Ring of Honor – July 15, 2015: Rednecks And Real Men

Ring of Honor
Date: July 15, 2015
Location: Terminal 5, New York City, New York
Commentators: King Corino, Kevin Kelly

It’s time for more build towards Death Before Dishonor, where Roderick Strong will be challenging Jay Lethal for the World Title. However, Lethal is still the TV Champion, meaning it’s time for a title defense against Mark Briscoe. This show has been solid so far and hopefully it keeps going in that direction. Let’s get to it.

Opening sequence.

Adam Page vs. Matt Sydal

This continues to be part of the King Corino vs. BJ Whitmer feud over Colby Corino being Page’s young boy. Matt takes Adam into the corner to start before dropping him with a hurricanrana. A spinwheel kick puts Page on the floor but a baseball slide takes Colby out by mistake. You would think Papa Corino would be more upset over this but it sounds like more of an annoyance than anything else.

We take a break and come back with Sydal getting a close two off a rollup but a pumphandle fall away slam (that’s a new one) gets the same on Matt. With nothing else working, Sydal just kicks Adam in the face but can’t hit the shooting star. Instead it’s a fireman’s carry into a backbreaker for two for Page, followed by a front flip from the apron into a clothesline. Matt comes back with a kick and the shooting star for the pin at 9:15.

Rating: D+. Why am I supposed to care about Adam Page? He’s a generic guy in the ring with nothing interesting going on other than an association with BJ Whitmer, who seems to be the one with the issues with King Corino. The match was really lacking too as they were just doing moves until Sydal hit his big move to win. Boring match with a boring heel.

Post match Whitmer comes in for the beatdown but ACH tries to make a save. This goes very badly as Colby throws in a bunch of chairs to help with the beatdown, capped off by the reverse piledriver on Sydal onto the chairs. King Corino freaks out and tells his kid to stop.

We run down the Death Before Dishonor card.

Here’s the gorgeous Veda Scott to mock Moose’s loss to Cedric Alexander. At Death Before Dishonor, Alexander will prove that you win with skills instead of potential. Alexander is going to take what Moose never deserved. This was a good way to build a match in about a minute and that’s exactly what it was supposed to be.

Silas Young vs. Will Ferrara

Silas knees him in the ribs to start and drops him with a release gordbuster. I’m digging the old school style he’s using and it’s working well for him. Back up though and Ferrara grabs the arm to slow things down and take over for a bit, only to get dropped on his back in a kind of powerslam. Silas cranks on both arms at once before Ferrara stops a charge with two raised boots. A tornado DDT gets two but Silas one ups him (in a way) with a DDT into the corner. Cue Dalton Castle’s boys for a distraction, allowing Ferrara to roll him up for the pin at 5:47.

Rating: D+. Just a quick match here with Ferrara being a decent enough worker for his experience level, but this was more about Castle vs. Young. It’s interesting that Castle is really a glorified comedy character but is getting a pretty high profile feud. What’s even more interesting though is how well he’s handling it so far. That’s a good sign going forward and Young is a great choice for him to feud against. Not much of a match but it served its purpose.

The Briscoes are fired up for next week’s 200^th episode.

TV Title: Mark Briscoe vs. Jay Lethal

Lethal, also the World Champion, is defending. They slug it out to start with Jay knocking him to the floor for a baseball slide. Truth Martini loads up the Book of Truth but ODB (the Briscoes’ friend) breaks it up to let Mark take over with a string of rams into the barricades. Back in and Mark gets two off a top rope chop to the head and we take a break.

We come back with Roderick Strong on commentary to bore everyone to death. Mark suplexes the champ down and kicks him in the chest, only to have the House of Truth come in for a distraction so Lethal can take over. We hit the chinlock followed by a front facelock until Mark nails a running clothesline. Jay superkicks him in the jaw to stop the comeback but the Lethal Injection is countered with a German suplex to send him outside. A Cactus Jack elbow takes us to our second break of the match.

Back again with ODB and Martini getting into it again and Jay Briscoe taking out Jay (PICK A NEW FIRST NAME) Diesel, allowing the Froggy Bow (frog splash elbow) to get two on the champ. ODB gets wiped out and Diesel hits Mark low, setting up the Lethal Injection (that stupid handspring RKO) to retain the title at 16:45.

Rating: B-. I liked this more than I was expecting as they managed to have all the people running in but still kept the whole thing from falling apart. I’m not wild on Mark’s promos but at least his in ring style matches his insane persona. Lethal still doesn’t do much for me and I don’t like one guy holding two titles, but it’s not bad so far.

Roderick Strong comes in to break up the post match beatdown, possibly setting up a six man next week. I’m mostly right as it’s going to be an eight person tag with ODB and Martini thrown in for good measure.

Overall Rating: C-. This wasn’t their best show but the main event helped a bit. Instead, they were basically spending the entire show hyping up the next pay per view, which is a very nice change of pace. Lethal still isn’t the most interesting guy in the world though and I’m not wild on him as a champion. That could be fixed through some more time though and it’s a problem with being thrown into a series instead of allowing it to be built up. The 200^th episode should be fun though.

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