This week's edition of Ring of Honor TV
saw the World Championship Tournament get into full swing, with two
first round matches taking place. ROH's product seems to be
reinvigorated as of late, with a real purpose behind what is shown on
television. After the strong and some time over powering SCUM
storyline, it's great to get back to what Ring of Honor does best,
wrestling.
World Championship Tournament First Round Match:
Mark Briscoe
vs.
Adam Cole
The main event
this week pitted Adam Cole against a returning Mark Briscoe. We
haven't seen Briscoe in the ring since his World Championship loss,
to brother Jay Briscoe, at June's Best in the World. Briscoe later
suffered a storyline concussion after multiple con-chair-tos at the
hands of SCUM's Rhino, as a way to explain Briscoe's absense from the
company after his contract ran out. Therefore, I was surprised when
they announced that Briscoe would be part of this tournament. Cole
has been put forward as one of the favourites for the tournament,
down to having a couple of title shots recently, as well as a strong
story, that has seen Cole almost turn heel on numerous occasion.
This was the first
one on one meeting between Briscoe and Cole, and at points it showed.
The early part of the match lacked flow and was difficult to follow,
with no real story being put into the match. Kevin Kelly and Nigel
McGuiness did a good job on commentary putting over the idea of
Briscoe's concussion and noting that Cole was delivering a number of
blows to Briscoe's head, but with Briscoe not really selling the
injury until later on in the match, audio didn't really match the
images that were coming up on the screen. The most entertaining part
of the match, for me, was when Briscoe launched into his “Redneck
Kung-Fu” with numerous chops to Cole's head, and this is where the
match really got going. With some well worked near falls, one off of
a huge knee from Cole and the other off of Briscoe's Froggy-Bo, I was
beginning to get into the contest, with Briscoe finally selling the
head injury and beginning to look tired in the ring.
The finish saw
referee Todd Sinclair check over Briscoe, for quite some time,
holding Cole back, only for Cole to superkick Briscoe in the head and
finish him off with his brother's finishing move, The Jay Driller for
the pinfall victory and to advance to face Jay Lethal in the Quarter
Finals of the tournament. I thought this was a very strong ending,
that played off of the concussion angle well, as well as furthering
momentum for Cole's heel turn. It was a shame that the earlier part
of the match felt so disjointed from the rest of the bout, as the
final couple of minutes were very strong. It made sense for Cole to
go over here with Briscoe no longer under contract for the company,
and to have Briscoe put Cole over gives him a ton of momentum in the
tournament.
So, how far do I
think Adam Cole can go in this tournament? Pretty far, I wouldn't be
surprised to see him make at least the Semi Final stage. I would
imagine that at some point during the tournament, we will see the
pay-off and Cole will finally turn heel, supposedly with some help
from Steve Corino who continues to be referenced as a “friend” of
Adam Cole, and from last week's Inside Ring of Honor, we know that
Corino is not completely gone from the company. Corino and Cole could
make a good on screen duo, with Corino in more of an advisory role
than we've seen him in before, but I can't help but thinking that it
is way to close to the end of SCUM to bring back Corino on
television. Personally, I'd rather see Cole go it alone for sometime,
before revealing Corino as the mastermind of it all, maybe even
having Cole turn on Corino to really put him over as a heel.
Best of the Rest (In The World)
Elsewhere on ROH
TV, we got a confrontation between four of the wrestlers scheduled to
take part in the World Championship Tournament. First out was
tournament favourite Michael Elgin, who cut a decent promo about not
wanting to have to the title handed to him, and not being scared of
anyone in the tournament. This brought out former World Champion
Kevin Steen, who had a few things to say to Elgin, about when Steen
retained his title against Elgin at last October's Glory By Honor.
Steen's charisma clashes nicely with Elgin's more serious delivery.
Out next was Mike Bennett, accompanied by Maria Kanellis, with
Bennett once again looking strong on the microphone, proclaiming
himself the future of ROH, whilst the other two were the past. The
whole Mike Bennett/Michael Bennett thing though is a bit silly. Last
out was Tommaso Ciampa, who went head to head with each of the three
men in the ring, before looking straight into the camera and
declaring himself the next World Champion to close the segment.
Ciampa's entry was refreshing after hearing so much talk from the
other three, Ciampa's attitude certainly stands out. It was a good
little segment, that was reminiscent of a WWE Raw or Smackdown
opening that were common place a few years back.
Elgin, Steen and
Ciampa would all have to be considered favourites in the tournament,
due to the way they have been booked over the last two years or so.
But the really interesting participant in this segment for me was
Michael Bennett. Bennett has shuffled around the mid-card for ROH for
the last few years, with a couple of World Television title shots,
and being chosen to take on veterans like Lance Storm and Jerry Lynn,
so this tournament could be used to reposition Bennett higher up the
card, this segment was a good start let's see if ROH continue this
way for Bennett. The tournament could be used to help a number of
talents at the same time, Bennett being one of them, whilst giving
new purpose to wrestlers like Roderick Strong.
In another World
Championship First Round Match, Karl Anderson took on ACH. The bout
was an exciting encounter, taking the form of a David vs. Goliath
contest. With Anderson's using power moves and precision to keep ACH
grounded throughout the opening part of the match, we were treated to
a number of fast paced comebacks from ACH, with a plethora of
highflying moves, including a great springboard to the outside. The
match built up well with a number of near falls for ACH including one
off of The Best 450 Ever, where it seemed like ACH might have pulled
off the upset victory. But it wasn't enough for ACH, as after he went
for another Best 450 Ever, but missed, Anderson capitalised with an
Ace Crusher to pick up the pinfall victory and advance to the quarter
finals, where he'll face either Michael Elgin or Paul London. I
enjoyed the finish, it quick and pacy with a number of near falls to
keep things interesting, with ACH looking competitive until the end.
ACH is certainly one to watch in the next few years for Ring of
Honor.
Matt Taven was
also in action defending his title against Brian Fury. The match was
essentially there to get the H.O.T over, with a lot of interference
from the group throughout. Fury, at times, looked sloppy with a
number of awkward looking moves, including a bridging pinfall attempt
that went woefully wrong, which was a shame after Fury put in an
impressive performance in the four way match last week. There were
two nice false finishes, the first saw Truth Martini distracting the
referee, giving Kaycee Ray the opportunity to hit a diving
hurracanrana on Fury, with Taven following up with a Frog Splash for
a near fall, the other saw Fury use the same move he used to finish
Vinny Marseglia last week but to no avail. The finish actually saw
Taven win cleanly after hitting Climax for the pinfall victory and to
retain his World Television Championship. It was good to see Taven
win clean here, as I've mentioned before the best heels are the ones
that can win cleanly, but choose not to, therefore this win showing
that Taven can win clean, can only be a good thing for the World
Television Champion.
Finally...
My final thoughts on this week's ROH TV.
1. Adam Cole vs. Mark Briscoe could have been a lot better than it was.
2. Michael Bennett is someone who could gain a lot in the ROH World Championship Tournament.
3. ACH is definitely someone to look out for within ROH and Independent wrestler.
