Views from the Hawke’s Nest: Nigel McGuinness: In It to Win It – Disc 2

Return Engagement
Chicago Ridge, Illinois
April 19, 2008
Nigel McGuinness(c) vs. Kevin Steen [ROH World Championship]
This was a great match and continued the mini-feud these two had in 2008 very effectively. Steen was pissed off here, but he didn’t really treat the match as intensely as he should have. That makes for nice character progression. Nigel was Nigel, and that was always wonderful basically. He survived the initial onslaught and relied on his tried and true strategies to get the advantage. In the end though, he still needed to put Steen through a table to set up the lariat finish. This was very good. (****)

 

Respect is Earned
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
June 7, 2008
Nigel McGuinness(c) vs. Go Shiozaki [ROH World Championship]
This was pure Nigel formula, but Nigel formula was one of most fun wrestling formulas from the 2000s. Challenger would get some shine. Nigel went after the arm and tried for some lariats. They would throw some bombs. Nigel would then either win with a lariat or the Dungeon. In this case, he won with the Dungeon. Go did not seem out of place at all. (****)

 

Vendetta
Chicago Ridge, Illinois
June 28, 2008
Nigel McGuinness vs. Jerry Lynn
This was Lynn’s first match in ROH since 2004 (when he beat Nigel). The crowd was very into Lynn here which made him a good idea to slot into the role of Nigel’s opponent. (Oddly enough, Lynn would be hated by most ROH fans about year later due to ROH overdoing his push.) They did a 2008 Nigel match, and it worked really well. Nigel ended up winning cleanly via fruit roll-up which was actually a great way to set up another non-title match before Lynn got his title match. If only Lynn didn’t win the title in the end. (***¾)

 

The Tokyo Summit
Tokyo, Japan
September 14, 2008
Nigel McGuinness(c) vs. Jimmy Jacobs [ROH World Championship]
This always struck me as an exceptionally odd match to run in Japan for a number of reasons. The most important reason being that it did not allow for the incredibly successful Nigel formula. Jacobs’ character at the time did not really allow for him to play babyface but that was clearly the best in-ring direction to go in. Unsurprisingly, this awkward dynamic did not really work, and the match came off super flat. The fact that this also involved Jacobs using or teasing chain usage repeatedly and multiple ref bumps only made it worse. At least Nigel won cleanly. (*)

 

The French Connection
Montreal, Quebec
November 7, 2008
Nigel McGuinness(c) vs. Kevin Steen vs. El Generico vs. Go Shiozaki [ROH World Championship]
This was an elimination match.
Unfortunately, this was just not very good. The rules allowed Nigel to play chickenshit for a long time. Go and Steenerico never got into a rhythm. Generico got eliminated first. The match felt too much like a tag match. Everything was awful. The nearfalls with Steen and Nigel was a tad hot at the end, but it was much too late. This was a bore almost all the way through. Nigel won with a jawbreaker on Kevin. (*½)

 

Southern Hostility
Nashville, Tennessee
December 6, 2008
Nigel McGuinness(c) vs. Jerry Lynn [ROH World Championship]
There was much less of urgency to this match compared to their June encounter earlier in the year. Once they got going, the final minutes were pretty fun. It just did not feel as satisfying with a less fun journey there. Nigel also trying to win via countout also felt tonally off for the promotion although I guess you could say it made sense for his character. For Nigel to then win with a fruit roll-up and his hands on the ropes made this even less satisfying. Fuck you, Adam Pearce. (**¾)

 

Final Battle
New York City, New York
December 27, 2008
Nigel McGuinness(c) vs. Naomichi Marufuji [ROH World Championship]
This was pretty good but did not come across like a world title match on the biggest show of the year. Part of the problem was that Marufuji was a special attraction challenger who had no realistic shot of winning. This was meant to be Tyler Black finally beating Nigel for the title, and you could tell the crowd did not really buy into the idea of Marufuji winning. With all that said, Nigel and Marufuji did put on a fun effort. The fans got into it enough, and the match was enjoyable. You just want more from a Final Battle world title match. (***½)

 

Caged Collision
Chicago Ridge, Illinois
January 31, 2009
Nigel McGuinness(c) vs. El Generico [ROH World Championship]
These two had one of the best ROH matches ever at Age of Insanity in 2008, but they completely failed to replicate that here. They made a major miscalculation in having Nigel cut Generico off immediately. Generico was never winning this match, and the crowd never got a reason to believe in him. The match was fine for what it was, but it was not a PPV title match. Nigel won with the London Dungeon. (***)

 

Anniversary Show
New York City, New York
March 21, 2009
Nigel McGuinness(c) vs. KENTA [ROH World Championship]
While this match didn’t have the atmosphere of a lot of Nigel’s best defenses (ROH was pretty cold by this point), I have a soft spot for this match that probably makes me overrate it slightly. While Samoa Joe, Bryan Danielson, and probably even CM Punk had more celebrated reigns as ROH World Champion, my favorite ROH champion ever was Nigel McGuinness. I think he was the perfect champion and had a number of excellent feuds as champion, which were all seemingly going on at the same time. So, to see the broken champion fight on here smartly and with honor was an awesome story to see unfold. He lost his main weapons (his arms), but he still managed to defeat one of the best wrestlers of the last twenty years in a believable fashion. Just an excellent match. Check it out. (****)

 

Read 50+ Nigel match reviews!

Watch free Nigel matches!

Nigel vs. Daniel Bryan [one of the best ROH matches ever]

Nigel vs. Daniel Bryan vs. Austin Aries

Nigel vs. Eddie Edwards

Nigel vs. KENTA

Nigel vs. TJ Perkins

Nigel & Dave Rayne vs. Disco Madness

Nigel, Chris Candido, Claudio Castagnoli, & Steve Stone vs. CM Punk, Matt Sydal, Danny Daniels, & Ace Steel

8.0

The final score: review Very Good

The 411

You do not get the best Nigel ROH matches on this set, but the set just proves that Nigel was so great at his peak that even his lesser-known matches had tremendous value. I strongly encourage everyone to check out this set.