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| Top 100 ROH Matches Pack | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: May 4 2013, 09:17 PM (12,092 Views) | |
| Big Tuna | May 4 2013, 09:17 PM Post #1 |
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This was assembled by the ROH Board and the company endorsed it around the time of the 11th Anniversary Show, so it should be interesting to see all the lies and hilariously wrong opinions as I review the best work of some of the best wrestlers of the last decade. #100 Low Ki vs. AJ Styles ROH Night of Appreciation - 4/27/2002 Philadelphia, PA Great stuff. This is one of those matches in the first year of ROH that they built the company's reputation on. Stiff, hard hitting, incredibly athletic, all those buzzwords. But really, some fantastic hard fought matwork, struggle over everything, logical progression, great offense, crisp, etc. The kind of a match you expect these two to have. Like all the big ROH matches in 2002, it's kind of a dream match for mat, feeling each other out and what not. Really just a movefest, but a well put together one. Ki reverses the Cliffhanger into a bridging pin to win. ***1/2 #99 CM Punk vs. Raven [DOG COLLAR MATCH] ROH Death Before Dishonor - 7/19/2003 Elizabeth, NJ Great match. Raven beats the absolute shit out of Punk to begin. He whips him with the chain, bloodies him up, etc. It goes into the crowd, but Punk yanks Raven by the chain off the bleachers, and Raven falls down on each row in a wonderful spot. He's bloodied up now, and Punk beats him down. He keeps mocking him in the ring, trying to call him every insulting thing he can, before saying Scotty Flamingo had more balls than Raven, and Raven fights back. AWESOME comeback, but the ref is hit. EVENFLOW, VISUAL PIN, BUT THE REF IS DOWN! CABANA RUNS IN AND GETS A LOW BLOW! DDT TO RAVEN ON THE CHAIR! Danny Doring (who was mentioned in the pre-match promo iirc) runs down to fight Cabana to the back, but Punk crawls on top of Raven, and steals ANOTHER win over him. The famous post-match stuff is also in the file, but it's not part of the match, so no review. *** #98 Kevin Steen/El Generico vs. Motor City Machine Guns ROH Death Before Dishonor VI - 8/2/2008 New York, NY Steen mocks the MCMG's stupid Michigan hand taunt, so they get mad and become dicks. First half is all feeling out stuff. Matwork, low end strikes, etc. It's quality, but it picks up when Generico is isolated. Shelley is a dick, since that's how he made his name in ROH with Gen Next, Embassy, etc. Sabin doesn't really adapt well, unfortunately, which holds this back some. Finishing run is full of good shit, but at the same time, you got a sense they were holding back. Steen makes Sabin tap to the Sharpshooter. *** #97 Xavier vs. John Walters [FIGHT WITHOUT HONOR] ROH Final Battle 2003 - 12/27/2003 Philadelphia, PA I have no idea how this got on here. John Walters is one of the early failed Gabe projects who lacked any real charisma or skill and got pushed as technicians. They had some cool spots, but there wasn't a lot of rhyme or reason to them, and the hate wasn't there at all. Just dudes doing weapon spots. They also don't space out their stuff well, and there's a big dead patch in the middle as a result. Really hilarious failure of booking, as Walters kicks out of EVERYTHING, BUT NOBODY CARES. Walters botches a Sunset Bomb off the top of a ladder and his foot catches the ladder platform in the corner, and it explodes apart and into Xavier's head and they rush to the finish as a result, and that ends it. This is the first hilarious pick. **1/2 #96 Jay Briscoe vs. Mark Briscoe ROH Honor Invades Boston - 8/24/2002 Wakefield, MA Good pick for the 100-90 range. This was a lot of fun. Crisp hard hitting stuff, and shockingly, a lot of this is psychology based. Jay is busted open and Mark does a lot of damage with punches, so Jay keeps stomping on his hand until it hurts too much to keep using punches. He works the leg too, which plays into a number of things to allow Jay to fight back. Jay's cut not being that big a bleeder and closing quickly is kind of funny, since he's made a name for himself since 2004 or so for bleeding a ton when called upon. Anyways, Mark wins with the Cutthroat Driver. *** Edited by Big Tuna, May 6 2013, 06:29 PM.
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| Big Tuna | May 6 2013, 06:28 PM Post #2 |
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#95 Kevin Steen vs. El Generico ROH Death Before Dishonor VIII - 6/19/2010 Toronto, Ontario, Canada YEAH! This rules, naturally. Tons of hate, gigantic bumps, Generico being the greatest babyface of his generation, Steen being a sick motherfucker. Generico has an awesome opening offensive before Steen shuts it down with the Apron Powerbomb. Really awesome and brutal control segment. Steen's still really good, but he was on a completely different level in 2010. One of those years like Triple H in 2000, Samoa Joe in 2005, Rey in 2009, etc. where a guy is clearly at the peak of his abilities with the proper push to showcase them with the perfect character and opponents too, to the point that the one year eclipses everything else basically. Totally fucking nuts closing run of big moves and shit. They fight on top and Steen grabs the wrench used to set up the ring and he hits him with it. He then hits him with a Super Fisherman's Buster for the win. ***1/4 #94 Kevin Steen/El Generico [c] vs. The American Wolves [ROH WORLD TAG TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP - NO DISQUALIFICATION MATCH] ROH 7th Anniversary Show - 3/21/2009 New York, NY Amazing match, and definitely the best meeting of the two teams. Lots of weapon related violence to begin before they eventually focus on Steen's knee. Lots of really brutal shit, and his selling is fantastic. They use a ladder for some big spots. The No DQ stip and the knee focus allow Eddie's weaknesses to be covered, back when he was still bad. Davey hurts his own knee after missing an SSP, AND STEEN GOES NUTS ON HIS KNEE WITH A CHAIR! FUCK YEAH! REVENGE SPOTS ARE THE BEST. Steen puts on the Sharpshooter now and Generico cuts off Eddie, so Davey has to tap. ***1/2 #93 Mitsuharu Misawa [c] vs. KENTA [GHC HEAVYWEIGHT CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Glory By Honor VI Night Two - 11/3/2007 New York, NY This doesn't belong here. It's a fun match, and an example of Old Man Misawa still being able to bring it when called upon, but there are certainly 100 ROH matches better. It's like the latter years of Flair's actual career in the WWE. He's capable of a lot, but a lot of times, just does his big stuff to easily pop the crowd. Misawa does that, but at the same time, he's doing a little beyond that, breaking out the epic Tope Suicida, big moves, etc. And KENTA is there to carry the load of the work to make it exciting all the way through with some nasty kicks and knees and stuff that Misawa sells a ton. Big finishing run, and Misawa wins with the Emerald Frosion. *** #92 Davey Richards vs. El Generico ROH 8th Anniversary Show - 2/13/2010 New York, NY This is the leg of Steen vs. Generico where Generico was selling losing his best friend by not really giving some matches his all, so Colt Cabana is in his corner to hype him up. This is from that period where Davey was starting to off the rails in between a good 2008-9 and the horribleness of him from the summer of 2010 until present day. I liked this more than I did on first review, but it still is not great and doesn't belong here. Weirdly, it's not Davey's fault, at all. He works the arm all match, keeping his focus, and he doesn't do a ton of stupid stuff. He sells reasonably well and protects his offense. Generico just has a bad night, and his usual amazing selling isn't there, as he barely touches the arm. This was very strange, as one of the most infuriating wrestlers on the scene wrestles a perfect match almost, and one of the most consistently great ones has a shitty night and doesn't sell. **3/4 #91 AJ Styles vs. Christopher Daniels ROH Road To The Title - 6/22/2002 Philadelphia, PA This does not belong on the list, but I get wanting to emphasize that this match happened in ROH. This is AJ vs. Daniels, you know what this is. This is not their best, not at all. They sell AJ's exhaustion and Daniels does a great job early on of trying to force him to run the ropes a lot and expend energy without needing to, getting pins on everything and making him kick out. AJ gets busted open, but it clots quickly, so the work on the cut doesn't have as much impact as they'd want. The match drags on as a result, despite lots of effort by them, and there's at least like 5-10 minutes out of 25 here that could have been lost and improved the match as a result. Daniels wins with the Last Rites. **3/4 |
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| Big Tuna | May 7 2013, 08:11 PM Post #3 |
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#90 Christopher Daniels [c] vs. Eddie Edwards [ROH TELEVISION CHAMPIONSHIP - BEST OF THREE FALLS] ROH 9th Anniversary Show - 2/26/2011 Chicago Ridge, IL This is the first match on this that I'm seeing for the first time! And what the fuck? It's GREAT! I love the idea of Daniels' last ROH run. He sees a roster comprised mostly of guys that were lower card wrestlers or rookies when he was last in ROH, so he comes back to take advantage and finally win the belt, but fails to do so, and falls to several other top guys. He gradually starts to lose his composure when confronted with his failures, before fully going heel. This is in the middle of the gradual turn, but he's still face-ish. This is a really well put together face/face match. Matwork is good and things progress and escalate in a logical manner from matwork to strikes to a little brawling. Nothing overly contrived happens, and they're able to keep it up for 30 minutes. They have dueling neck work and both men sell! At like 23-24 minute, Daniels gets a roll up bridging with the pressure on Eddie's neck to go 1-0. Daniels keeps on the neck and gets pissy when he can't put it away, so he fucks up and tries a repeat move, but Eddie turns it into the Achilles Lock to even it up at 1-1 with 27 minutes gone by. That's literally like the only part of this not focusing on the neck, so that kind of blew. But Daniels sells a bad knee after that, so it has a point mostly. Exhaustion selling is good. Time expires. ***1/4 #89 Austin Aries [c] vs. Davey Richards [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Aries vs. Richards - 11/13/2009 Novi, MI LOL THIS LIST. This is the most ridiculous inclusion yet. This was problematic, but much more from the length than either man (although both men hardly wrestled their best match here). The biggest issue was the fact that they went 50 minutes. Most of the issues stem from that, or Davey being Davey. The matwork in the first 10 or so munutes was good, and then Aries had some good work on Davey's knee. He then just randomly stopped working on it to do a generic control seg. Davey then kind of just stopped selling his knee at all. Aries went back to the legs but Davey didn't sell it at all. They do some spots and Davey passes out in the Last Chancery. **1/4 #88 Nigel McGuinness [c] vs. Jerry Lynn [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Supercard of Honor - 4/3/2009 Houston, TX NOPE! NOT WATCHING THE DEATH OF THE TITLE AGAIN! #87 Roderick Strong vs. El Generico ROH Pick Your Poison - 4/23/2010 Dayton, OH This is also REALLY sketchy as a pick for this, as it's just barely great. Generico does his stuff, but this is more about Strong getting more aggressive as he keeps losing to Tyler Black in title matches. The story is obviously that he snaps after the loss in May, but going into that, he looks more focused than ever, and the job of this match is to sell that. He counters almost everything Generico does, and stays on the back as soon as he gets offense early on. Generico sells exhaustion more than back work, and they do some cool stuff. They mostly protect their bigger things, and Strong hits two Sick Kicks and a Gibson Driver, but working with his angle, he pulls him up to hit a third kick to make sure it's three. *** #86 Motor City Machine Guns vs. D.I.F.H. ROH Tag Wars 2008 - 4/18/2008 Detroit, MI This, however, is more than belonging on here! In fact, kind of underrated. They work it in a weird way where you can see it as heel/face from either side, and it totally works. The MCMG are pricks early on, constantly slapping around Black and Shelley keeps taunting Jimmy as he does so. Shelley vs. Jacobs is AWESOME. They drop any pretense and just start beating the shit out of each other in hate and Shelley again gets the better of it. MCMG isolates Tyler and the way the match is structured, it's the babyface control seg before the heels take over, but the MCMG's offense is a lot more heelish in nature and Shelley is a natural douchebag. The match opens up when DIFH start using high flying stuff and they control on Shelley as a result now. They use heelish stuff too, but it feels more like reactions to Shelley's stuff in the first half. Sabin gets in quickly though and the DIFH control segment was not that long, furthering the idea that they are secret babyfaces in this. Really good finishing run that did a good job of not peaking too soon. There was some stuff that didn't need to be in it at 35 minutes, obviously, but they made up for it in other ways. In a completely clean win, Jacobs FINALLY beats Shelley by making him tap to the Ode to Gibson! This is what I use as an example of this style done perfectly. They don't blow their wad before the finish, work a straight kind of tag before the crazy finishing run, and have a personal issue to drive everything and work it as such so you actually care about the nearfalls. I don't know if they intended to work it where you can see either team as babyface depending on where you stand, but that's the way it came off, and as such, it was fantastic and really unique. **** |
