ROH TV 3rd August 2013 Review

This week’s Ring of Honor benefitted from only being taped a week before broadcast, and being pretty much up to date with all the things that had happened since Best in the World. Namely, the World Championship being vacated by Jay Briscoe, with the announcement of a sixteen man tournament for the title, beginning with a qualifying match on the broadcast. With World Tag Team Championship match being thrown in as well, this was a return to form for ROH.

World Tag Team Championship Match: 

Forever Hooligans 

vs. 

reDRagon ©

With Nigel McGuiness announcing that because of the vacant World Championship, the coming weeks would see a focus on the tag team division, World Tag Team Champions Kyle O’Reilly and Bobby Fish, collectively know as reDRagon, came out have their say. They asked McGuiness to change their match with Forever Hooligans, in the night’s main event, from a Proving Ground match, to a World Tag Team Championship match, with McGuiness quickly agreeing.  I was impressed with Bobby Fish’s promo here, as I hadn’t really seen much of him on the mic, and he manages to get a good mix of entertainment and heel antics into the work. Before we could find out why O’Reilly and Fish really wanted to make the change, long time rivals The American Wolves came to the ring. Davey Richards and Eddie Edwards announced they wouldn’t be part of the ROH World Championship tournament, instead focussing on Tag Team gold and they’d beat the winner of tonight’s main event. It was interesting segment, but made me want to watch reDRagon vs. American Wolves again, instead of the main event we had to come.

Having said that the main event was a very strong tag team contest, with a lot of action and excitement. Forever Hooligans, consisting of Alex Koslov and Rocky Romero, have only made two appearances in ROH as a team, and hadn’t been seen since March, after bouts with American Wolves and reDRagon. The now IWGP Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Champions didn’t take long to remind us of what they could do in the ring with an interesting array of moves, including a great section that lead into an advert break, which finished with Romero soaring over the top rope to take out O’Reilly and Fish. The match was fought at fast pace, with some nice double team moves being pulled out from either team.

With the Champions on a roll, hitting a number of strong strikes and suplexes on Romero, it looked like they were closing in on victory as they went for their Chasing the Dragon double team finish, only for Koslov to pull Fish out of the ring, allowing Romero to get a backslide for the pinfall victory and make Forever Hooligans the new ROH World Tag Team Champions. It was an enjoyable ending that was worked at a similar high pace to the rest of the match and built the tension well. Fish did a great job of attempting to break up the pinfall with the flailing of his arms as he tried to break the grasps of Alex Koslov.

It’s an interesting move by ROH to hand the titles to Forever Hooligans, who will surely only be with ROH for a few dates at a time, but the clever nature of the move lies in the number of dates Forever Hooligans work abroad, which will allow ROH to get exposure elsewhere, specifically Japan, with Forever Hooligans currently working for New Japan. I can’t see the title reign last particularly long, with either reDRagon regaining the title, or American Wolves picking up another title reign, if they get their title match later down the line, either way in the short term this is a good move for Ring of Honor.

Best of the Rest (In The World)

Elsewhere on the show, a World Championship Qualifying match scheduled between Adam Page and Silas Young, became a three way after QT Marshall cut a solid heel promo to convince Nigel McGuiness to allow him into a the match, even if McGuiness only allowed him into the match to keep him quiet. The bout was a competitive three way that made the most of having three people in the match. The strongest part of the match was the section between Page and Young, with both men looking impressive, similar to their surprise barn burner last month on television, with a great headstand moonsault from Young really standing out.

The end of the contest saw Marshall push Page from the top rope, but when Marshall got back in the ring, after some showboat, Young managed to get a small package for the pinfall victory and to qualify for the World Championship Tournament, with a first round match against Tomasso Ciampa. It was clever move by ROH to have Marshall involved in  the match and take the fall, as it leaves the door open for another Page and Young match later on in the year, which is a great prospect after their original match. However, I would expect Young to go far in the tournament, as he is still fairly new to ROH, and his opponent Ciampa is a lot higher up the pecking order in the company.

There was also a quick tag team contest with ACH and Ta’darius Thomas of Adrenaline Rush taking on Scott Parker and Shane Matthews of 3.0. It was a basic squash match that showcased the style of ACH and Thomas well, as they brought their unique offence of strikes to the new tag team. After Thomas had taken out one member of 3.0 with a moonsault to the outside, ACH got the win for his team with ACH’s Big Bang Attack for the pinfall victory. Hopefully, ROH will keep this young team together, after ACH ventures into the World Championship tournament with a First Round match against Karl Anderson. ROH certainly needs to start building new teams for their division with a number of team leaving over the last two years, so breaking up Adrenaline Rush would be a silly move. 

Finally...

What did I learn from this week's ROH?

1. Forever Hooligans should be on ROH more often.

2. ROH protecting the Page/Young rivalry by involving QT Marshall in their match was a clever move.

3. I've missed Nigel McGuiness on commentary.