing through this topic a few times I've seen a very positive review of a show by one person, then a very unimpressed review of the same show by someone else.I just watched Glory By Honor Night 2 tonight and was surprised to see when Bruno exited the ring after his promo, the first wrestler at ringside to shake his hand was Alex Shane!He got stuck in there breaking up the post-promo brawl too, I swear I heard him shouting at Joe: "He ain't wurf it!" and such.

[dopper]

Index of show reviews in this topic, in chronological order:

 

 

NAME OF SHOW (DATE OF SHOW) : PAGE NUMBER(S)

 

 

MANHATTAN MAYHEM (07/05/05) : 11

 

FINAL SHOWDOWN (13/05/05) : 11

 

NOWHERE TO RUN (14/05/05) : 11

 

REDEMPTION (12/08/05) : 19

 

JOE vs KOBASHI (01/10/05) : 19

 

THIS MEANS WAR (29/10/05) : 22

 

VENDETTA (05/11/05) : 22, 26

 

STEEL CAGE WARFARE (03/12/05) : 4, 22

 

FINAL BATTLE 2005 (17/12/05) : 22, 24

 

HELL FREEZES OVER (14/01/2006) : 1

 

TAG WARS 2006 (27/01/06) : 4, 5

 

DISSENSION (28/01/06) : 6

 

UNSCRIPTED 2 (11/02/06) : 6

 

FOURTH ANNIVERSARY SHOW (25/02/06) : 8, 23

 

ARENA WARFARE (11/03/06) : 8, 9

 

BEST IN THE WORLD (25/03/06) : 9, 13, 14, 16

 

DRAGON GATE CHALLENGE (30/03/06) : 10, 14, 15

 

SUPERCARD OF HONOR (31/03/06) : 10, 16, 17, 24

 

BETTER THAN OUR BEST (01/04/06) : 18, 19, 25

 

THE 100th SHOW (22/04/06) : 14, 19, 26

 

WEEKEND OF CHAMPIONS: NIGHT 1 (28/04/06) : 17, 22

 

WEEKEND OF CHAMPIONS: NIGHT 2 (29/04/06) : 17, 22, 25

 

HOW WE ROLL (12/05/06) : 20, 21, 25

 

RING OF HOMICIDE (13/05/06) : 20, 27

 

DESTINY (03/06/06) : 22, 29, 34

 

FIP - IMPACT OF HONOR (10/06/06) : 30

 

IN YOUR FACE (17/06/06) : 23, 24, 29

 

THROWDOWN (23/06/06) : 25, 29, 33

 

CHI-TOWN STRUGGLE (24/06/06) : 28, 35

 

DEATH BEFORE DISHONOR IV (15/07/06) : 29, 32, 35

 

WAR OF THE WIRE II (28/07/06) : 35

 

GENERATION NOW (29/07/06) : 36, 37

 

TIME TO MAN UP (04/08/06) : 38

 

FIGHT OF THE CENTURY (05/08/06) : 21, 38

 

UNIFIED (12/08/06) : 39

 

GLORY BY HONOR V: NIGHT 2 (16/09/06) : 30

 

 

That passed a few boring Saturday morning hours.

[Pegasus Kid]

Awesome work Dopper, I've been watching a bunch of 2006 ROH recently and these reviews have been really helpful. So thanks to all!

[gadge]

Epic Encounter II 25.8.06

 

My first review in ages on here, this is the first show after the UK tour where the ROH World and Pure titles were unified, and sees Nigel McGuinness get his last shot at Bryan Danielson and the ROH World Title. It's also ROH's return to St Paul, MN. The only show there before was Reborn: Stage One way back in April 2004.

 

Warning: match results will almost certainly be spoiled.

 

The show opens with Jay and Mark Briscoe vs Irish Airborne. There's a little backstory, as they had a match at Death Before Dishonor IV, won by the Briscoes, and then Irish Airborne shockingly (and to an extremely negative reaction) eliminated the Briscoes first from the Ultimate Endurance match on the Fight of the Century show.

 

This one is shorter than the DBDIV match, and is solid enough. As with most midwest crowds, Irish Airborne are pretty over. In the end though, the Briscoes score a convincing victory to get their win back.

 

Homicide vs Jimmy Jacobs is next, and has no backstory at all. After Jacobs makes his entrance, the power dies to the snazzy ring lighting, clearly delaying things though the DVD cuts to Jacobs singing at Lacey and the crowd booing the heck out of him. Homicide's entrance puts an end to that. I didn't like this much at all, they just didn't gel with each other. Let's continue...