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| Big Tuna | May 8 2013, 01:49 AM Post #4 |
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#85 Austin Aries [c] vs. Kenny Omega [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH The Omega Effect - 11/14/2009 Mississauga, Ontario, Canada Another overly long Aries title defense. Better than vs. Davey though. MUCH better, since they stick with the basic theme of Heel Ace vs. Comedy Midcarder, boosted by Kenny being Canadian and it taking place in Canada. Lots of fun spots based around Aries treating Kenny like shit, and Kenny slowly proves he can hang, and Aries gets mad. Thing is, they could have done that in 20 minutes instead of 35, so you've got at least 15 minutes in here you can cut. Nothing stupid like aimless leg work or anything, but god damn. Looking at this list, I have a theory that it was voted on well, but ROH replaced some matches, be them AOTF/Briscoes brawls, Necro Butcher matches, Gen Next/Embassy tags, etc. with stuff from 2009-11 that they wanted to push as just as good as Gabe-era stuff to either pretend they still matter or sell some DVDs. This is one of those. Really fantastic finishing run, and Aries wins with the Last Chancery. **3/4 #84 The American Wolves [c] vs. Kevin Steen/El Generico [ROH WORLD TAG TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP - LADDER WAR II] ROH Glory By Honor VIII - 9/26/2009 New York, NY This is a great match. I don't mean to harp on this match, but this is an example of my theory about this list, because it doesn't belong on here. Eddie's elbow hindered this a lot and made them change it up, but it was still pretty awesome. Steen gets violent as fuck here. The arm injury with Eddie forces them into a story where the Wolves are gutting it out to win in the blowoff, which kind of makes Steenerico look like the inferior team. Which fucking sucks, because they did like 95% of the work as far as making this feud great. They did most of the work in this too with some insane bumps. The Wolves were overly cautious for once, which like...fuck you. If you don't want to get hurt, don't do a fucking ladder match. I've seen shoots since where Davey said he never wanted to do this match and hates gimmick matches, because he's such an insane human being. Some really cool and inventive spots. Generico and Davey fight on the ladder after Steen is sent off a ladder through a table on the floor, and Eddie manages to get Generico in a version of a Half Crab through the ladder rungs, and Davey gets the belts. *** #83 Low Ki vs. Samoa Joe [FIGHT WITHOUT HONOR] ROH Glory By Honor - 10/5/2002 Philadelphia, PA This is, 11 years later, STILL one of the stiffest matches of all time. It's also criminally low on this list. he story is that The Prophecy hired Joe to take out Low Ki. This is one of the more important and famous ROH matches. Important, since it's Joe's debut, and he's one of the 2 or 3 most important guys in company history. Famous, since it's this amazingly brutal striking war. When I started watching ROH again in late 2004/early 2005, this was one of the matches that really got me hooked along with the Punk/Joe stuff, Joe/AJ, and Joe/Aries. It totally holds up. There's a ton of strikes in here that are still awe inspiring. It's one of those matches that everyone should see once. On top of it all, they actually have a story of a bruiser vs. a smaller guy, so this rules on a number of levels. Great exhaustion selling by both men, and the spot where at the end, they both get up, pull all their elbow & knee pads off and take off their wrist tape is one of my favorite things ever. Ki ends up going nuts with strikes and shit, and Joe finally collapses after a punch to the back of the neck and Ki pins him to win. **** #82 The Briscoes vs. Austin Aries/Kota Ibushi ROH Tag Wars 2008 - 4/18/2008 Detroit, MI Phenomenal spotfest. They lay the groundwork you need for this to work with some solid matwork and a real control segment. The spots are really cool, they're hit crisply, they're sold well, and they keep it under 20 minutes. Nobody's finish is killed, and nothing contrived happens. Best possible 2007-8 Briscoes Match as a result. Killer killer finishing run, and The Briscoes beat Kota with the Springboard Jay Driller. ***1/4 #81 CM Punk/Ace Steel vs. BJ Whitmer/Dan Maff [CHICAGO STREET FIGHT] ROH Death Before Dishonor II Night Two - 7/24/2004 Chicago Ridge, IL CRIMINALLY LOW ON THE LIST. This is a top 5 brawl in ROH history, only topped by the very best of Jimmy Loves Lacey and ROH vs. CZW. A ton of great HATE~ and big brutal spots that get bigger and more insane. A barbed wire board gets used and Punk takes two brutal landings on the wire. There's this horrific spot where the Saints have BJ sitting in the corner, and put a table against his throat to hold him there. They put a chair in front of his face, and slide a ladder on the table and into the chair. Everybody bleeds, there's whipping and revenge spots, and it's what you want out of a huge feud ending brawl. Punk asks for chairs, and a big fucking chair throwing riot breaks out. Punk and Maff trade big Suplexes onto the sea of chairs, and Maff is put on a ladder lying on the guardrails. Punk flies off the top to hit a big Splash to him, and in the ring, Ace and BJ are left. Ace hits a Super Tombstone through the table and onto the sea of chairs to win. Amazing out of control feeling, and it still holds up super super well. ****1/4 |
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| Big Tuna | May 9 2013, 11:18 PM Post #5 |
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#80 Samoa Joe vs. Takeshi Morishima ROH Fifth Year Festival: NYC - 2/16/2007 New York, NY Awesome big man match. Morishima makes with feats of athleticism to take over, and dominates Joe. The idea here is to really establish Morishima as a top guy, since he wins the ROH Title the next day, and they believe it can be done with a good showing against the all-time Ace of ROH. This isn't true, because everybody worth a shit has done that, and ROH never really understood that you can't truly MAKE someone the Ace. It requires a connection with fans that you can't manufacture or that at least it takes years to manufacture through strong booking. A defeat can pass the torch if done that way, but they've never really done it right. The only legitimate Ace figures ROH has ever had were Joe, Danielson, and arguments can be made for Punk and Steen and Aries at points, but primarily those two. ANYWAYS, the match does a great job of attempting this idea and Joe certainly does everything he can do to make this look like a match of equals. It's a lot like a Joe vs. Top Local (Necro, Super Dragon, Steen) match where it's based around how much the lower ranked tough guy can survive, and Morishima survives a lot. Joe wins with The Choke. ***3/4 #79 AJ Styles vs. Bryan Danielson [#1 CONTENDER'S TROPHY] ROH All Star Extravaganza - 11/9/2002 Philadelphia, PA So hey, yeah, this is a great match up. Incredible matwork that still holds up as the best matwork in ROH 2002. Really crisp and hard fought and the kind of shit you miss seeing with both guys in mainstream style companies. They pick the pace up and destroy each other with strikes, before AJ catches Danielson on the eye with a kick, and he bleeds a ton from the eyebrow. AJ then worked on the head to make it worse, and Danielson's selling was awesome. He went after the eye in revenge, and fuck man, just a really tight, stiff, and hard fought match. AJ wins with a second Styles Clash. ****1/4 #78 AJ Styles vs. Bryan Danielson [#1 CONTENDER'S TROPHY] ROH Main Event Spectacles - 11/1/2003 Elizabeth, NJ This is a great match, and it's helped a ton by Gabe and other guy not being on commentary at all and it just being the live recording. Great matwork to begin, amazing AJ athletic spots, etc. Danielson starts working the arm in amazing fashion, leading to an AMAZING match. Some idiot is chanting "BORING", so Danielson looks right at him in a hold and yells "WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU KNOW ABOUT WRESTLING, BOY? WHAT *THE FUCK* DO YOU KNOW ABOUT WRESTLING?! YOU SHUT YOUR MOUTH!" The guy he yelled at posted on this board around 2007-8. AJ has some brutal stuff to try and fight out, among them, the rare and amazing face chop. He starts working Danielson's knee, but unfortunately stops selling his arm aside from a few minutes right after. Some great stuff on the knee though. Good finishing stuff, and AJ counters a Triangle Choke with a modified Styles Clash, and then hits a regular Styles Clash to win. ***3/4 #77 CM Punk [c] vs. Roderick Strong [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Escape From New York - 7/9/2005 New York, NY HOW IS THIS ONLY #77?! I said in 2010 when I reviewed this that this is one of the better Punk performances ever, and 3 years later and the best work of his career, I'd still hold this up as a top 10 CM Punk performance. He riles up the crowd amazingly before the bell even rings and spends the first 10 minutes trying to go as slow as possible and avoiding Strong's chops. This is both continuity and amazing heeling, as Strong's chops destroyed Punk in their first match. Also, robbing Strong of his chops is like taking forearms away from Misawa, kicks from KENTA, etc. He builds up Strong FINALLY connecting for like 10 minutes, so the pop when Strong does hit it is much bigger. Also, he's just an amazing dickhead heel period, and every time he cuts off Strong's comeback, it takes more and more to stop Strong, and the crowd gets more and more behind Roddy. Punk doing a Backbreaker and yelling that that's how you do it was the best. Strong's comeback is awesome as shit and there's a few AMAZING nearfalls. Punk gets a roll-up counter with his feet on the ropes to retain. ****1/4 #76 Samoa Joe/Bryan Danielson vs. KENTA/Naomichi Marufuji ROH Best in the World - 3/25/2006 New York, NY HAHAHAHA, what?! This is a pretty disappointing match, no idea how it even got on the list, let alone this far. This is good, but again, overlong. all the Joe/KENTA stuff is fucking amazing. TONS of hate and violence, with some incredible strike exchanges. KENTA/Danielson is also very good. Marufuji continues to not bring that much to the table. Good finishing run and what not. Some stuff happens, things are kicked out of. KENTA pins Danielson with the Go 2 Sleep. *** |
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| Big Tuna | May 13 2013, 11:12 PM Post #6 |
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#75 Samoa Joe [c] vs. Jay Briscoe [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP - STEEL CAGE MATCH] ROH At Our Best - 3/13/2004 Elizabeth, NJ HOW IS THIS OUT OF THE TOP 50?! This is an all time classic ROH match and Jay Briscoe hitting his first insane gusher is a fantastic moment, so there's no excuse for this. Classic Joe performance, going from confident to desperate and putting over Jay for making him get that way. Great underdog performance from Jay too, and the work on the cut was fantastic. Amazing amazing performance from Jay, and all his comebacks were super fucking urgent and desperate. Jay kicked his head in the corner so hard the cage wall broke and he tried to crawl out. The blood began to clot up now. Joe hits a Super Muscle Buster for the win. ****1/2 #74 Tyler Black [c] vs. Kevin Steen [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Salvation - 7/24/2010 Chicago Ridge, IL LOL. This is a really good match and for ROH 2010, it's great, but it does not belong on this list. INCREDIBLE Steen performance. Even during the ring intros, he applauds Black and tries to get fans to cheer for him. Then he immediately goes nuts with a slugfest to open the match. Takes a little bit to get going, but Steen's control seg is awesome. They told a nice story where Black was so thrown off by Steen's recent behavior that whenever he got an opening, he went for risks too soon, and it kept backfiring. Black is busted open and Steen goes nuts on the cut, and shows off his blood to ringside fans. Black has to use insane stuff to get an opening, like the Paroxysm on the apron. It gets a little too Tyler Black-ish at a point in the finishing run, but Steen brings it back around. Black hits a Double Stomp off the to Steen through the timekeeper's table. They kick out of finishes, and yeah. Black puts Steen in his own Sharpshooter and Steen taps. They had a nice idea of the whole Mind Games psychology with a pretty boy babyface champion fighting a total psycho, but this lacked the cool body part stuff that that had. Also, Black clearly was not working on Steen's level, which hurt it. *** #73 KENTA/Kota Ibushi vs. Naomichi Marufuji/Katsuhiko Nakajima ROH The Tokyo Summit - 9/14/2008 Tokyo, Japan The hilarity continues. I like this a lot more than I did last time, but it's still way longer than it needs to be at 35 minutes, because Gabe is a fucking idiot and is of the "longer is better" mindset. They have a cool story with kicker/flipper vs. kicker/flipper, as well as the KENTA/Nakajima feud. And they get these things over, as well as the ropes, where KENTA is more experienced than Nakajima, but Marufuji is more experienced than Kota. However, these aren't the dudes you want going over 20 minutes, because they don't work holds and there's only so long you can see just kicking and flips without anything else. They have a limited amount of spots. Everyone does. **1/2 #72 Samoa Joe/BJ Whitmer/Adam Pearce vs. Chris Hero/Necro Butcher/Super Dragon ROH The 100th Show - 4/22/2006 Philadelphia, PA AHAHAHAHAHAHA WOW, NOPE. This is legit a top 5 ROH match ever. It's fucking PERFECT. So much hate, a totally insane crowd, and there's something amazing happening basically every minute. Everybody in the match puts on an incredible performance, even dudes who are usually just average like Pearce. Joe/Necro is a legendary pairing, Hero is an amazing cowardly heel, Joe/SD, Whitmer again only being great in bloody brawls, and Pearce shows TONS of fire here. If you saw this and didn't LOVE it intensely, I don't understand you. This is perfect. SUPER DRAGON SHOVES DOWN SOME FAGGOT IN A SHANE DOUGLAS SHIRT. Claudio turns on ROH and gives CZW the win. I can't even talk about this without just giving away every spot, it's so fucking good. Fucking crime that this isn't in the top 5. ***** #71 Roderick Strong [c] vs. Eddie Edwards [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Manhattan Mayhem IV - 3/19/2011 New York, NY This was actually pretty great. They took a classic story of an overconfident champion against a midcard stalwart, and ran with it. They didn't need close to 30 minutes, but the fat was in the middle and not in the end due to kicking out of tons of finishers or going way too long in the finishing run. Lots of hard hits, and Strong did well as a dick heel. I enjoyed him gradually realizing he was in over his head and trying to pull out the big guns. Fun reversals at the end, and Eddie sat down on Roderick trying to get out of the Achilles Lock in a Victory Roll to win. Didn't belong on the list, but it was not bad. *** |
