This week we get to see the STILL ROH World Champion Tyler Black in action against the Generic Luchador, El Generico. Non-title action, that is. After all, Generico isn’t a Pick 6 contender right now. In addition, we get the House of Truth (YES), Kevin Steen, and Erick Stevens and the Necro Butcher destroying each other! Great stuff. So let’s just dive right in. Here comes the rush!
Before the opening credits, we see a short commercial for the replay of Death Before Dishonor VIII (which I pimped endlessly last week) warning the people that ROH is not PG (as they show footage of El Generico choking out Kevin Steen with a necktie). Stuff like that makes you come off a little bush league, to me. But then again, ROH’s target audience tends to be more smarkish, and they eat that sort of stuff up with two spoons, and I guess you’ve got to press your competitive advantage, so who am I to complain.
Your Hosts are, as always, Dave Prazak and Mike Hogewood.
**We send it right to the ring, where Kevin Steen is coming out with his epic entrance music that gets disrupted by Kevin Steen himself, dismissing Bobby Cruise. He further dismisses Prazak and Hogewood. Apparently Corino will be not only handling the ring introductions, but the commentary for this match. Steen jumps the jobber Bobby Shields from behind. I question the necessity of that.
**Kevin Steen vs. Bobby Shields
Steen and Corino make this match about 100x more entertaining than it has any right to be by doing dueling commentary during the match, while Steen is wrestling. Shields gets a couple of fluke moves, and Steen counters a hurricanrana with a powerbomb before telling Shields “That hurt, asshole!” Steen locks up a sort of crossface with Shields holding the microphone as Steen continues to talk trash before referee Bryce Remsburg finally calls it.
Kevin Steen def. Bobby Shields via ref stoppage (Corino hilariously announces it as a pinfall) in just over 2 minutes.
Time isn’t exact because frankly, I couldn’t tell when to start or stop the clock. As a match it was terrible. As a segment, it was hilarious. (1/4* for the match, *** for the running commentary, call the whole thing *1/2 overall)
**Kyle Durden backstage reports that doctors are reluctant to clear the Necro Butcher tonight, but reports that Necro has guaranteed that tonight, we’ll see, and the Embassy will see a side of him they’ve never seen before. That’s…ominous.
**Necro comes out in street clothes (well, more so than normal, I guess), and asks for a microphone. The cold hard fact is that he can’t afford to wrestle tonight, because of his medical bills and the fact that he has no insurance, coupled with Butcher’s Rules matches getting more and more brutal by the week. But he’s got a friend who he thinks will do just fine for himself.
**Erick Stevens vs. Necro Butcher Grizzly Redwood
Uh-oh. The crowd chants for Grizzly. Nana gets on the microphone in the opening seconds and taunts Grizzly while Stevens throws him around. Redwood tries a suicide dive but gets caught, military pressed and thrown into the ringpost. Owwwwwwwwww. Back in the ring, Stevens chokes out Grizzly with his suspenders just to be a dick. Standard big heel vs. small babyface match ensues. During the second Stevens distraction and Nana/Osiris beat down I wonder just what exactly happened to Grizzly’s flannel shirt and why he STILL doesn’t have boots. Were lumberjacks famously barefoot and I didn’t realize it? Stevens could have won it with a release german suplex, “runaway train” (choo-choo) and lariat combo, but picks Grizzly up. He then hits a short arm lariat but picks him up again. Finally, Grizzly manages to roll him up for the shocking 3!
Grizzly Redwood def. Erick Stevens via school-boy in 7:15
Solid, acceptable big man/little man match, as Grizzly is actually a good little wrestler. Unfortunately, the gimmick is going to hold him back severely. He won’t even be a viable TV Title contender, despite having the skill to be. I get the impression most of the cheers he get is the crowd cheering him ironically. (**)
**Post-match, the Embassy hits the beat down big time with Grizzly eating a Doctor Bomb, but Rasche Brown hits the ring, and lays out the Embassy, including a sit out chokeslam to Erick Stevens and an elevated choke on Nana until Stevens goes low to break it up, and now Rasche is getting beat down. Nana promises the new Crown Jewel of the Embassy tonight, as Rasche gets taped up in the corner, literally. “Parade of the Charioteers” begins as Necro Butcher himself returns in the Jimmy Rave robe and a suit (though barefoot). Necro pulls out a piece of plywood with the name “Rasche” on it, and just destroys it over Rasche’s head. Well, you can’t say he couldn’t see it coming. The Embassy tosses in Grizzly Redwood as Necro has his two chairs set up and goes to hit the chair assisted backbreaker until a bevy of officials pull Redwood out. We cue the music as The Embassy celebrates together! Well, I guess that’s one way to freshen things up, and it does provide a good, honest reason for Necro to turn, frankly. If he needs money, there’s no one better to go to than Nana.
**Another commercial for Death Before Dishonor VIII replay. Go see it. You owe it to yourself. If you didn’t listen to me last week, listen to me this week. See it.
**We recap the reveal of Necro Butcher: Crown Jewel. Why not. Mick Foley: Pure Wrestler got great heat in the original ECW. This could be a similar situation.
