Csonka’s ROH/NJPW Global Wars Columbus Preview

Welcome back to column time with Larry. Today’s column is all about fun; today I want to talk about the ROH/NJPW Global Wars Columbus. This is the next step of the Global Wars tour. Lets have fun today talking about something we love. Remember, your comments are always welcomed. I hope that you enjoy, and feel free to share your thoughts. It’s wrestling, we love it and will disagree. The only rules are “have a take, be respectful of other’s opinions and don’t be a dick.”

Josh Woods vs. Shane Taylor: Woods and Taylor have recently started a feud on ROH TV, with Woods getting the better of things. Woods is the top prospect winner and needs the win to maintain momentum. Taylor is still searching for his identity in ROH following the loss of former partner Keith Lee and the Rebellion being disbanded. ROH doesn’t quite seem to know what to do with either guy, but with Woods winning the top prospect tournament, and he should pick up the win here to keep his momentum and move into bigger things. WINNER: Josh Woods

Bullet Club (Adam Page and Marty Scurll) vs. Kenny King and Mark Briscoe: This has the possibility to be a really fun match as all four work very well in the tag setting. With the tag experience of the competitors and strong personalities of Scurll and Briscoe, they should keep the crowd invested in the match. I have the feeling that this may be used to set up a TV title match, with Scurll likely picking up the win on King. WINNERS: Bullet Club

Beer City Bruiser and Silas Young vs. The Motor City Machine Guns: While it is a match with the tag team champions, the positioning of Silas Young on the show following his big win at Death Before Dishonor is a complete letdown. (Yes he got a match with Suzuki in Pittsburgh, which ended up a disappointment) At the same time, it’s a shame that they couldn’t get a juniors team in to face off with the Motor City Machine Guns. Also, his continued association with the Bruiser should really end if he’s moving up the card. Their pairing is a complete, mid-card, comedy heel act that is below Young at this point, if they actually want to elevate him. Young & The Bruiser work well as a team and if the Guns are healthy and game, this could be good. WINNERS: The Motor City Machine Guns

Hiromu Takahashi vs. Jay Lethal: This is a match with some serious potential as both guys have high ceilings as far as match quality goes. As long as the match isn’t overtaken with Daryl Shenanigans (I love Daryl, but he needs to be kept to a minimum) and they don’t overstay their welcome and stick to more of a sprint format, this should be really good. With Takahashi being a junior, and having no stable direction in NJPW, along with the fact that Lethal is an ROH main eventer, he should pick up the win here. WINNER: Jay Lethal

Jonathan Gresham & Jay White vs. The Addiction: Jonathan Gresham & Jay White have been great additions to the ROH roster and always deliver. Their athleticism and energy will provide most of the moving parts for the match, while the experience of The Addiction will provide s strong foundation for the match. Gresham and White are part of the Search and Destroy stable along with the Machine Guns, and with The Addiction trying to ruin the Machine Guns moment at Death Before Dishonor (likely setting up a tag title match), having the salty veterans take out the young protégés of the Guns should add to the build to a title match. WINNERS: The Addiction

Chaos (Toru Yano, Will Ospreay and YOSHI-HASHI) vs. Suzuki-gun (Davey Boy Smith Jr., Lance Archer and Minoru Suzuki): If you haven’t seen a Suzuki-gun match, it will go like this. Suzuki-gun jumps their opponents before the bell, we get some floor brawling, and Suzuki will try to kill Yano to play into their upcoming match on November 5th. Picking the winner here feels more difficult due to the booking, HASHI can’t lose because he challenges Omega the next day. Ospreay is the junior champion, so he’ll likely not lose. Archer and Smith are IWGP tag champs, so they won’t lose. Suzuki is the NEVER champion, and shouldn’t lose. Yano has his title shot locked in, and even though he has a match with Cabana in Chicago, he’s the most expendable one here. This will likely be a typical mess of a Suzuki-gun match with some fun highflying by Ospreay. WINNERS: Suzuki-gun

The Elite (The Young Bucks and Kenny Omega) vs. Best Flippin Friends (Flip Gordon, Trent Beretta, & Chuck Taylor): This right here is my pick for match of the night; The Elite will be, by far, the most over act on the card, which will provide a great atmosphere. Add into that the fact that Trent Beretta, & Chuck Taylor are also over big and the ROH audience will be fans of Being the Elite, which should lead to some fun stuff with Flip and the Bucks, playing off of the show. The Elite will dick around a bit and do some comedy and then decide to get serious, and when they do, we should be in for a great 12-15 minute sprint with lots of speed, MOVEZ & DIVEZ (in the best way possible) and it should be a ton of fun. The Elite are tremendous working six-man tags, and have some great opponents to work with here. I am sure that the Best Flippin Friends will put on a great performance, but they aren’t elite, The Elite picks up the in what should be the match of the night and possibly weekend. WINNER: The Elite

ROH Champion Cody vs. KUSHIDA: there are issues here that may very well ruin this match, and not the cliché Cody joke. First of all, KUSHIDA just lost the junior title and also recently lost the ROH TV title, so why is he getting a title shot? But the real problem here, similar to the Death Before Dishonor match with Suzuki, is the fact that there is a near 100% chance that Cody retains. This is because ROH isn’t cutting his run off in Columbus on a B show, and also because Cody is a heavyweight in NJPW and KUSHIDA is a junior, and juniors beating heavyweights is rare. While KUSHIDA is a dynamic performer and one of the best in the business, I don’t know if he’s good enough to overcome the lack of drama as well as Cody’s shortcomings as a performer. Hopefully, I am wrong and Cody steps up his game like he did with Okada and we get a great match. Unfortunately, I think there’s too much against them for that to happen, but I’m hoping for the best. WINNER: Cody

– End scene.

– Thanks for reading.

“Byyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyye Felicia!”