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| Big Tuna | May 15 2013, 10:41 PM Post #7 |
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#70 Paul London vs. Michael Shane [STREET FIGHT] ROH Unscripted - 9/21/2002 Philadelphia, PA Their strikes aren't very good, but this is a great stunt show, and this feels like a breakout match for both of them. Great spots, and Shane bled a ton. He had some great moments of dickishness from Shane, and London was a great babyface. Shane catching London doing the Jeff Hardy ladder leapfrog spot into a fucking Liger Bomb is AMAZING. This is the birth of the "PLEASE DON'T DIE!" chants for London, and he hits his beautiful Shooting Star Press off the top of a big ladder to get the win. This has flaws, but two rookies putting this on is a really impressive feat. ***1/4 #69 Nigel McGuinness [c] vs. Kevin Steen [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Northern Navigation - 7/25/2008 Toronto, Ontario, Canada This belongs on the list and its placing feels about right. One of the better Nigel title defenses. This did not have bullshit arm work, and combined with the hot crowd and Steen being amazing in this, made it work better than most Nigel defenses. Steen takes an insane bump off the railing into the apron to damage his back. Nigel mostly works the back although there's a few moments when he forgets and does arm holds, and it's like "dude, come on. Really?" But he mostly sticks to the back and Steen sells well. He keeps taking insane bumps but will not die and is great about making it believable. Some kick outs at the end were ridiculous, but I admit that Steen kicking out of the Rebound Lariat elicited a "FUCK YEAH!" from me here. Nigel hits the Lariat off the top rope to win. ***3/4 #68 Eddie Edwards vs. Roderick Strong [RINGMASTER'S CHALLENGE] ROH Death Before Dishonor IX - 9/17/2011 New York, NY This stip is awful. First fall is pinfall only, second is submission, and the third is a 15 minute Iron Man Match. This was not nearly as good as the title switch. Not a ton of story, just a long match of dudes hitting each other hard. The first match had a semblance of a story, but they can't run that again after Eddie's won the big one and Roddy knows how good he is. After like 14 minutes, Roddy wins fall #1 with his Suplex Reverse Death by Roderick deal. They do stuff in Fall #2, and it lacks the focus you need in a submission only match. Roddy works the back, but Eddie doesn't feel like selling and wins with the Achilles Lock around 20 minutes. Final fall is decent stuff, but they waited like 20+ minutes to do that. Fuck this. They go crazy and go to a time limit draw. UGH. FUCK THIS. NOBODY IN THIS COMPANY IS GOOD ENOUGH TO GO THIS LONG. Cornette comes out and books a sudden death, AND THAT GOES ANOTHER 7 MINUTES BEFORE EDDIE WINS. FUCK THIS MATCH, EVERYTHING WRONG WITH CORNETTE ERA ROH. ** #67 Homicide vs. Steve Corino [NO ROPES BARBED WIRE] ROH War of the Wire - 11/29/2003 Framingham, MA This fucking match, man. I love it. Doesn't belong outside the top 50. Cautiousness early on, and Corino's experience plays into it, as he throws Homicide in first. When they build it up well, the first time someone goes into the wire is always cringeworthy in a great way. Corino busts him open with the wire and tries for the eye in revenge. The fork busts open Corino, AND HOMICIDE STABS HIM IN THE EAR! Biting, use of a barbed wire bat, etc. This is one of the most brutal things I've ever seen. Almost every bump into the wire is cringeworthy, and by the end, it feels like a crazy violent fight to the death. Homicide has the STF, BUT LEGRANDE THROWS RUBBING ALCOHOL IN HIS FACE! J-TRAIN BEATS THE SHIT OUT OF TEAM CORINO FUCK YEAH! Corino grabs protective gloves and a strand of the wire though AND HE GETS THE COBRA SLEEPER WITH THE WIRE AROUND HOMICIDE'S THROAT AND ARM JEEEEEEEESUS CHRIST! Homicide tries to get out, but Corino gets a body scissors on him, so Smokes throws in the towel! ****1/4 #66 Nigel McGuinness [c] vs. Austin Aries [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Supercard of Honor III - 3/29/2008 Orlando, FL This is great match, but it's weirdly high up. I liked this more on rewatch, sometimes it's a matter of mood. Classic ROH Title match formula. Opening matwork and action leading into a limb being isolated in the middle, then lots of stuff at the end. Nigel's really the last champion to do that style well (even if not to the extent of Joe, Aries 2005, Punk, or Danielson, since all the others since him have either done something different (Steen, Aries) or sucked as champion (Lynn, Black, Davey, Eddie, Roddy). Aries sells his arm mostly very well, and does a good job transitioning away from it only to reinjure his arm at the end. They go a little too far with the finisher stuff at the end, but it's an ROH Title match, so y'know. Nigel hits the Rebound Lariat to win. ***1/2 |
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| Big Tuna | May 16 2013, 01:20 AM Post #8 |
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The Master and Ruler Of The World
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#65 El Generico/Colt Cabana vs. Kevin Steen/Steve Corino [CHICAGO STREET FIGHT] ROH Bitter Friends, Stiffer Enemies II - 4/24/2010 Chicago Ridge, IL YEAH! Awesome frantic and chaotic crowd brawling. This reminds me a lot of the Steenerico/Briscoes street fight in Boston in 2007, but it has a lot of the kind of violence you'd get out of the Cabana/Homicide and Corino/Homicide feuds too. The best of both kinds of ROH brawls, really. They go in the crowd and shit and Steen climbs the scaffold. Corino tries to go up too, BUT GENERICO DIVES THROUGH THE MIDDLE WITH THE TORNADO DDT! GENERICO POINTS TO STEEN ON THE SCAFFOLD! THEY FIGHT ON THE SCAFFOLD, AND STEEN HITS A MICHINOKU DRIVER ON THE SCAFFOLD! Generico is hurt now, leading to a control seg of sorts on Cabana. CORINO BREAKS A BEER BOTTLE AND STABS CABANA WITH IT! CORINO USES A FORK TOO! AWESOME CALLBACK! They keep beating on him, and Steen goes for a Moonsault, BUT GENERICO RUNS BACK IN, AND HE PUSHES HIM OFF THE TOP THROUGH A TABLE ON THE FLOOR! Corino is busted too, and the finishing run is amazing. Lots of big stuff, and yeah. Generico has this awesome insane run at the end and Cabana puts Corino in the Billy Goat's Curse. Generico gets a barbed wire bat, AND HE PUSHES IT UP INTO CORINO'S FACE! He hangs on though, SO GENERICO HITS HIM IN THE BACK OF THE HEAD WITH A CHAIR! Corino is out now, and the ref calls it. ****1/2 #64 The Kings of Wrestling [c] vs. The Briscoes [ROH WORLD TAG TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP - NO DQ] ROH Death Before Dishonor VIII - 6/19/2010 Toronto, Ontario, Canada Another amazing brawl from 2010. Everyone but Claudio bled, it was under 20 minutes, had a white hot crowd, some really awesome spots, etc. And there was only ONE ridiculous kickout, which for a Briscoes match (apart from their peaks in 03-04 and 06) is really amazing. That kickout was Jay kicking out of the Loaded Elbow. Really cool way to isolate a man in a No DQ match as Hero used a spare bootlace to tie Mark Briscoe against the ringpost by the throat. He got cut loose after a few minutes, but was obviously hurt from being choked out. Anyways, awesome finishing run. Hero puts the loaded elbow pad on his boot and as Claudio does a Giant Swing to Mark, Hero comes in with a Loaded Sliding Dropkick for the win. **** #63 Low Ki vs. Christopher Daniels vs. Spanky vs. Doug Williams [ROH CHAMPIONSHIP - 60 MINUTE IRON MAN MATCH] ROH Crowning a Champion - 7/27/2002 Philadelphia, PA This is sort of a famous match, and it's an incredible feat that they pulled off this great a match for the skill/experience levels and the time given. The rules say 2 points for a decision and -1 points for a loss. Daniels refuses to fight Ki, and Ki/Doug is a great matwork opening. Everyone vs. Doug is great to begin, and then Daniels gets a slap on Low Ki for a tag, and keeps dodging him. People start working Ki's leg now, and finally Daniels gets in when Ki's down. Ki tags out before any long lasting damage is done, but when he gets back in, Doug goes back to the leg. I love that they changed it up from normally working the left side to work on Ki's right leg, since that's his kicking leg. The same thing happens with Spanky's neck, and Ki does a great job of selling the leg while still working on Spanky's neck. Daniels' arm is also worked on, although neither of them are on Ki's level of injury selling in this. Ki tags himself in to get at Daniels, but is clearly still hurt, and Daniels further injures the knee. He cuts off the Tidal Krush with a chop block, and hits the Last Rites to go up 2 points at something like 25-30 minutes, and Ki has -1. After that, in another smart bit, Spanky and Daniels isolate Doug Williams, since he's the only one without any kind of injury. Ki finally gets back in, and Spanky tags himself in on Doug without him knowing it. Doug tries the Chaos Theory on Ki, BUT KI BACKLIPS OUT INTO THE DRAGON CLUTCH ON SPANKY BEHIND HIM HOLY SHIT! Spanky taps, and Low Ki now has 1 point, so it's Daniels with 2, Ki with 1, Spanky with -1, and Doug at 0. Ki kept selling his leg in amazing form, and they did an amazing job of both picking up the pace and selling the exhaustion. They continually got across the idea that if you try a move twice, it will fail. Anyways, Spanky hit Doug with Sliced Bread #2, but Daniels tackled him out, and Ki hit Doug with the Phoenix Splash (which he actually over-rotated and almost invented the Phoenix 630, but just ended up headbutting Doug in the chest REALLY fucking hard) to get another fall at 50 minutes. It's now Ki with 3, Daniels with 2, and the others at -1. Spanky and Doug took each other out on the floor with 4-5 minutes left, so it was down to Ki and Daniels. They had a great fight, and Ki kept blocking the Last Rites, so he put Ki into his own Dragon Clutch with a minute left. At like 10 seconds, Ki fought back up and hit Daniels with the Last Rites in revenge, and time expired, so Ki wins the belt! For the first 50 or so minutes, this is a brilliantly cerebral match. One of the most cerebral ROH matches ever, along with Joe/Punk III, Danielson/Aries for 77 minutes, and maybe Joe/Danielson in 2004. It sort of fell apart in the last 10 minutes and Daniels forgot about his arm, so that's really the only thing holding it back from being this all-time classic. Still, worth seeing once. I remember reading about this in PWI when I was 12. **** #62 Naomichi Marufuji [c] vs. Nigel McGuinnes [GHC HEAVYWEIGHT CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Glory By Honor V Night Two - 9/16/2006 New York, NY This is one of those matches that Nigel's reputation was built on, this coming a month after the famous Unified match with Danielson. I don't think it belongs on the list, but as the match that showed Nigel could do this level of a match with someone besides Danielson as well as a really historic match, I get why it's here. Marufuji still had some level of restraint here, so he's not THE WORST like he became around 2008/9. However, they are very clearly killing time in the first half. Marufuji has knee work and Nigel sells that, but Maru does not sell the arm stuff at all. Finishing run is great enough to overlook it. Maru retains with a Super Shiranui. *** #61 Nigel McGuinness [c] vs. Bryan Danielson vs. Claudio Castagnoli vs. Tyler Black [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP - ELIMINATION MATCH] ROH Death Before Dishonor VI - 8/2/2008 New York, NY Great match, but far too high up. Really great booking in this match. Great action too, and Claudio and Danielson both deliver huge in the first big section of this. Tyler Black was Tyler Black, but the other three did a good job making him look like an actual good wrestler. They focus on Nigel trying to do as little as possible. Things break down and it's good. Danielson gets Claudio with an inside cradle off of a cover, and Claudio is in shock. AND CLAUDIO SNAPS AND BEATS THE FUCK OUT OF DANIELSON! RICOLA BOMB! HE GETS A CHAIR AND STOMPS IT INTO DANIELSON'S FACE LIKE 10 TIMES! CLAUDIO HURLS AROUND THE REF AND PEOPLE AND KILLS BLACK TOO AND LEAVES! Nigel was down on the floor during all this and easily pins Danielson. Black slides in and Nigel carries Tyler through a great finishing run of stuff. Crowd is super fucking hot and stuff happens. Nigel retains with a Lariat. Crowd is dying to see Nigel/Black for the belt now, and since that was supposedly Gabe's plan for Final Battle before he got fired, that makes sense. ***1/4 |