 

Christopher Daniels vs Claudio Castagnoli is based off Daniels choosing Claudio as the first man to receive a handshake from Daniels in ROH at the 100th show, only for Claudio to turn on ROH and align himself with CZW that same show. That gives the match a good face/heel vibe with 'Double C' hilariously spending much of the match trying to talk the crowd out of doing the "Heyyyy!" thing and eventually trying to hide behind nothing as the different sides of the crowd are going "Heyyy!" as he turns to them, reverse Hogan style.

 

I don't share the Daniels hate that has been prevalent in much of this thread, and this was definitely the best match so far for me. I popped for Daniels scoring with a rollup to win, so job done in my eyes.

 

Colt Cabana and Davey Richards are the latest thrown together tag team in ROH in 2006 as they face the Embassy of Jimmy Rave and Sal Rinauro, sadly without Prince Nana or Daizee Haze. While this is a good match, Davey's continuing series of victories over Rave and Cabana getting a title shot the next night make it blatantly obvious who the winners are going to be, and the Embassy team do little to convince anyone otherwise. The crowd react rabidly to the high impact stuff, especially from Richards, yet without smarky chants which makes the match all the more enjoyable. After Cabana makes Rinauro tap to a reverse boston crab (bizarrely called a "Billy Goat's Curse"), The Briscoes come out to taunt Richards and he attacks them with fiery death in what becomes an excellent pull apart.

 

During intermission promos, they show an ad for FIP Heatstroke 06 Night 1. The only reason I mention this is that someone in the crowd at that show has a sign written on a white board to taunt Bryan Danielson that says "Hey CASPER! You're as white as that guys tube socks!". Excellent. Jacobs then confronts Cabana and gets no answers, bless him. Cabana even mocks the song.

 

In an exact replica of Reborn: Stage One in April 2004 in the same building, the first match after intermission is Delirious vs Matt Sydal. That match was basically an ROH tryout for both guys, at a time where Delirious and Sydal were facing each other all the time, ala Jacobs vs Shelley and Punk vs Cabana before that. In the time since, Sydal has slowly gone up the card helped by his joining Generation Next in 2005, and Delirious got over despite not winning a match until April this year.

 

2 and a half years on from their first match, and both guys trademark spots are now well known by the ROH audience, and here they produce an athletic match similar in many ways to the 2004 one, only building on the familiarity the audience have with them and they have with each other. It's funny how a wrestler's performance can be enhanced by them performing at their level. For example, Delirious had a match with Nigel McGuinness earlier in the month of August where I felt Delirious repeatedly kicking out of Nigel's big moves towards the end was overkill and almost harmed Nigel who was and still is pursuing Danielson for the World Title. Here, I see Delirious and Sydal as equals, and when they start doing kickouts of big moves, it still seems believable.

 

I'm a big fan of both Delirious and Sydal, and I seriously loved this match. The only thing that slightly disappointed me personally was that Delrious didn't get the win, as the Reborn match was once again echoed as Sydal scored the pin with his moonsault belly to belly suplex. Great effort from both guys.

 

Austin Aries and Roderick Strong defend the ROH World Tag Team Titles against BJ Whitmer and Samoa Joe in the penultimate match of the show. The big fight feel is definitely evident here, as the crowd goes nuts for all four guys. We get clips of Aries vs Joe at Final Battle 2004 (where Aries won the World title) and Escape From New York in 2005 (where Joe defended the Pure title) to remind us of their history, and in the early going Aries vs Joe is the main attraction. Just in case we hadn't got the point, they then do a great looking sequence where Joe avoids Aries trademark dropkick escape from a headscissors, then Aries immediately avoids both parts of Joe's chop to the back/kick to the front combo.

 

Joe and Whitmer control a big section early on, mostly over Aries, allowing Strong to get one of his trademark hot tags, then Whitmer gets isolated by the champs until Joe gets in there and kicks the tar out of Strong for a while, with Strong keeping in the match with his hard chops. Aries making the tag triggers the final sprint, with the champs hitting their chop-brainbuster and missile dropkick-powerbomb combos, Whitmer and Aries taking a nasty spill to the floor, and with Strong and Joe left alone in the ring, Strong escapes The Choke by lifting Joe onto his shoulders into a gutbuster, and follows that with a BIG boot and the Gibson Driver... then scores the three count on Joe! Shocking finish to what is probably my pick for match of the show, and the third straight show with a great tag match on second to last on the card.

