Ring of Honor’s 17th Anniversary saw several noteworthy moments last night. ROH emanated from the Jones Town Casino, the same place IMPACT Wrestling has recorded their t.v. tapings over the last year at various times. It caused an ironic bit of synergy as IMPACT was airing their weekly episode of IMPACT on Twitch at the same time as the ROH pay per view. Two shows, one venue, airing at the same time. The modern marvels of pre-tape.
Besides the silliness of duel venue usage, ROH did cause some major noteworthy moments. Firstly in the ROH Television Championship match, Shane Taylor fell short of beating Jeff Cobb for the belt, but did hit his version of the Canadian Destroyer; dubbed the Cleveland Destroyers (apologizes to Petey Williams). While Taylor did fall short, the internet was abuzz with acknowledgement for Taylor’s dynamic performance.
In the middle of the show, ROH World Champion Jay Lethal battled Matt Taven for the belt in what would end up being a sixty-minute draw. The match was met with justified criticism following the draw, highlighting an issue with North American wrestling as a whole; the lack of announced mach length limits. Back in the early days of IMPACT on Fox Sports, the then known TNA promotion would have 10-minute time limits for standards bouts, and 15-minute time limits for main events, while then using a 30-minute time limit for title bouts. Times varied on pay per view, but each time limit was posted at the top of the screen. This lasted for a few months but would be dropped after Dusty Rhodes left the promotion. ROH missed an opportunity to bring this back and fans were rightly angry at a random time limit all of a sudden being the deciding factor when that had never come up prior.
In a show that ran late and had to drop a tag match from the card, the main event featured The Briscoes defending the ROH World Tag Team Championships against PCO and Brodie King of Villain Enterprises. The match was hard hitting, and had a lot of hardcore spots, and while some would scuff at the idea of a 51 year old PCO, and King winning the belts, that’s exactly what they did. PCO showcased his unique blend of daredevil antics, while King grinded away for most of the match. The duo will now go into the G1 Supercard of Honor event against The Guerrilla’s of Destiny in a ‘Winner Take All’ tag title vs. tag title match. The winners will be the IWGP Heavyweight Tag Champs and the ROH World Tag Team Champions.
Rush defeated Bandido in an exciting matter, only for Rush to be challenged by Dalton Castle during the post-match celebration.
The full card is below;
IWGP Heavyweight Championship
– Winner of the New Japan Cup vs. Jay White (c)
ROH World Championship
– Marty Scurll vs. Jay Lethal (c)
IWGP Light-Heavyweight Championship
– Bandido vs. Dragon Lee vs. Taiji Ishimori (c)
WINNER TAKE ALL: IWGP Heavyweight Tag Team Championships vs. ROH World Tag Team Championships
– Guerilla’s of Destiny (c) vs. Villain Enterprise (c)
WINNER TAKE ALL: NEVER Openweight Championship vs. ROH Television Championship
– Will Osprey (c) vs. Jeff Cobb (c)
Open Challenge
– Bully Ray vs. ???
Pre-Show
– Honor Rumble
In Other News…
After being thought of as a pillar of IMPACT Wrestling, Ethan Carter III, aka EC3 (formerly Derrick Bateman) has lost, again, on Main Event. The former World Champion fails to be worth anyone’s time as an on screen character since his return to the WWE. He was wasted in his brief time in NXT, and since being called up, he was emasculated by the departing Dean Ambrose, and has since been rendered a mute of sorts by the writers. He’s now lost to Apollo Crews and Tyler Breeze; neither schmucks by any measure but EC3 was a headlining act. He deserves better than this. Here’s hoping he gets out of his deal sometime soon.
Quick Hits – Kurt Angle is set to announce his retirement opponent on Monday Night unless plans change, according to the WWE.