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| Big Tuna | May 17 2013, 12:46 AM Post #9 |
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#60 Davey Richards vs. Kenny Omega ROH The Epic Encounter III - 3/20/2010 Toronto, Ontario, Canada Hahahahaha what? Really? It's a great match, especially for them, but being above some of these matches is totally absurd. Davey had some great dick heel moments in his control segment too. Davey can be a great heel, it's just that when he works a limb, a lot of times it goes nowhere and is no-sold, so I'm glad this all came together well. Weirdly, Davey did a few minor things on the arm, and now Omega sells it really well, as opposed to when people do long work on his limbs and he ignores it. I thought it went overlong at 24 minutes or so, but I guess I'm glad they didn't go 30. Kudos to them for managing to do mostly engaging back and forth for 20 minutes of that. However, the finish sucked. Davey no-sells the Croyt's Wrath at 2 to counter the bridge into the 14:59 for the win. *** #59 Samoa Joe [c] vs. Homicide [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Do or Die - 5/31/2003 Philadelphia, PA FUCK YEAH. This is the first GREAT Samoa Joe title defense, and it really sets the tone for most of Joe's matches. The challenger uses speed and hangs tough, but Joe will mow them down or catch them. He dominates and it's brutal and stuff and it's a fucking peak era Samoa Joe control seg. It's the best. Homicide has a ton of fire, and his comebacks get increasingly more desperate and he has to use bigger and bigger stuff. Joe is legit KO'd off a Brainbuster, so the ending is a little rough, but he wins with a Super Muscle Buster. This is probably their only match on the list, which is a shame because I think their Generation Next and Death Before Dishonor II matches should be on a list like this and in a top 10 for most underrated ROH matches ever. ***1/2 #58 Davey Richards vs. Tyler Black ROH Tag Wars 2010 - 8/28/2010 Charlotte, NC LO FUCKING L. These two had a really great match, for them, at Death Before Dishonor VIII that I'm sure somehow slips into the Top 25 given the nature of the list. Just the best possible match these two could have. Tight, stiff, no limbwork, really well laid out, not a ton of finisher murder, etc. So here, they change everything about that, and force Black into being a singles heel, which he sucks even more at, and Davey into being a fighting spirit babyface, which accentuates his worst qualities. They basically kill time until they can do spots, and yeah. Davey wins with his shitty Texas Cloverleaf. **1/2 #57 The Kings of Wrestling [c] vs. The Motor City Machine Guns [ROH WORLD TAG TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Supercard of Honor V - 5/8/2010 New York, NY Great great fucking match. reat matwork from Hero and Shelley and then Claudio and Sabin work an amazing lucha sequence. The Kings are too confident, but MCMG are the one team who can actually do double teams as effectively and quickly, if not moreso, than the KOW, so they get blown away early on. The KOW take over using their power and have some awesome double teams of their own, and are dicks about it to Sabin on the apron. Sabin and Shelley get a little contrived at points, but the Kings mostly reign them in. Great hot tag from Sabin. Fantastic finishing run of huge offense, etc. Hero gets the loaded elbow on, but the Briscoes run out to attack him for the DQ. MASSIVE MASSIVE MASSIVE heat for that, but with politics, it's probably the price of booking this match. ***3/4 #56 Nigel McGuinness [c] vs. KENTA [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH 7th Anniversary Show - 3/21/2009 New York, NY This is clearly only here for name value, because this is not a good match. It should be. It's KENTA vs. Nigel, first of all. Secondly, KENTA is working the arms at a point when both of Nigel's arms are completely destroyed, him having Lariat'd himself into being the cautionary tale he is now. But in the weirdest fucking thing ever, Nigel just REFUSES to sell his arms, even though they're legitimately injured with torn biceps and fucked up elbows and shoulders. He works KENTA's arm, and it's fucking KENTA, you KNOW he isn't going to sell a god damn thing. And he doesn't. This match isn't awful, but it's so fucking disappointing that you leave it thinking about it as a terrible thing. Nigel wins with the London Dungeon. **1/4 |
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| Big Tuna | May 18 2013, 01:22 AM Post #10 |
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#55 The American Wolves vs. Adam Cole/Kyle O'Reilly ROH No Escape - 7/9/2011 Charlotte, NC I haven't seen this, but this feels ridiculous. And it was. This is like 20-25 minutes, and the first like 10-15 is good. Not great, but they set some good ground work the veterans vs. rookies story. Kyle and Adam had some good fire and the hierarchy was well established. Then they went totally fucking nuts and gave them way more than the story needed and killed off finishers and went way too long, because it's ROH 2011 and a Davey Richards match. Eddie finally beats Kyle with like the 15th Achilles Lock. **1/2 #54 Jay Briscoe vs. Mark Briscoe ROH Fifth Year Festival: Finale - 3/4/2007 Liverpool, England FUCK YEAH! Not sure if it belongs on the list, but really enjoyable match. This is a complete display of head drops and strikes, but in a much more lovable and endearing way than the last match, because it's brothers. Also, it's the Briscoes, and how else would a Briscoe fight a Briscoe? This is a total popcorn match, and it ends after an insane flurry of back and forth head drops, when neither can get up by 10. *** #53 Generation Next vs. The Briscoes/Jimmy Rave/John Walters ROH Generation Next - 5/22/2004 Philadelphia, PA This is one of those legacy making matches in 2004 like the Joe/Punk and Danielson/Aries matches. Over the top matches to get positive attention back on ROH after the RF scandal. They probably didn't need 40 minutes, but it put Gen Next on the map immediately. Due to the length, you get some really great and long opening matwork. The story of the match is how well Generation Next already works together, but it also establishes their strength. Shelley is the technician, and he can control things on the mat. Evans is the flyer, and he changes the tide by going to the air. Strong is the power, he uses his strength, and Aries is super explosive, and is the most energetic guy in this. You get like 10 minutes of feeling out, before Evans is isolated, and he just DIES. Jay Briscoe is isolated next, and they work on his knee. Mark has bad ribs, and Rave has a stip at this point where if he loses again, he's fired, so they try and stay out. Rave finally has to get in with everyone else a little hurt, and him vs. Shelley is the best match up here, weirdly. Shelley keeps avoiding the Basement Knee. In the second half, they work with flying vs. flying with Mark vs. Evans, power vs. power with Jay vs. Strong, and it's pretty great. Walters hurts his neck in the first half, and when it seems like the match is going to end 20-25 minutes in, Gen Next hurts Walter's neck again, and they isolate it. On top of with the tag, and there's TONS of cool cool shit, including a great payoff where Rave hits Shelley with a Basement Knee. Walters tags back in though, but Shelley's in with him. He hits a Flying Double Stomp to the back of the neck and puts on the Border City Stretch to win! Some contrived shit and there's flaws, but fuck man, A BRISCOE SOLD A LIMB, and it's so much better than it had any right to be, and a super important match. Also a sentimental favorite, since it's the first big match for my all time favorite stable. ****1/4 #52 Bryan Danielson vs. Austin Aries [BEST OF THREE FALLS] ROH Testing The Limit - 8/7/2004 Philadelphia, PA Oh, god damnit. This is one of the best matches in ROH history, but it's beyond infuriating. There's some god damned incredible work here both in terms of offense and strategy, but at some 76 minutes, it's something you can't just sit down and watch on whim, you have to plan it. I've had it in front of me for a while, and this is only the third time I've ever seen it. This is one of the most cerebral matches I've ever seen, but it doesn't hit you until it's over, so the first time, it's SO fucking overlong and boring. But I like it more each time, and it starts with this amazing plan by Danielson to try and work every limb in the first 15-20 minutes to test out Aries' reaction while Aries wants to prove he can hang on the mat with him. Aries gets off the mat to quicken the pace when his neck is targeted. That is a fucking AMAZING little thing in retrospect, since it was Aries' bad neck that came into play a year or so later when he lost the ROH Title to Punk. WHO IS ON COMMENTARY FOR THIS AHAGAHAGJDGFHFWHOA. Aries messes up and tries a second Frankensteiner within minutes of a first, and Danielson hits a Super Gutbuster. He then works on the ribs with some amazing stuff. Aries barely sends Danielson out after a hold and turns the tide with a dive, so he then focuses on the neck. Both men sell very well, although Aries is more subtle about it, having trouble standing upright, wincing whenever he has to lift Danielson etc. Danielson keeps going to the midsection to stay alive. In an incredible moment that should be an iconic momsnt, Danielson has Aries set for a Superplex on the top, and due to the low ceilings, the fans chant "PLEASE DON'T DIE". Danielson looks and yells "I DON'T GIVE A FUCK IF I DIE OR NOT!" and hits the Superplex. They have some great counters, and at 42 minutes, Aries gets Danielson in a Dragon Suplex-style version of the Cattle Mutilation, which does more damage to the bad beck, and Danielson taps to give Aries the first fall. In an awesome throwback to the Danielson/London best of three falls match in 2003, after losing the first fall, Danielson viciously goes after the knee. The knee work rules, but it's basically voided by Danielson missing a Tope Suicida, AND CLIPPING THE SIDE OF HIS HEAD ON THE CORNER OF THE RINGSIDE TABLE HOLY FUCK. Gabe makes a hilariously epic call that I remember to this day with "CRASH AND BURN DANGERRRRROOOOOOOUUUUUUUUSSSSS". Aries then climbs up top and hits a Flying Elbow to Danielson on the floor. This gives Aries a lot of time to heal his knee, making the rest of the match not really no-selling since the knee work was not that long. He hurts his arm when Danielson ducks a forearm and he hits the post. Danielson mounts a comeback and Aries won't tap to the Cattle Mutilation, so Danielson turns it into a rollup to tie it up at 64 minutes. They then get a lot slower and more desperate, and Danielson's hurt head really begins to affect him. Aries hits a Super Brainbuster, two more regular ones and the 450 to win at 76 fucking minutes. Great match, mostly very intelligently worked, but again, why do a 76 minute match? Austin Aries is now a made man. ****1/4 #51 Nigel McGuinness [c] vs. Bryan Danielson [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH 6th Anniversary Show - 2/23/2008 New York, NY Earlier in the show, Nigel officially turned heel, and made Danielson promise to avoid blows to the head if he wanted the shot. They do some incredibly smart work to get this over, with Danielson adapting usual head shots into limb or body attacks. Really incredible matwork early on, and Nigel can't get anything going. Nigel starts to oversell the back of his head in a plan, AND NIGEL TRIES TO WALK OUT ON THE ACTUAL MATCH! This is HUGE, since even CM Punk when trying to leave ROH with the belt never even tried to walk out during a match, and the ref won't let him, SO NIGEL HITS THE REF FOR A BLATANT DQ! BUT THE REST OF THE LOCKER ROOM BLOCKS NIGEL FROM LEAVING! FUCK YEAH! Nigel targets the arm, and Danielson sells incredibly, as always. Nigel maybe puts on the best heel performance of his life, constantly taunting the crowd, and yelling "I HAVE TIL FIVE, REFEREE!" or "BEST IN THE WORLD!" to mock Danielson. Great finishing run, and Danielson responds to requests to kick his head in by saying he gave his word. Nigel hits the first Lariat, AND DANIELSON ROLLS AROUND HOLDING HIS PREVIOUSLY INJURED EYE! Nigel takes some accidental landings on his head really well, and commentary says he might not be that badly injured after all. Danielson can go for the Crucifix Elbows, BUT STAYS TRUE TO HIS WORD AND DOES THE ELBOWS TO THE RIBS INSTEAD! They keep it up, BUT NIGEL USES HIS OWN HEAD AS A WEAPON WITH A HEADBUTT TO THE BAD EYE! OH SON OF A BITCH! He does it some more and does the Crucifix Elbows to Danielson's head, AND KNOCKS HIM OUT WITH ONE TO THE EYE! He puts on the London Dungeon, and the referee calls it. **** |
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| Big Tuna | May 18 2013, 08:28 PM Post #11 |