 

Finally, the 2 out of 3 falls World Title match. The rivalry between Nigel McGuinness and Bryan Danielson began with a really good title vs title match at the end of April which Nigel won by countout to retain the Pure title but fail to win the World Title. It earned him a straight World Title shot at the end of July, which Danielson won with a small package after crawling under the ring and coming out the other side. This set up an awesome unification match in Liverpool two weeks prior to this, which Danielson won when the referee stopped the match as he rained elbows on Nigel's head.

 

The first fall is mostly slow going. Early on, Danielson is in control with a side headlock when a fan shouts "BORING!". Danielson immediately looks at him and goes "All my offense is boring, so fuck you!" and the next five minutes or so is all Danielson headlocks, even when Nigel does his best to counter, and the majority of the crowd are into all this. In fact, despite the slow pace, the early work is probably more interesting than the same periods in any of their previous matches. Nigel finally gets some momentum going on the outside, including a sequence referencing Nigel getting his head battered into the post in Liverpool where this time Nigel injures Danielson's arm. After about 20 minutes though, Danielson once again manages to pin Nigel with a small package.

 

The second fall is still mostly slow paced, with Nigel getting more time in control where he continues to work over Danielson's arm, including the use of Danielson's Cattle Mutilation against him, though Nigel's number one weapon on the arm though is a keylock. Danielson goes for his crawl under the ring trick, only his missile dropkick from the other side of the ring backfires as Nigel hits the ropeswing lariat for two and follows that by earning the equalising fall by submission when he combines the keylock with trapping Danielson in a headscissors so he can't reach the ropes.

 

The pace naturally picks up for the deciding fall, with Nigel perhaps going a bit overboard on those left arm lariats he hits so nicely now, and much submission wrestling still being used for the nearfalls. Danielson makes the same mistake as their first match when he dives into the crowd only to eat a chair from Nigel, but with no countout in this match, Nigel has to get him in the ring and Danielson kicks out of the cover. The first warning of the impending time limit comes with five minutes to go, and the pace ups further, though with a minute to go Danielson is once again raining the elbows in on Nigel's head. At 30 seconds left Nigel hulks up and reverses it into elbows of his own, but Danielson isn't rendered unable to continue before the time limit expires.

 

Having been there live for the emotional rollercoaster that was their unification match in Liverpool, I enjoyed this plenty, but certainly couldn't rate this as highly. I don't know if I'd rate it as high as the 1 hour draw with Samoa Joe earlier in the month, but this is a different type of match with the two falls breaking the match into 20 minute chunks here. I certainly don't think I could recommend this to those who don't like Danielson as this is very much his match, not Nigel's. That said, for the Danielson fan there's an hour of goodness to be had here.

 

There's an extended aftermath, as Danielson appears to be KO'ed after all, and takes ages to revive and then looks ready to throw up any moment. Eventually, he gives Nigel the actual Pure title belt as the championship is being retired. Nigel cuts what appears to be a really nice acceptance, but he talks really quietly and as a result it's largely inaudible.

 

Overall, I'd give Epic Encounter II the thumbs up as I enjoyed each of the last 5 matches, and the second half is especially strong.

[GIB]

Edit...

Edited January 16, 2007 by GIB

[Philjax]

Just wondered if people had stopped buying the DVD's of late due to the christmas period? We haven't had any in depth reviews for ages. I'm just about to finish Unified and have the DVD's up to the end of Survival Of The Fittest to watch myself.

[robgomm]

ROH slow down DVD releases at this time of year so people can catch up. The latest show they released is from 3rd November so I guess more will be out late January/early February but I'm not certain. Christmas spending is the main reason I haven't bought anything past the Glory By Honor shows. I'm gradually reviewing all the shows I have (very gradually as my reviews can be quite long) so I can post them here if wanted.

[gadge]

I've watched through to Survival of the Fittest now, but it takes me so long to write reviews I can rarely be bothered. Survival of the Fittest was a really bad show by ROH standards and all, and the crowd are sat on their hands for everything bar the opening Matt Sydal vs Davey Richards match and the final portion of the SOTF main. It's no surprise that ROH aren't running Cleveland, Ohio any more.

[WU LYF 4 LYF]

Yeah, I haven't bothered any ROH DVD's, as I find them hard to watch now, especially with the retarded crowd. The 'this is awesome' chants every match on the British shows finished me off.I'm don't watch any wrestling anymore though, so it isn't as if it's just as ROH thing. I only catch a couple of matches every week or so, when I catch a window, and even then, I only watch it when I' having lunch, and don't enjoy them much.