Csonka Reviews This Week’s ROH Free Matches

Csonka Reviews This Week’s ROH Free Matches

OFFICIAL RESULTS
– Women of Honor Match: Mandy Leon defeated Stacy Shadows @ 6:02 via pin [*]
– Future of Honor Match: Buddy Hanlon defeated Jay Savage @ 3:40 via pin [½*]
– Throwback Match: Champions The Kings of Wrestling defeated The Briscoes @ 17:20 via pin [***]

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Women of Honor: Stacy Shadows vs. Mandy Leon: Stacy Shadows has worked 87 matches since 2009, working such places as BCW, ACW, RISE, SHIMMER dark matches and the ZERO1 USA Women’s Title Tournament. Leon is a mainstay of the Women of Honor division. Good news, Mandy Leon isn’t a blood-covered murderer anymore. Shadows has the size advantage, and shoves Leon down right away and then sets her up top. Leon tries to battle back with forearms and chops. Leon with a snap mare and Hennig neck snap. Shadows then catches the cross body and hits the big slam, covering for 2. Shadows then chokes out Leon in the ropes, lays in some forearm strikes and works the heat. Leon fights off a German, but Shadows fights off the unprettier. Kicks follow, Leon looks for a sunset flip, but Shadows looks to sit down on her; Leon avoids that, hits the unprettier but Shadows rolls to the floor. Leon hits a cannonball off the apron, but Shadows fights back and posts her and follows with a spinebuster. Shadows rolls her back in and lays the boots to her. Leon fires back with chops, avoids a charge and hits a clothesline. She avoids another charge, and hits a bulldog for 2. Leon heads up top, hits a missile dropkick and covers again, but Shadows kicks out at 2. Shadows fires back with forearm strikes, hits the bicycle kick, covering for 2. Leon hit a flatliner into a koji clutch, but Shadows powers out and Lon counters into a sunset flip for the win. Mandy Leon defeated Stacy Shadows @ 6:02 via pin [*] This was slow and clunky, and never felt as if they were quite on the same page. It also felt as if they gave Shadows way too much here, and judging by the layout you’d almost think she was the ROH contracted talent and part of Women of Honor as Leon came off as lucky here. Also, Mandy Leon’s work here was not pretty, she’s slow, awkward and it feels like she takes 27 steps to set up basic moves and exchanges. They really should have gone home when Leon hit the first unprettier and just called it a day.

Future of Honor: Buddy Hanlon vs. Jay Savage: Hanlon is from “The House Of Truth Wrestling School” and started back in 2003, working 38 matches in his first two years and then basically taking off until 2014; he’s worked 34 matches since then. I can’t find much of anything on Savage. Hanlon says fuck the code of honor and attacks before the bell. Rights by Hanlon, Savage with some embarrassing rope running and hits a sloppy sling blade and a fisherman’s buster for 2. Hanlon takes Savage to the floor, looks for an apron kick and then stops politely so Savage can trip him up. They go back and forth back in the ring, Hanlon fishhooks him and slams him to the mat. Hanlon follows with mounted rights, and then takes Savage to the corner with more rights. Running forearms follow, but Savage hits a tornado DDT and bridging German for 2. He tries to fire up, but Hanlon locks in the torture rack. Savage escapes, they trade strikes center ring and Hanlon hits an XPLODER and puts Savage away. Buddy Hanlon defeated Jay Savage @ 3:40 via pin [½*] I try to keep in mind that these are dark/tryout matches that ROH puts on Youtube, but it just wasn’t good. Hanlon seemed generally solid, but Savage looked like he wasn’t ready for something like this, odd timing, bad positioning and some horrible rope running technique were just some of his issues. This was bad.

Throwback Match: Champions The Kings of Wrestling (Hero & Claudio Castagnoli vs. The Briscoes (Mark & Jay) [HD NET (8.21.2010)]: Mark and Hero to begin, Mark lights up Hero and Castagnoli tags in and the Briscoes run wild and clear the ring. The Kings take a powder, talk things over and Castagnoli is back in with Jay. Hero cheap shots Jay allowing Castagnoli to work over Jay in the corner, and Hero tags. He and Jay trade strikes, blind tag by Castagnoli but the Briscoes take over, hitting a double team elbow drop on Castagnoli. They then send Castagnoli to the floor. The Kings tease walking out. They stay and Castagnoli attacks, working over Mark but he quickly fights back, hitting a suplex for 2. The Briscoes then toss Castagnoli across the ring and Jay hits the basement dropkick for 2. Jay sends him to the floor and follows with a dive, and Mark follows with a dive onto Hero. We get the mass brawl on the floor, and back in Jay hits a suplex and covers for 2. They then trade forearms, but Castagnoli hits the springboard uppercut and tags in Hero. Mark tags in and hits the high cross for 2. Mark lays in head butts, and then follows with chops in the corner. Hero fights off the uranage and hits the backdrop driver. Del Rey gets in a cheap shot from the floor and the ref sends her to the back. This allows Hero to tag in Castagnoli, and they take over, double teaming Mark. Castagnoli with rapid-fire strikes, he tags in Hero and he beats down Mark in their corner. Hero then hits the senton and covers for 2. Castagnoli in now, working the stretch muffler. Mark escapes, and hits a boot and the neck breaker. Castagnoli cuts off the tag, Hero in and they continue to isolate Mark in their corner. They trade strikes, but Castagnoli grabs onto Mark and then tags in but Mark fights them off and looks for the tag but Hero drops him with an elbow strike as Castagnoli held him in position and then covered for 2. Castagnoli dumps Mark, and Hero beats him down on the floor. Castagnoli back to the stretch muffler, but Mark makes the ropes. The Kings continue to work double teams, and toss Mark to the floor again. They continue the attack, and roll Mark back in as Castagnoli starts to work the knee. Uppercuts by Castagnoli follow and then hits the UFO, covering for 2 as Jay makes the save. More double teams by the Kings, with Hero covering for 2. Castagnoli takes out Jay, but Mark fights back and a miscommunication from the Kings allows Mark to hit a Saito suplex on Hero. Mark finally gets the hot tag to Jay, he hits a high cross to both and then runs wild, hitting a superkick and leg lariat. Hero to the floor, Castagnoli gets cut off and eats the Jay driller for 2 as hero makes the save. Mark tosses Hero, and he heads up top. The Briscoes look for the doomsday device but Hero cuts off Mark and Shane Hagadorn runs in but Jay cuts him off, but Hagadorn hits the low blow and Castagnoli covers for the win. Champions The Kings of Wrestling defeated The Briscoes @ 17:20 via pin [***] This was an overall good tag match, with a strong layout and good work from all four. Unfortunately this was on the lower end quality wise in the Briscoes vs. KOW series of matches, with a really flat and unsatisfying finish.

– Post match, PAPA FUCKIN BRISCOE hit the ring to beat down Shane Hagadorn.

– End scene.

– Thanks for reading.

“Byyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyye Felicia!”

3.0

The final score: review Bad

The 411

Not a good collection of matches this time around, with only the throwback match being worth the time. And even then, that was only good with a really flat finish.