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#50 The Briscoes [c] vs. The Kings of Wrestling [ROH WORLD TAG TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH The Big Bang - 4/3/2010 Charlotte, NC Wow, nope. There's a lot of great KOW matches in 2010, and a lot of great Briscoes tag Title matches. There's several great KOW/Briscoes matches too, not just from 2010, but from 2006 and 2007. But this is the best match, apparently. Nope. It's really good, almost by force of will from Hero and Claudio, since it's way too long and the crowd kind of blows. The Briscoes control early on with a lot of their great double teams. It began to drag a little but then the KOW took over and that was great. Mark had a good hot tag, but then he got shut down and the Kings got more vicious on the 2nd control seg. Lots of brutal strikes and power moves. He gets the hot tag, and they have a good finishing run. I have a few issues with the finishing run in terms of booking, as the last few minutes seem like it belongs to the second match in a series. The KRS-ONE is kicked out of, which is ridiculous in and of itself, but whatever. Then the actual finish. This was structured with the Kings as a dominating force that the Briscoes couldn't handle like it's Vader/Sting, but then in their first match, the Briscoes show themselves to be able to do it and get screwed by the Loaded Elbow. Seems like that should be the finish of the second match. That being said, this is an awesome match and gets the belts on the best act in ROH, the Kings of Wrestling. *** #49 Bryan Danielson vs. Paul London [BEST OF THREE FALLS] ROH The Epic Encounter - 4/12/2003 Philadelphia, PA THIS FUCKING MATCH. This is the perfect three fall format. It starts off scientific and you get some like 20-25 minutes of great even matwork, and the roles are established. Here, it's technician vs. flyer. Danielson gradually gets more and more aggressive to emphasize how great London is at this point as a white meat babyface, and even 10 years later, London might be one of the five best pure babyfaces in ROH history. Danielson starts getting more and more heelish, and when London gets a cradle to go 1-0, Danielson snaps. He destroys London's knee, and goes 1-1 with a Half Crab. Great selling in the finishing fall, and after a Super Tornado DDT and the London Star Press, London wins. ***3/4 #48 Bryan Danielson [c] vs. Homicide [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Final Battle 2006 - 12/23/2006 New York, NY Theoretically, Final Battle is the year's big ending show. ROH never really booked it that way with the exception of 2009 and 2010, as Gabe was the type to space out his big blowoffs. It generally worked out well for him, so I won't criticize that too much, but this is the only time Final Battle ever felt like THE show, and it was a lot because of how well this got built. Great match. It's technically two matches, but not really. They have a good 7 minutes or so, before Adam Pearce and Shane Hagadorn run out. They attack Homicide, and continuing to be an awful ref in Homicide's title matches, he calls it a DQ. They hit Cide with a Spike Shoulderbreaker, BUT HOMICIDE'S THUGS RUN OUT AND FIGHT THEM OFF! INCLUDING J-TRAIN, AND JULIUS SMOKES THROWS A FUCKING DROPKICK! They fight them to the back, and Smokes stays in Cide's corner now, AND TODD SINCLAIR RESTARTS THE MATCH! Todd FINALLY makes the right call after a year of bad decisions! Cide's arm is hurt though, and Danielson works on it. It's Danielson working an arm, so it rules. Doesn't go on very long before Homicide starts working Danielson's hurt arm too. The arm work doesn't come into it a lot, disappointingly, but they both sold very well. Danielson sold REALLY fucking well actually, especially kipping up with one arm. AMAZING payoff to "I HAVE TIL FIVE REFEREE!" with Danielson refusing to let go of the Crossface Chickenwing with Cide in the ropes, and yelling "FUCK THE FIVE COUNT!" Danielson's arm was under the ropes on the pin after the Cop Killa, so he didn't get 3. Homicide teases snapping again, really similar to how he first turned heel in 2004, in another amazing callback. He throws it down, BUT DANIELS GETS A LOW BLOW! SMALL PACKAGE, BUT HOMICIDE IS THE FIRST ONE TO KICK OUT OF IT! LARIAT FROM HOMICIDE, AND HE WINS! FUCK YEAH! ****1/2 #47 Nigel McGuinness [c] vs. Bryan Danielson [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP - DANIELSON'S LAST SHOT AT NIGEL] ROH Rising Above 2008 - 11/22/2008 Chicago Ridge, IL Goes without saying, this is incredible stuff and probably underrated in the scheme of this actual list, but about where it would belong on an accurate list. Danielson comes in with a bad knee. Awesome matwork to begin, and Danielson does an incredible job of selling his knee subtly until Nigel does try and go after it. Danielson's selling rules and they have a good enough mini-finishing run before it goes to the floor. Nigel distracts the ref by trying to use a chair, and from behind, CLAUDIO RUNS OUT AND HITS DANIELSON IN THE KNEE WITH THE CHAIR! CLAUDIO STOMPS IT INTO DANIELSON'S HEAD! Nigel gets back in and the 20 count begins. BUT SUGARFOOT COMES OUT TO RETURN THE FAVOR, AND HE ROLLS DANIELSON IN AT 19! Nigel mixes in stuff on the leg with his high impact stuff. Really great finishing run with awesome nearfalls. Nigel wins with the Rebound Lariat. **** #46 KENTA [c] vs. Davey Richards [GHC JUNIOR HEAVYWEIGHT CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Supercard of Honor IV - 4/3/2009 Houston, TX This is upsetting, since this match is enraging. This is the match that ruined Davey Richards. Since 2007, he'd started to develop into being a really good little heel. He'd focused more on pissing off the crowd and being a huge asshole than on big moves or strikes, and he'd come back from Japan as this great asskicking machine. Then he went nuts here with huge kickouts and no-selling stuff, it got retarded amounts of praise, since the fanbase is totally useless as to actually liking good wrestling by now, so he started to do this kind of match more and more, and became awful. Really a shame, and that's one of the reasons why watching Davey is so infuriating, because there's a great wrestler inside him. I like his style of offense, lots of kicks and forearms and submissions, and I like how much of an asshole he can be (see: Davey in SNSI, No Remorse, especially SD/DR), but he just refuses to do any of that. Total strikefest war. It's flawed as Davey spends a good chunk of time working the knee of KENTA, and he totally ignores it. Which, I mean...his offense is mostly kicks and kick based offense. It was a stupid decision to work his leg. It was a stupid decision to work any body part when the last half is them throwing out huge offense to kill each other. They do it well enough, but it's the kind of epic that works SUPER well live and the first time you see it, and then flaws become obvious. Davey blowing off selling to encourage "THIS IS AWESOME" chants while he was lying down was the worst. Specifically, after a fucking Falcon Arrow off the apron, when neither man is supposed to be moving, he sits up a bit and encourages a loud "FUCK WRESTLEMANIA!" chant. FUCK YOU. Davey makes some ridiculous "intense" faces too. KENTA wins with a Reverse GTS. **3/4 |
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| Big Tuna | May 22 2013, 01:31 AM Post #12 |
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The Master and Ruler Of The World
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#45 The Briscoes vs. Kevin Steen/El Generico [BOSTON STREET FIGHT] ROH Death Before Dishonor V Night One - 8/10/2007 Boston, MA Glad this made it on here, this is some classic stuff. One of the better possible all over the arena weapons spotfests. There's always something going on, so people aren't waiting around for spots, and all four bring a lot of aggression and hate. Super hot crowd helps out a ton. It's just a fucking fun match. Really chaotic vibe, and they used chairs, the railing, ladders, tables, etc. Most important thing is that it was succinct for a match like this on the indies at some 20 minutes, and ended at the absolute climax. Steen hits a Package Piledriver on a ladder to win. ****1/4 #44 Samoa Joe/BJ Whitmer/Ace Steel/Adam Pearce/Homicide vs. The Kings of Wrestling/Necro Butcher/Nate Webb/Eddie Kingston [CAGE OF DEATH] ROH Death Before Dishonor IV - 7/15/2006 Philadelphia, PA So yeah, amazing. I won't recap everything, but this shit was perfect and arguably the peak of ROH. Blood, violence, and amazing storytelling with Homicide's return, Danielson turning, Kingston and Hero, etc. Just like the 100th Show six man, everyone should see this. The pop for Homicide's return is one of the loudest ever, and yeah, shit goes nuts. Homicide beats Webb with the Cop Killa on the barbed wire board for the win to end the promotional feud. ****1/2 #43 Austin Aries/Roderick Strong vs. KENTA/Davey Richards ROH Honor Reclaims Boston - 11/3/2006 Boston, MA Hahahahaha, really? That's how they follow the last two matches? This is one of the first forced epics in ROH, something that didn't really start until this fall 2006 period when everything was backfiring. They give this 25-30 minutes when it didn't need it, and the extra 5 or so minutes really shows. They go long just to go long, so the first half is all filler with no point of story to it. Finishing run is fine, and Davey loses to Aries' 450 Splash. **3/4 #42 The Kings of Wrestling [c] vs. The American Wolves [ROH WORLD TAG TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Tag Title Classic II - 12/17/2010 Plymouth, MA Very much a Boston slant to this post. Lame. This is also long for the sake of being long, but the Kings do an awesome job of hiding that. I liked this more on rewatch than the first time, but MAN, 35 minutes is too long. The Kings masterfully get 25-30 good minutes out of the Wolves, but it falls apart near the end when they just keep going. But the bulk of this is great, they tease stuff and pay it off, the Wolves sell, Hero and Claudio are Hero and Claudio, etc. In the first 30 or so minutes, they avoid ridiculous kick outs and use saves instead, which was great. Finish is also retardedly much, as Eddie KICKS OUT OF THE DEATH BLOW, and then sustains THREE unprotected Rolling Elbows from Hero before being pinned. *** #41 Samoa Joe [c] vs. CM Punk [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH World Title Classic - 6/12/2004 Dayton, OH The nostalgia swells within me. Everybody knows how this works. This is their first 60 minute draw, and it's based on Punk trying to extend Joe with the headlocks, since Joe's never gone long before. Joe counters with knee work, since that worked in 2003 in their non-trilogy match. They use the idea of Punk avoiding big stuff early on and falling for it in the second half, due to exhaustion, and I love that stuff. Also notable is Punk's knee costing him the title when he hurts it hitting the Pepsi Plunge, allowing Joe to roll out. This is clearly the least of the three matches though, due to some downtime and them saving stuff more for the second match. **** |
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| Big Tuna | May 23 2013, 11:20 PM Post #13 |
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The Master and Ruler Of The World
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#40 Roderick Strong [c] vs. Davey Richards [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Final Battle 2010 - 12/18/2010 New York, NY Hahahahaha, nope. It is highly representative of all the flaws in the ROH main event style by this point. You have two guys who CAN be good in the right setting, but they give them 30 minutes and they let Davey's horrible tendencies take over. They both work on the arms early on and it is good stuff, but then hey, they both forget about it when they get to the middle. They sort of just skipped the middle of the match where someone controls a bit or a story is established and then they went right to a finishing run for 15-20 minutes. They kick out of a ridiculous amount of stuff and they start to sell Davey having a concussion and being KO'd, which is neat, except that he still goes on for another 5 minutes and then had some ridiculous no-selling during that. Strong wins with the Stronghold. **1/2 #39 Eddie Edwards [c] vs. Chris Hero [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Revolution: Canada - 5/7/2011 Toronto, Ontario, Canada This was almost really great and nearly on the level of some of the better 2007-8 title matches. Great matwork, since Eddie is more than capable of being led on the mat, and Hero is Hero. Hero works on the arm, and does some really cool offense on it. He targets his elbows and kicks to the arm too, AND EDDIE SELLS REALLY WELL! WAT! He holds his arm like all match, doesn't use it, and it impacts the match because he can't hang onto stuff and it causes a fall through a table after an elbow on the top rope. Great exhaustion selling also, and he evens it up with a Fisherman's Buster on the apron! They go into a tired finishing run now, and this is where it jumps the shark, since they had like 5 more good minutes, but it went another 10 to be like 40 minutes. Too many kick outs, and Eddie finally wins with the Achilles Lock with head stomping for a KO. So close to being genuinely amazing, but still mostly great. ***1/4 #38 Bryan Danielson vs. Takeshi Morishima [FIGHT WITHOUT HONOR] ROH Final Battle 2008 - 12/27/2008 New York, NY Great match. It's not as good as the Danielson/Claudio FWH from a few weeks prior and the heat had all died down from this feud compared to a year prior, so it's not as great as it could have been, but it's still great. Actually, it's probably the weakest of their three big matches, and their first match is obviously still to come, since it's in the pantheon of great matches, but their November 2007 match that went to a DQ is just as good and forgotten about. Great big vs. small stuff, and yeah. Danielson bleeds a lot and has a ton of fire. They use a chain, and Danielson ends up wrapping the chain around his arm and hitting chain-assisted Crucifix Elbows until Mori is KO'd for the win. ***1/2 #37 Low Ki vs. Bryan Danielson vs. Christopher Daniels ROH The Era of Honor Begins - 2/23/2002 Philadelphia, PA This match is amazing, and I am glad it's here, although it's overrated for importance. Most important indy match of all time maybe, considering that if this wasn't amazing, the entire ROH project tanks, since it's based on great matches and the rest of the card didn't deliver that. There's at least 5 different exchanges or spots in this that, 11 years later, are still completely mindblowing. Everything gets bigger and bigger, and it's just a perfectly laid out spotfest. Ki breaks up the Cattle Mutilation with a Phoenix