**Highlights from Death Before Dishonor VIII. I’ve already given my opinion and endorsement repeatedly.
**Josh Raymond and Christian Able vs. Up In Smoke
Apparently, Raymond and Able aren’t the House of Truth, as there is no Truth Martini. I have to admit, that makes me a little sad. However, the sadness is put off by my being confused by how a tag team that’s essentially supposed to be stoners has ska for entrance music. Small “Cheech & Cloudy” chant. Able and Cloudy start, and Able wins the lockup.
“YEAAAAAAAAH!” –Christian Able.
As Raymond takes control after the tag, we get a very short-lived “HoT” chant as well. I am A-OK with seeing more of both of these teams. First time we see Cheech tonight, he and Cloudy pull off some great double team work, before he tags back out to Cloudy. It doesn’t take much for Raymond and Able to take control again and Cloudy plays Ricky Morton for a little while and hits a top rope hurricanrana and an ace crusher to take out the Not-HoT and get the tag to Cheech, who hits a suicide dive onto Able and a pele style kick to Raymond before missing a slingshot senton. However, Cheech is able to bounce back and hit a step-up plancha onto both Raymond and Able on the outside. Cheech eats Raymond and Able’s double team finisher (the elevated quebrada) for two before Up in Smoke is able to hit Partly Cloudy with a Chance of Cheech (619/running knee combo) on Raymond for 2. Able breaks that up. and Able lawn darts Cloudy into the corner face first in a sick spot, and Cheech gets a small package while Sinclair is turned around with Able. Cheech’s anger allows Raymond and Able to hit what almost looked like a Doomsday Rocker Dropper for the three count.
Josh Raymond & Christian Able def. Up In Smoke (Able pins Cheech) via “Doomsday Rocker Dropper” in 9:10
It was perfectly solid tag-team wrestling, but it kind of eschewed the formula as there wasn’t really an extended heat segment on anybody except maybe Cloudy, but it just felt like a lot of moves. They were solid moves, and nothing botched, but still, nothing utterly spectacular. As another famous reviewer once called it: “Perfectly Acceptable Wrestling.” (**3/4)
**We cut to a Dark City Fight Club promo, so we don’t forget about them. Jon Davis thinks he’s the brawn to Kory Chavis’s brain. Ironic, given his Bobby Lashley voice. The DCFC discuss the Kings of Wrestling, as next week, the two teams will collide (I assume non-title). Hey, I’m on board. And good thing, since I’m the one who’ll recap it!
**Now, a video package from two weeks ago, as Christopher Daniels lays out the challenge to Tyler Black and Davey Richards both. I really dug this segment, and it helps my being a big fan of Daniels. And this leads us to pimp another tag team match–Roderick Strong & Christopher Daniels against The American Wolves. Yes. This is a solid plan, and I endorse it.
**Tyler Black(c) vs. El Generico (Non-Title Match)
Significant girly pop for Black. Interesting. As I recall, these two had a hell of a match in PWG awhile back. We point out early that both of these guys are coming off very tough physical matches in Toronto “two weeks ago.” Immediately dueling “Let’s Go Tyler/Let’s Go Generico” chant. Both of these guys excel at the same type of match, so let’s see what happens. Chain wrestling into a standoff, drawing polite applause from Philly. Tyler soon takes control with a kick to the back and his leaping stomp, leading Generico to take a powder. Generico gets back in and hits his lucha armdrag series and a calf kick sending Tyler to the corner before Generico hitting a bodyslam for 2. Tyler takes back over after a strike series, and hits his backflip before Generico is able to send him out of the ring and hit the dive to take back over. Steamboat crossbody for 2. Tyler misses his corner charge, and Generico hits a Michinoku driver for a close 2. Tyler eats a yakuza to the face like A MAN before he summons FIGHTING SPIRIT and hits a pele kick to put both men down. Tyler rolls through an O’Connell Roll into Peroxysm for a long 2. Tyler hangs Generico in the tree of woe and hits the double stomp that would have put out Generico were it not for a foot in the ropes. Tyler looks angry, but pulls Generico out and goes up, looking for the Phoenix Splash. It misses but Tyler rolls through and charges into an overhead suplex into the buckle and a Van Terminator for 2. The crowd chants “This is Awesome.” Generico tunes up the Yakuza, but Kevin Steen pulls him down and crotches him for the DQ.
El Generico def. Tyler Black via DQ in 11:04
This was damn solid stuff. Both of these two sell like champs, know when to time their comebacks, and have a great arsenal that really pops the crowd. The disappointing part was the lack of a clean finish. Honestly, I wouldn’t have seen it hurting Generico significantly to lose a match like that to the World Champion. He’d still be crazy over, and they could have done the beatdown/save thing after the match just as easily. (***3/4, minus 1/4 star for the finish, so ***1/2)
**After the bell, Steen attempts to continue the beat down, but that’s cut short by a Tyler Black superkick sending Steen scampering to the floor and the two stare down as we fade out.
Let’s add up the numbers. On a 50+ minute show, there was almost 30 minutes of wrestling, the vast majority of that being damn solid wrestling, at that. The squash was made very entertaining by the involvement of Kevin Steen and Steve Corino, and everything else on the card was good/great. Really good stuff, and a couple of solid tag matches set up for next week. Love it.
As always, thanks for reading, never hesitate to hit me up with any comments questions or anything else and I hope to see everyone next week!
