wrestling / TV Reports
Tremendous Tirades 9.28.13: Ring of Honor TV
Introduction
As a reminder, this will not be another traditional recap, but instead it will be a mash up of the Rs, Instant Analysis and my usual Twitter ramblings I would do during the shows; completely uncensored and as the ideas flow unfiltered to the old keyboard. As always, I encourage discussion and even disagreement, just do so in a respectful manner. I will be doing the review for Raw and most PPVs and iPPVs going forward.
~ROH TV~
~9.28.13~
~EPISODE 106~
~Matches from Death Before Dishonor XI…~
Semi-Final Tournament Match: Adam Cole vs. Tommaso Ciampa: I talked about the sense of urgency in the ROH Tournament matches on TV, the feeling that the matches were important and that the guys were giving it everything to win their match for a shot at the title. That was very prevalent here as Ciampa was a house of fire in the opening minutes, including a spot where they went to the floor and he hit repeated charging knees as well as a running powerbomb onto Cole into the barricade. Cole was able to battle back, with the story that Ciampa was constantly countering the Florida Key. Ciampa would hit a kryptonite crunch from the second rope for a good near fall at about 8-minutes into the match. Cole worked the knee, including a superkick to the bad knee of Ciampa while he was on the ropes. Cole then went all Bret Hart and did the ring post figure four, showing that crazy look like he had in the Mark Briscoe match early in the tournament. One thing I noticed is that Ciampa gets sloppy when he’s tired, as he had two issues pulling Cole up for the Project Ciampa, thankfully Cole saved it both times. Cole scored the win at 14-minutes when he locked in the figure four, and landed repeated kicks to the head of Ciampa who as trying to break free from the hold. Ciampa was KOd, and Cole scored the pin from the figure four position. The crowd didn’t react that well to the finish, sort of like they were confused. This was good back and forth match, and simply clicked well for me. It was a little sloppy down the stretch, but overall was good stuff and I really liked the finish.
Match Rating: ***¾
Semi-Final Tournament Match: Michael Elgin vs. Kevin Steen: The first thing that I liked about this match was that it felt completely different from the previous tournament match. They started off with grappling and some one upsmanship, while establishing the power of Elgin. They did a quick tease of finishes, with both men escaping, showing that they know each other well. Also, Cole and Ciampa worked a break neck pace, while these guys were setting a deliberately slower pace. The contrast is always appreciated, because variety always helps a show. The prior match was about accumulated punishment after a ton of shit was thrown at the fan, this ended up about power and bigger moves taking the toll. In a simple but effective spot, Steen missing the charge and posting his shoulder leading to an immediate crossface from Elgin was well done and a believable finish. Steen survived the buckle bomb and locked in the sharp shooter, but (psychology) Steen had issues holding on due to the shoulder being dinged earlier and Elgin was able to escape. Steen also couldn’t do the package piledriver, so he had to resort to sleeper suplexes, which Elgin survived. Steen tried the package piledriver, again, which Elgin turned into a crossface, which led to Steen tapping. Elgin getting the big win over Steen was the story, but also doing it via clean submission was even better for Elgin and his path to the title. I really liked the match, thought it was rather awesome, but also felt that it was hurt from the lack of reaction at times from the crowd. In front of a hotter crowd, this comes across like a much bigger deal. I also loved the booking of the longer match. Cole took way less damage and worked a shorter match, while Elgin was in a war and looks to have expended himself before the title match. Elgin won at 20-minutes by making Steen tap to the crossface.
Match Rating: ****
For a free TV show, this was all main course and nothing else, and that is appreciated. Two very good matches on free TV made this a must see show as they are setting the stage to crown the champion. As far as delivering good wrestling, what they presented was great. I will say that I think some will be very upset about the show if they bought the VOD of the event. I think if people knew that the would be showing these matches, they wouldn’t have spent the money. I know that people have been upset in the past with ROH for doing this, and I cannot blame them. With this happening one week after the event, I get the anger if you spent the money. My only hope is that they show the multi-team tag match and finals next week, since I did not get to see them due to the iPPV broadcast issues. Show Rating: 8.0 As a reminder, I will be going by the 411 scale… 0 – 0.9: Torture The final rating is not simply an average of the rated segments above. The rating takes them into account as well as the segments that are small but not scored, the flow of the show, the overall booking, build to PPV, crowd reactions, and so on and so forth. |
Larry Csonka is a Pisces and enjoys rolling at jiu jitsu class with Hotty McBrownbelt, cooking, long walks on the beach, Slingo and the occasional trip to Jack in the Box. He is married to a soulless ginger and has two beautiful daughters who are thankfully not soulless gingers; and is legally allowed to marry people in 35 states. He has been a wrestling fan since 1982 and has been writing for 411 since May 24th, 2004; contributing over 3,000 columns, TV reports and video reviews to the site.
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