Splash for the win. ***1/2 #36 Bryan Danielson [c] vs. Roderick Strong [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Supercard of Honor - 3/31/2006 Chicago Ridge, IL This is the 56 minute match. I go back and forth on this match whenever I see it, honestly. When I saw it live, it started at close to midnight, and I just wanted to leave. When I saw it on DVD, I loved it. LOVED IT. When I reviewed it again two years ago, I was bored by it again. Great matwork, and Danielson has a crazy bridge out of a double knuckle lock. Danielson is again flustered by the chops, and this has the famous moment where Strong gets on the mic and awkwardly yells "HEY DANIELSON, GET BACK HERE AND DEFEND THAT BELT, MOTHERFUCKER!" Unfortunately, they cut the amazing part, which was him stumbling the line, asking if he can start over, getting it right, and then fist-pumping in celebration. Someone yelled out "great job", so he said "THANK YOU!" Strong keeps using the power of his legs and his chops to fight out of control segments. It goes a little long before they get into that though, so you've got an opening back and forth of like 20 minutes. It's good, it's just entirely unnecessary. Danielson has good work on the knee, but Strong fights back using his chops. Strong accidentally chopped the post, leading to Danielson working the hand and wrist. Danielson yelling "TAP OUT TO A WRISTLOCK!" was amazing. On a side note, I want to kill Prazak during this! Some fans chant boring, and he then says they'll probably love John Cena's match on Sunday. Yeah, probably. Since it won't be long for the sake of going long, will have an amazingly hot crowd, and will be a genuinely great match, I probably would love it. Fuck you. AWESOME finishing run, as Strong can't throw chops or run, so he has to throw tons of Backbreakers. Danielson counters into the Crucifix Elbows, BUT STRONG SURVIVES THIS TIME! YEAH! Strong maybe has it won after a Super Death By Roderick, but hesitates before a cover, initially going for the Stronghold, and it costs him. He then puts the Stronghold on, but Danielson eventually counters into a roll up to get the win. Great match, just too long. Danielson's total deconstruction of Strong was incredible, but with like 20 less minutes, this is an all-time classic. ***1/2 |
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| Big Tuna | May 24 2013, 11:47 PM Post #14 |
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The Master and Ruler Of The World
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#35 Eddie Edwards [c] vs. Davey Richards [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Best in the World 2011 - 6/26/2011 New York, NY HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA NOPE. This is again, a match that could have been great, and is held back by being too long and other Davey-centric complaints. The story of Davey not giving it his all until Eddie has to slap the shit out of him to get him to finally go 100% was really interesting, but it took too long to get there. Eddie was really the one guiding this, since he's the guy trying to keep a focus on the story, he's saving his stuff for the end, selling a limb, etc. Davey refused to sell his knee and yeah, he really brought this down. There's also a clear peak here, and they go another 5-10 minutes after it. Davey has to kick Eddie's head into unconsciousness to win. Gross. **1/2 #34 Homicide vs. Steve Corino ROH Bitter Friends, Stiffer Enemies - 8/16/2003 Farfield, CT This is amazing. Great grudge match feel early on, and Homicide his this absolutely ungodly slap on Corino that legitimately cost him hearing in his ear. Corino tries to bail, but Homicide's crew is blocking the entrance! Homicide gets out a stand of barbed wire now, and JESUS CHRIST, HE CUTS CORINO'S BICEP WITH IT! He's digging the wire into the cut and shit, and it is amazingly gruesome. Cide also brings out the ghetto fork on the arm. Homicide gets busted open bad from the face, and Corino is just as brutal as Cide was, biting and digging his fingers into the cut and using the wire. They keep fighting and it's violent and gritty and amazing. Homicide misses the Tope Con Hello, and crushes back-first into the top of the railing. While brutal as fuck, it's also a great throwback to their first match, where missing the dive cost him the match. He fights out of the Cobra Sleeper now, and they have an awesome finishing run. Homicide starts throwing bombs on Corino's bad neck, but like when Corino had Homicide hurt at 1YA, now Corino keeps kicking out even though he's basically done. Homicide puts on a brutal STF, and adds in a Border City Stretch style hold on the head to work on the taped up shoulder too, and LeGrand throws in the towel! ****1/2 #33 Davey Richards vs. Christopher Daniels ROH Richards vs. Daniels - 10/16/2010 Chicago Ridge, IL This is a total miracle and with a length of 25 or so minutes, could absolutely have been HORRIBLE, but it worked. Didn't belong on this list let alone in the top 50, but this is a horrible list, so hey. hey avoided limbwork or any of that, didn't kill their finishes or engage in any ridiculous no-selling, and kept a strong pace throughout. They had a lot of really cool sequences, and yeah. Of course, it's Davey. There were a few contrived counters in the finishing run, but I'm willing to overlook that since it's two flawed guys putting on an actual great match in an amount of time that usually dooms them. Davey has a cool new Indian Deathlock/Ankle Lock mixture and Daniels taps out. ***1/4 #32 Kenta Kobashi/Homicide vs. Samoa Joe/Low Ki ROH Unforgettable - 10/2/2005 Philadelphia, PA Not as fondly remembered since this show took place in the shadow of Joe vs. Kobashi, but this is almost just as good. The idea behind a classic AJPW/NOAH tag match format is defining roles so you can do multiple control segments and so every exchange has something behind it. ROH has tried it, and it rarely works because the guys who perfected it worked it like every weekend for years, and weren't dudes trying a new thing. It works here, because Kobashi is among the guys who perfected it. You have Joe/Kobashi and Ki/Kobashi in matches with top ROH guys trying to hang with the universal Ace at this point, Ki and Homicide in an equal pairing, and Joe/Homicide in a match of guys who hate each other, so the roles can be told in addition to the obvious size disparagies. Both smaller guys got isolated, and everyone kills each other. They get about 30 minutes from all this, and the finishing run is incredible. They build all match to a Joe/Kobashi run, and it rules again. This time, Joe comes out looking exactly on Kobashi's level, before Ki gets in. Kobashi can handle him though, and wins with the Burning Lariat. ****1/4 #31 Bryan Danielson [c] vs. Samoa Joe [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Fight of the Century - 8/5/2006 Edison, NJ Another incredible match. They go sixty minutes here, and it's about you'd expect from a meeting of the two greatest ROH Champions ever. The ROH Title broadways were always based on the love of guys like Punk, Danielson, Daniels, Joe, etc. for the old NWA Champion archetype, but Joe was so vastly different than any classic NWA Champion and Punk/Daniels was something of a failure, so this is the closest that they ever came to getting it right. Fuck, they DID get it right here. A champion who is maybe the best technician in the world, but also a huge asshole, facing a beloved favorite who is bigger and stronger. This has some incredible matwork based on the big/little idea. Danielson keeps evading being hit and avoiding big stuff. He eventually gets some cheap shots, and targets the weak knee from Cage of Death's betrayal. Danielson eventually injures Joe's knee with a clip to take over. His legwork was mostly awesome, but some of it kind of dragged. Joe's selling is amazing, as were the dives from both men. Really great finishing run of reversals and shit. Joe finally gets on The Choke with seconds left, but the time runs out and it's a draw. ****1/4 |
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| Big Tuna | Jun 1 2013, 11:57 PM Post #15 |
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The Master and Ruler Of The World
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#30 Takeshi Morishima [c] vs. Bryan Danielson [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Manhattan Mayhem II - 8/25/2007 New York, NY This is such a great fucking match. 2007 is the best year of the last like 10-15 years for big/little matches between this and Cena/Umaga and Cena/Khali, etc. Really smart, and yet also really simple big vs. little storytelling pulled off perfectly. Danielson keeps kicking at the leg. Morishima gets more and more pissed at this, and Danielson uses speed to avoid getting drawn into any kind of slugfest. And when he does, Danielson absolutely gets killed. It's hard to tell which blow does it exactly, but one of them fucks up Danielson's eye bad. I think it might have been a detached retina, but yeah, his eye was hurt. It adds a ton to the match either way, both in terms of Morishima's attacks and Danielson's comebacks. The knee work slowly starts to pay off, and knowing the result, I got into it watching it again. When Morishima finally crumbled to the mat from a kick to the knee, I pumped my fist and yelled "YEAH!" That says just about everything. Danielson is the perfect opponent for Morishima, as he enables him to not really have to do anything but throw big strikes and hit his moves. Danielson can't get the job done with the eye and once Morishima endures his big final run, he hits a Lariat and the Backdrop Driver to win. This actually got better with age, and holds up better than a lot of other stuff I thought was better at the time. ****1/2 #29 The Briscoes [c] vs. The Motor City Machine Guns [ROH WORLD TAG TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Good Times, Great Memories - 4/28/2007 Chicago Ridge, IL This is one of the better spotfest tag matches they've ever done. I think it's too high, but considering some of this list, whatever. This is carried a lot by the MCMG being great dick heels. They mock Mark's concussion and stall and stooge a lot early on, and like always when the Guns break out heel work, it's SO much better than their babyface work, since Shelley is a natural dick. That being said, they clearly go long just to do it, as they can cut out stuff in the beginning, middle, and end. Like a lot of Briscoes matches in 2007 and early 2008 when they kind of got caught up in this bullshit epic style, there's like 20-25 great minutes and 10 filler. Awesome finishing run and it has a perfect ending after Mark hits the SSP, since that's how this feud began kind of, but then they kept going, before the Briscoes won with a Cutthroat Driver/Flying Legdrop combo. ***1/4 #28 Samoa Joe [c] vs. Austin Aries [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Final Battle 2004 - 12/26/2004 Philadelphia, PA WOW, NOPE. I have a lot of sentimental attachment to this, as it's one of the 5 or so matches I saw in late 2004/early 2005 that made a huge ROHBot and got me into indy wrestling, but I think this is at worst a top 5 ROH match ever. Probably the Benoit/Jericho vs. 2MPT of ROH, in terms of stuff I like waaaaaaay more than most other people. Definitely the best ROH Title switch ever. Such a psychologically brilliant match. Aries tries to rush Joe at the start, and is IMMEDIATELY shut down. Aries regroups, and tries CM Punk's headlock strategy and Bryan Danielson's knee work strategy, but it fails for him like it failed for them. Later in the match, he tries the flash sunset flip that Cabana used, and that fails too. This is also brilliant in how they laid out things to make you believe that a change wasn't coming, like having Aries kick out of the Island Driver, so that if he lost, he could look strong there, or having Aries hit one 450 Splash, since that was his big finish then. This is kind of weird where it's worked with Aries working from underneath and almost as a subtle babyface, on the night of him pulling the coup on Shelley, but it almost has to be. At this point, after everyone Joe's beat and a 21 month reign, the guy who beats him can't just be this piece of shit heel, it has to be this huge monumental victory and a changing of the guard, and with Joe dominating and Aries making huge fiery comebacks and doing it clean, everything works perfectly. Everyone knows about The Combo. God, I hope everyone does anyways. It's a legendary final minute or so, and the fact that they started with a dead crowd and ended with everyone standing and screaming using maybe about half their offensive arsenals is fantastic. ****3/4 #27 The Briscoes [c] vs. The Second City Saints [ROH TAG TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Reborn: Stage Two - 4/24/2004 Chicago Ridge, IL Another incredible match from ROH's best in-ring year ever. This is the main event of the first Chicago show and the first weekend of shows after the RF scandal, so there's a ton of pressure, and they just kill it. This is one of the more perfect ROH tag formula matches I've ever seen. They stick with 15-20 minutes, and nail the idea of opening matwork and back and forth going into a control seg and then the finishing run. The Briscoes kick ass as heels and have some amazing cut offs. Both Punk and Cabana put on career level performances, to this point, as hometown babyfaces. For like a year, Punk's yelling at Cabana to stop goofing around, and he finally gives in here, and they're one of the most natural babyface teams I've ever seen. But yeah, Punk's a great FIP and the Briscoes kick ass, and he does the AMAZING Steiners Doomsday Powerslam spot. Kick ass finishing run with tons of super inventive stuff even 9 years later. This was the debut of the "all four men down after strikes" thing that ROH tags STILL go to to this day, and one of the only times it worked. My only real complaint is the lack legal man continuity at the end, but this is way too much fun for that to spoil it. Punk wins with the most hellacious Pepsi Plunge ever. **** #26 AJ Styles vs. Paul London [#1 CONTENDER'S TROPHY] ROH Night of the Grudges - 6/14/2003 Cambridge, MA Really good matwork to begin, and again, AJ's matwork is underrated. Probably because he hasn't really done it since like 2006, but still. They start throwing bombs on the floor, and London injures AJ's leg. His work on the knee is vicious and awesome. AJ tried to counteract it by constantly going for and hitting big high impact stuff, so it turned into a battle of knee work vs. head drops, and the strategery was a great touch. AJ's knee selling was mostly great, but with a few minor rough spots. He hits the Styles Clash, but it hurts his knee too much to follow up soon enough. AJ hits a German Suplex with a bridge, but his knee gives out on the bridge, and both men's shoulders were down for 3, so it's a draw. ****1/4 |
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| Exponent | Jun 2 2013, 04:13 PM Post #16 |
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The Italian Stallion
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2007 also had Joe/Christian which had a heel "little" and face "big" but still ruled. |
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| Big Tuna | Jun 7 2013, 11:06 PM Post #17 |
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The Master and Ruler Of The World
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![]() #25 Bryan Danielson vs. Davey Richards ROH The Final Countdown Tour: Boston - 9/25/2009 Boston, MA This is such an upsetting match. It's on the Danielson farewell tour where he's putting over lots of guys, but this is the one ROH claims is a passing of the torch, and it's clearly not, because it's one of the most blatant Danielson carryjobs of all time. He guides Davey through matwork that looks more like a contest than time killing until spots. He can dominate and Davey works over the arm. Davey's arm work has always been good, but so often it's blatant time killing that is ignored until the end. Danielson makes sure that doesn't happen with his selling, but they run into problems when they have to go 35 minutes, because Davey can barely fill 20. Only through sheer force of will can Danielson make this great, but it feels like more of a struggle than anything in the actual match. Davey wins with the 14:59. *** ![]() #24 Bryan Danielson vs. KENTA ROH Driven - 6/23/2007 Chicago Ridge, IL It's these two, so it's great. It lacks that little something extra that took their ROH Title match from "great" to "classic", but it's two of the better wrestlers in the world wrestling hard for 25-30 minutes, so it delivers. Danielson guides him through matwork, and then tortures him a bit, before the big finishing run. It's fine and they have some really cool stuff, and then KENTA does a fighting spirit sell when Danielson uses the GTS on him. Yep. He no sold HIS OWN god damn finisher. That's the point where I cash out. KENTA wins with the GTS. ***1/2 ![]() #23 Low Ki vs. AJ Styles vs. Paul London [#1 CONTENDER'S TROPHY] ROH One Year Anniversary - 2/8/2003 Queens, NY An elite spotfest. Until the last 2-3 minutes, it's totally balls out, super stiff and innovative good shit. Ki and AJ is an amazing match up, and AJ vs. London shines as well. For the most part, it doesn't really come off as contrived, apart from a few bits where London is caught waiting for shit. AJ and Ki do a great job of avoiding this though. It slows down a bit at the end, so that's unfortunate. Ki hits AJ with a Super Ki Krusher, but before he can cover, London hits AJ with the London Star Press for the win. ***1/2 ![]() #22 Austin Aries/Roderick Strong/Matt Sydal/Jack Evans vs. Jimmy Rave/Alex Shelley/Abyss/Prince Nana [STEEL CAGE WARFARE] ROH Steel Cage Warfare - 12/3/2005 New York, NY This is basically just an elimination War Games, and it's perfect. It starts out with Jimmy Rave vs. Austin Aries. That was solid with some great Rave bumping, and Alex Shelley was in next. Shelley and Rave made an absolutely amazing team, and I love that they're keeping it basic in the early stages to save for the chaos. Matt Sydal is in next, and does a great job cleaning house. Abyss was in next, and Aries and Sydal bumped around like lunatics for him. They brought in a chair, and began to start getting brutal. They basically killed Aries and Sydal, and Roderick Strong was in next. He did alright, but fell to a 3 on 1. Sydal took an AMAZING Black Hole Slam, and Rave demanded the glory, and eliminated Sydal after the Pedigree. Strong and Rave had a great fight on the floor, and Shelley is the king of this with his shit talking. Prince Nana is in next to help out with the 4 on 2. Jade Chung came out to lure them to chase her on the floor as Jack Evans got in last. Jack went up AND HIT THE EMBASSY WITH A DOUBLE GODDAMNED MOONSAULT OFF THE TOP OF THE CAGE!!! Roddy and Aries fought back, and they all ganged up on Abyss. Jack went up and Rave tried to stop. Strong got up too though, AND THEY HIT ODE TO THE BULLDOGS OFF THE TOP OF THE CAGE TO ELIMINATE ABYSS FUCK YEAH! More great shit happens and Shelley blocks the 630, and hits the Air Raid Crash to Jack to eliminate him. Nana stays out, and it turns into a great 2 vs. 2. Nana gets back in, but accidentally hits Rave and Shelley! They accidentally hit him, AND STRONG GOES NUTS WITH BACKBREAKERS ON RAVE! ARIES HITS SHELLEY WITH THE BRAINBUSTER ON AN OPEN CHAIR! STRONGHOLD ON RAVE! RAVE TAPS AND ARIES PINS SHELLEY! Nana's stuck alone now, and they beat the shit out of him. They hit the Half Nelson Backbreaker -> 450 Splash combo to win. Really really satisfying match. ****1/2 ![]() #21 The Briscoes [c] vs. Kevin Steen/El Generico [ROH WORLD TAG TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP - LADDER WAR] ROH Man Up - 9/15/2007 Chicago Ridge, IL Wonderful spectacular spotfest. Some totally ridiculous and stupidly dangerous spots, and it is a lot of fun for this kind of a match. There's a great hateful vibe between the teams that makes it work and ties everything together as more than just a Briscoes match with a ladder involved. Nice little thing that Generico is the first to actually try to win, since he's always cared more about the belts than Steen, who's cared just as much about hurting the Briscoes than he has about winning the belts. For the most part, the spots did a good job building up in size so the end had a bunch of crazy shit. They did a shockingly good job of avoiding contrived spots, so it always looked like they were trying to win, or at least so it didn't look like they were clearly just doing spots. The Briscoes won, and then get hung upside down. ***3/4 |
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| Big Tuna | Jun 22 2013, 12:38 AM Post #18 |
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The Master and Ruler Of The World
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![]() #20 Samoa Joe vs. Bryan Danielson vs. Homicide vs. Colt Cabana vs. Austin Aries vs. Mark Briscoe [2004 SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST FINALS - ELIMINATION MATCH] ROH Survival of the Fittest 2004 - 6/24/2004 Philadelphia, PA This is such an incredible match, and the best elimination match of it's kind ever possibly. Tons of storties, and pretty much everyone involved has some kind of focus. Joe/Danielson is a simmering issue, Joe and Homicide want at each other, and the other three are trying to beat Joe to earn title shots. Cabana and Briscoe have issues over the Tag Titles, and a Rottweilers/Briscoes feud started earlier on the show. Mark Briscoe has a hurt neck from his qualifying match, and Cabana has one from the last show, so everyone works on that in the first section of this. Danielson and Joe also go after Mark's legs, both trying to shut down his speed and also continuing their contest of trying to one-up each other. Things break down, BUT CABANA GETS A FLASH SUNSET FLIP ON SAMOA JOE, AND PINS HIM! HOLY SHIT! Plays up Joe's weakness against roll ups, and gets us Joe/Cabana. Homicide goes after Cabana and hits the Lariat, BUT MARK GETS THE BLIND TAG AND STEALS THE PIN WITH THE SHOOTING STAR PRESS! And now Mark's pinned Cabana and the Briscoes get another Tag Title shot. Homicide goes after the bad neck now, and Mark sells really well. Mark gets a Bridging German, but his neck gives out, AND BOTH MEN ARE ELIMINATED! WHOA! They brawl away, and it's fucking great. It's down Danielson and Aries, and they get like 20 minutes together and it's what this match is known for. This is the match that made Austin Aries into a star, and it's the kind of thing ROH tried to recreate with Danielson/Black and every other guy they wanted to push, but it never felt as genuine as it did here. Those performances felt like they were given to Black & Co., but the stuff Aries got in this felt earned. Aries' chin gets split open and Danielson works on it amazingly. There's some just insanely brutal Danielson stretches too, and when Aries takes over, it feels like he's throwing everything into all his attacks because he's fighting for his life. Danielson goes insane on the back with like 20 body slams and a Back Superplex, and puts on this INSANE Bear Hug/Boston Crab type deal for the submission win. ****1/2 ![]() #19 The American Wolves [c] vs. Bryan Danielson/Tyler Black [ROH WORLD TAG TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Tag Title Classic - 4/18/2009 Markham, Ontario, Canada This at #19 is a travesty. It's a good match, and actually really good for the skill level of Eddie Edward and Tyler Black at this point. Davey's just beginning to get up his own ass as far as his no-selling and theatrics, but Danielson is Danielson and guides EVERYONE for 45 minutes. They begin with an actual feeling out process that makes sense. There's sort of a lack of focus, but still a coherent structure. The Wolves kept taking over since they're a better unit. It started to drag in a Black offensive run, but then it picked up when Davey knocked him off the top rope through the ringside table. Danielson was then all alone and they worked on his knee. Danielson sold really well. Black got in and his stuff dragged again, and there's a gigantic gap in quality between Black and Danielson here. The last 20-25 minutes is a lot of big offense and stuff, and Danielson really holds it all together. Black hits the Small Package Driver at the end, but the 45 minute time limit expires. ***1/4 ![]() #18 Bryan Danielson [c] vs. Roderick Strong [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH This Means War - 10/29/2005 Woodbridge, CT Beautiful match. Danielson comes in as a face, but due to the crowd favoring Roderick Strong and due to Strong continually getting the best of him, Danielson gradually gets more and more aggressive and pretty much turns himself heel. They didn't need 36 or whatever minutes to do this though, which is the biggest problem with most of the classic Danielson title defenses. Could have also used with more arm selling by Strong given that Danielson focused on it for the first third, but it wasn't a huge deal, since Danielson forgot about it and it wasn't worked on that roughly. Awesome final half where Danielson takes out the knees to block the Backbreakers, but Strong is willing to sacrifice them for the title. Danielson gets knocked out by a forearm, and snaps when he gets up with a sudden burst of energy, and puts on an Omoplata to win. ***3/4 ![]() #17 Nigel McGuinness [c] vs. Austin Aries [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Rising Above - 12/29/2007 This belongs on the list, but maybe a little bit too high up. Gets somewhat overrated due to a few totally god damned insane moments. Nigel gets upset with people booing him, AND ARIES HITS A TOPE SUICIDA TO NIGEL'S BACK AND HE GETS SPLIT WIIIIIIIIIIIDE OPEN ON THE RAIL! Hell of a cut. Aries goes after the cut and the injured arm, and Nigel tries to work the arm too. Nigel's too fucked up to get any real traction, and Aries goes more after the head. They totally kill it with the finishing run, including Aries taking a bump off the top rope Lariat to the floor, a Brainbuster into the top of the guardrail, a Tower of London on the floor, etc. They were missing that one great nearfall or moment to take this from "great" to "classic", but that's hardly a fault with the match. Nigel wins with the Rebound Lariat. **** ![]() #16 Bryan Danielson vs. Low Ki [ROUND ROBIN CHALLENGE SERIES - SPECIAL REFEREE: KEN SHAMROCK] ROH Round Robin Challenge - 3/30/2002 Philadelphia, PA Another one of those super important early ROH matches. This is mostly matwork, and it's beyond impressive that guys with this little experience, like 3 years for Danielson and around that for Low Ki too, can go 30 minutes in this style and like 20-25 of that is great stuff. Danielson wants to keep it on the mat because he's coming in with a cut on his eyebrow from his first match and also a bad neck, and Low Ki is Low Ki, so he wants to strike, but because he's an insane person, he doesn't want to allow people to think anyone's better at him than anything, so he refuses to stop mat wrestling. So it's this weird version of Wrestler vs. Striker, where the striker, once he's lured into an exchange of holds, refuses to change the pace until they're separated. Ki gets kicks in on the eye and Danielson gets mad and it becomes amazing. It does go on something like 5 minutes too long though, and them going 30 minutes is clearly one of those things they did to put the ROH name out there. It worked, since this match got a lot of buzz at the time, so it was all for the best. Danielson ends up making Ki pass out to the Cattle Mutilation. ***3/4 Edited by Big Tuna, Jun 22 2013, 12:39 AM.
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| Big Tuna | Jul 3 2013, 10:17 PM Post #19 |
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The Master and Ruler Of The World
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![]() #15 Tyler Black [c] vs. Davey Richards [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Death Before Dishonor VIII - 6/19/2010 Toronto, Ontario, Canada This at #15 is laughable, but this is a match that could have been SO much worse. Example being every other match they ever had against each other. This is just the perfect match for them. It's laid out and paced better than usual, there's no limbwork, and it build very well. They begin with a nice story with Davey trying to keep it on the mat, where he's better, but Black frustrating him by hanging with him hold for hold. Davey gets mad and uses a lot of strikes. Good control segment, but it ended too soon with how long this went. The "finishing run" went about 15-20 minutes. It had a ton of really cool stuff. And I mean really really cool stuff. Reminds me a lot of Davey/Omega, in that they paced themselves really well so that, while there wasn't a ton of substance, they never lost steam and it felt like it peaked when it ended. They had a small story of Black having more success going to the air and Davey having more with strikes. There was no real egregious no-selling, so there wasn't a ton to hate here apart from a few kickouts. I could see someone hating this, but they put in a ton of effort and I felt more about this was good than bad. Smart finish as Davey keeps avoiding God's Last Gift using his free arm, so Black invents a Wrist Clutch-God's Last Gift for the win. *** ![]() #14 Jimmy Jacobs vs. BJ Whitmer [STEEL CAGE MATCH] ROH Supercard of Honor II - 3/31/2007 Detroit, MI Fair placement. JIMMY IMMEDIATELY BEGINS WITH A TOPE SUICIDA THROUGH THE DOOR! YEAH! Good brawl on the outside, and it gets back in. Jimmy takes some amazing bumps into the cage. They do this incredible spot where both men get spikes, catch each other's eyes across the ring...AND THEY RUN AT EACH OTHER AND STAB THE SHIT OUT OF EACH OTHER! They both get up on each other, and go nuts with spike shots at point-blank range and it is amazing. The thing with a crew member having to bring them weapons from the back was weird, but that was a minor flaw. A barbed wire bat got used really well and Jimmy brushing his hair with the wire was great, on top of him using BJ's blood as chest paint and other awesome gross shit like that. BJ's arm got cut, so Jimmy used one of the spikes to stab at his arm while using the other on his face. It turns into this horrifyingly violent spectacle at a point, with both men having most of their upper bodies stained in blood. Great exhaustion selling in the finishing run. BJ trying a Superbomb to end it was a great callback. Jimmy hits a Back Senton off the top of the cage through the table to win. ****1/4 ![]() #13 Samoa Joe [c] vs. CM Punk [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP - NO TIME LIMIT] ROH All Star Extravaganza II - 12/4/2004 Elizabeth, NJ THIS is where the list loses any credibility. At worst, this is a top 10 ROH match ever. I think it's #1, but I can see cases for some other stuff. This is fucking perfect. It's in the short list of my all time favorite matches along with Benoit/Jericho vs. 2MPT. Just a god damned brilliant match. Everything pays off here. The headlocks fail and Joe mauls Punk. Punk bleeds a ton and Joe destroys the cut. Punk has probably the best babyface comeback of his life, actually hitting that rare level of a truly desperate performance. The apron dropkick in the place where Punk hit a Huracanrana in the first two matches is my favorite piece of learned psychology of all time. The nearfalls in this are godly, and it goes from classic to legitimately one of the best matches of all time when the struggles for The Choke begin. Punk fights harder than any man, and even gets nearfalls to counter at points. AND JOE IS SO DESPERATE TO END IT THAT HE TRIES A PIN WITH HIS FOOT ON THE ROPES! They keep going and Punk FINALLY passes out to The Choke. If you've seen this and didn't think it was at least really fucking great and in the pantheon of all-time great matches, fuck you. ***** ![]() #12 Austin Aries [c] vs. CM Punk [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Death Before Dishonor III - 6/18/2005 Morristown, NJ Ah, god damn. Another fucking beautiful match. This gets overshadowed by the booking, and that's fair because the post-match angle is the kick off to one of the greatest angles in wrestling history, but this is a legitimately great match too. Aries is coming in with a bad neck, so Punk works on it. Lots of great counters and attacks on the neck, until Aries evens it out with a DVD on the apron. Aries works on the neck too and it's also great. Fantastic finishing run with one of the hottest ROH crowds ever. This is where the BOOOO/YAAAAAAAY thing that took hold in the second half of the 2000s first really started, or at least came back to prominence. Punk has a magnificent adrenaline comeback, and the Pepsi Plunge wins the title. ****1/4 ![]() #11 Austin Aries/Roderick Strong [c] vs. The Briscoes [ROH WORLD TAG TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Unified - 8/12/2006 Liverpool, England This is a little high, but it's still one of the best ROH tag matches ever, and a perfect example of how to do a moves-heavy/spotfest tag and make it work. They build up their offense to a totally insane finishing run, everything is crisp and fluid, the timing's right on the tags and finish, and they have a super super hot crowd which always helps these matches. Jay Briscoe losing the gum from his mouth, picking it up, and displaying to the crowd before putting it back in was a fantastic character moment. GREAT hot tag from Strong and the finishing run was absolutely killer. Lots of inventive counters of stuff that worked in their first two matches. The Doomsday Device fails a second time, as Aries ducks Mark. Strong takes him out with a Sick Kick, and Aries hits Jay with a Reverse Rana. The Half Nelson Backbreaker -> 450 Splash combo pins Jay to retain. **** Edited by Big Tuna, Jul 3 2013, 10:17 PM.
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| Big Tuna | Jul 23 2013, 11:34 PM Post #20 |
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The Master and Ruler Of The World
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![]() #10 Samoa Joe vs. Kenta Kobashi ROH Joe vs. Kobashi - 10/1/2005 New York, NY Undisputedly great match, and probably a little underrated. A lot of this is callbacks to famous Kobashi opponents like Joe using Misawa's Elbow Suicida and using Kawada's Stretch Plum, but those are just neat little side things. It's mostly about Joe defending his spot as the Ace of ROH against the guy who's the most dominant pro wrestler in the world at this point in time. And yeah, they totally obliterate each other with strikes and it's beautiful. They get over the difference in rank between the two with some awesome layered striking. What that means is that Kobashi can drop Joe with lots of chops, but it takes chops, kicks, and a Jumping Enzuiguri for Joe to drop him. It puts over Kobashi as stronger and higher up than Joe, but shows that Joe can still take him down if he can string offense together. In another example, once Kobashi's been beaten up a lot by Joe and is threatened, he has to use chops to the side of the neck instead of his normal chest ones to take over. This is a perfect spectacle match as well as being brilliant and putting across the iconic veteran vs. young lion vibe. Joe throws everything at Kobashi, but he comes through and starts KILLING Joe. Joe hangs on though, and his desperate flurry at the end was amazing. Kobashi hits three brutal rolling side of the hand chops to the side of Joe's neck, and a running Lariat to win. ****1/2 ![]() #9 Kevin Steen vs. El Generico [UNSANCTIONED MATCH - CAREER VS. MASK] ROH Final Battle 2010 - 12/18/2010 New York, NY I think this is a little overrated. I think this is a damn near perfect blowoff, except that they go too long. There's too much dead space in the middle and a few of the kickouts are a little much and take me out of it. But overall, it's must-see stuff because the highs are as good as anything in ROH history. Throwbacks with the chain, tables and chairs get involved, blood, hate, etc. Using a ladder for many of the same spots as the Ladder Wars was a nice touch. The kickouts got to be a little much at the end. I get that it's a big huge grudge match, so I'm not saying they're killing off their big moves, but it still could have been done better. And some kickouts were completely insane, like a Package Piledriver onto an open chair seat or the BRAINBUSTAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH. Great finish as Generico has Steen lined up for a chair shot in a mirror of last year. Steen then holds up the stolen mask and Generico stops. He takes it from him, BUT HE THROWS IT DOWN AND KILLS STEEN WITH THE CHAIR SHOT! GENERICO WINS! ***3/4 ![]() #8 Samoa Joe [c] vs. Bryan Danielson [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Midnight Express Reunion - 10/2/2004 Philadelphia, PA HOLY SHIT IT MADE IT! I talk a lot about matches being underrated on this list, but I almost never hear anybody give this the credit it deserves. This is the best successful non-CM Punk defense of the Samoa Joe reign which puts it in the top 5 ROH Title matches ever, realistically. The reason Samoa Joe is the best ROH Champion ever isn't just because he was the guy who put it on the map or whatever, but because his entire reign had a story. People trying to figure out how to beat the unbeatable man. 2003 is full of guys trying to come right at him and getting mowed down. Daniels tried to tire him out, but went for the kill way too early and didn't have enough firepower yet. The guy with the biggest arsenal in the company, AJ Styles, even got choked out when he tried it. So in 2004, people realize this doesn't work and they try other things. Punk tired him out and came closer than anyone. Cabana was the only guy to pin him in a singles-ish match in June 2004 with a flash cradle...which is what Bryan Danielson beat him with in early 2003. Which happens to be the last singles match Samoa Joe had lost in ROH to this point. Danielson has this in his back pocket, and tries to tire Joe out also. He does it in a different way than Punk though, trying to get Joe to punch himself out of the match and get tired, but he also goes after the knee in a new strategy. There's an AMAZING sequence where Danielson backpedals in a circle in the ring, forcing Joe to chase him and wildly swung with strikes, connecting on nothing, and Danielson does the boxing shuffle. However, Joe keeps swinging his slaps and punches to avoid knee work. Danielson tries to work the arm to stop it, but this allows Joe to start attacking the ribs. There's Joe's epic Elbow Suicida, and Danielson debuts his big Springboard Plancha. This also begins the theme of Danielson being WAY more aggressive in ROH Title matches. Danielson works the knee enough to keep going back to it to turn the tide back in his favor, but when Joe starts throwing bombs, he works even harder on the knee. However, he didn't do it enough, and Joe's able to pull through and throw strikes harder than Danielson and use his power more. AMAZING finishing run, but Joe gets a number of knees with his good knee and The Choke to win. ****1/2 ![]() #7 Bryan Danielson vs. Nigel McGuinness ROH Driven - 6/9/2007 Philadelphia, PA Really good match, but way way too high. This gets overrated because of an incredible finishing run and Danielson's totally insane hardway cut that's now sort of famous, but they really kind of killed time for the first half and Nigel sort of forget about his hurt back. The only real flaw is these occasional segments were they work on a body part for a bit, but then abandon it. They're two of the best in the world, no idea why they do that shit. This is the debut of the "THIS IS WRESTLING!" chant, which is another thing I can blame Philadelphia for now. Finishing run was amazing. Felt really organic, in the confines of pro wrestling logic at least, and hard fought. They start running and headbutting each other, causing a nasty hardway cut on Danielson. Danielson wins with the Crucifix Elbows and the Cattle Mutilation. **** ![]() #6 Bryan Danielson [c] vs. Roderick Strong [ROH WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP] ROH Vendetta - 11/5/2005 Chicago Ridge, IL What the fuck? Great match, really incredible stuff, but way too high. This list is turning out like the two BQ100 lists we tried, where guys got absurdly high ratings on the principle that they were all relatively high up on everyone's list, but got put ahead of where they were on everyone's list because of how the points worked. This is 48 minutes or so, and really really good. Not so much due to the length, but the unique way they went about it, in probably the best use of the "peaks and valleys" format. They'd go slow for most of the match, with moments of flaring up of aggressions in super intense fashion, before Danielson would slow it back down. Danielson slaps Strong immediately, so he drives him out with chops, and Danielson is pissed. Danielson keeps trying to slow it down, and in a highly memorable moment, he starts chopping Strong in the corner and responds to boos by yelling "Oh, you'll only cheer for his chops? Fuck off!" before furiously chopping Strong 4 or 5 more times. In another one, he responds to a fan heckling him about his gear by yelling "GOOD JOB REGAL!" by loudly saying "REGAL CAN'T LACE MY BOOTS!" Danielson is amazing at getting the crowd 100% behind Strong, and gets progressively more brutal when cutting off Strong's comebacks. However, this is not without flaws. It gets pretty dry in the middle before picking back up in the last 10-15 minutes. Also, Danielson's attacks are all over the place, focusing on a number of different body parts, with most of it being clear filler as it's never brought up again, aside from the knee, which Strong doesn't sell very well at all. The finishing run in this is amazing though, and Danielson debuts the crucifix-position elbows to the temple for a referee stoppage win. ***3/4 |
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6:52 PM Jul 10