A2Z Analysiz: Supercard of Honor V (Roderick Strong, Tyler Black)

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supercard of honor v

New York City, New York – May 8, 2010

No introduction this time around, as we jump straight to ringside. Joe Dombrowski and Dave Prazak will be calling the action tonight.

MATCH #1: Jay & Mark Briscoe vs. Kenny King & Rhett Titus

Jay and King start the match for their respective teams, and Jay takes first advantage with a tenacious headlock. King fights back by showing off his impressive athleticism. Jay is not impressed though, and he dishes out kicks to both King and Titus. Tags are made and Mark hits Titus with a back elbow off the top rope. Jay clotheslines Titus to the floor and they both tumble out to the floor, and Mark follows them out with a moonsault off the top rope. Back in the ring Mark goes to work on King. They double-team him a bit until King counters the double Biel by landing on his feet! Titus joins King in the ring and they hit simultaneous dropkicks on Jay and Mark to take control. Jay comes back with a cross body block on King and makes the tag. Mark unleashes his Redneck Kung Fu. He hits King with a spinning heel kick and then a Northern Lights Suplex for two. Mark goes up top but Titus knocks him down and King kicks him in the head for a two-count. They work Mark over briefly and then Jay gets a hot tag. Jay is a house afire, beating up everyone in sight. Well, mostly just Kenny King and Rhett Titus. Jay hits Titus with a falcon arrow for a two-count. The Briscoes hit a sidewinder elbow drop on Titus for two. King and Titus come back and double-team Jay, who doesn’t seem interested in selling a damn thing. Mark joins in on the fun and they hit simultaneous fisherman busters. They lift King up for the Doomsday Device and King lands on Titus before getting pinned at 12:54. That was a solid opener and I’m sure the Briscoes were told to just fire up the crowd and they certainly accomplished that.
Rating: **½

King and Titus blame each other for the loss and start shoving. They get right in each other’s faces and Titus takes the bowtie off! King walks up the aisle and Titus chases after him, and then they make up.

Earlier tonight Grizzly Redwood cut a promo about how tonight he’s going to battle the Embassy to get revenge for his friend the Necro Butcher. He promises to chop Erick Stevens down.

MATCH #2: Erick Stevens vs. Grizzly Redwood

Stevens is accompanied by Prince Nana and Mr. Ernesto Osiris. Redwood attacks right away but gets shoved back. He hits a headscissors and then Stevens knocks him down with a shoulderblock. Redwood comes back by tripping Stevens and then locking on a sleeper. Stevens slams Redwood down to the canvas. Redwood comes back with a victory roll for two and then a hurricanrana. Stevens rolls to the floor and Nana distracts the referee and Redwood, allowing Stevens to take a cheap shot. Osiris then gets up on the apron to distract the ref while Stevens and Nana both put the boots to Redwood on the floor. Stevens presses Redwood over his head and hurls him ribs-first into the ring post. Back in the ring Stevens goes to work on the ribs, hitting a back suplex for two. He goes for a press slam but Redwood escapes and executes his usual offense. Redwood hits the swinging DDT but Stevens kicks out at two. The straps come down and Redwood goes up for the mounted punches. Stevens shoves Redwood down to the mat but then misses a charge and lands on the apron. Redwood dropkicks him to the floor and then hits a dive right on Nana! Back in the ring Redwood goes up top for a cross body block but Stevens clobbers him out of the air with a clothesline. Stevens then hit the Doctor Bomb for the win at 6:48. That was a spirited little squash.
Rating: **

Nana wants to exact revenge on Redwood for that dive, but for some reason Balls Mahoney comes out to make the save. No, that’s not a misprint. Osiris tries him and gets hit with a Nutcracker Suite. Nothing against Balls, but I don’t know what the point of having him on this show was. I guess there’s nothing really wrong with it, just very random.

MATCH #3: SHIMMER Match – Sara Del Rey vs. Amazing Kong

Del Rey is accompanied by Shane Hagadorn and the ROH World Tag Team Champions the Kings of Wrestling – Chris Hero and Claudio Castagnoli. They start by trying to overpower each other and Kong wins that battle, knocking Del Rey down and hitting a big splash for two. Kong takes Del Rey out of the corner with a big Biel. She follows up with chops and kicks before choking Del Rey with her boot in the corner. She squashes Del Rey and generally looks dominant. Del Rey avoids a charge in the corner and goes after the arm. That’s good strategy when dealing with someone much stronger than you. Del Rey kicks Kong’s arm with a spinning heel kick, sending Kong to the floor. She throws Kong into the guardrail and then gloats about it. Kong doesn’t appreciate that so she comes back and whips Del Rey into the very same barricade. Back in the ring Kong resumes throwing Del Rey around. Kong goes up to the second rope but misses the splash. Del Rey goes for a German Suplex but Kong backs her into the corner. Kong goes for the Amazing Bomb but Del Rey counters it to a cross armbreaker and Kong has to reach the ropes. Back on their feet Kong hits a solid spinning back fist and a clothesline for two. Kong goes for the Amazing Bomb but Del Rey counters with a release German Suplex! That only gets two. Castagnoli distracts the referee, allowing Hero to pass Del Rey the lucky elbow pad. Del Rey bashes Kong in the face with it and that gets the pin at 7:16. That was looking really good but it felt like they cut it off just as they were getting into it. The finish lends itself to a rematch, but they could have let this one go a little longer anyway, they had it in them.
Rating: ***

Christopher Daniels is backstage to talk about his opponent for tonight, the ROH TV Champion and American Wolf Eddie Edwards.

MATCH #4: Non-Title Match – Eddie Edwards vs. Christopher Daniels

There is some tension shown during the handshake, so this could be interesting. You know what’s not interesting? As of this writing (August 17), Edwards hasn’t defended the title in almost five months. They share a tense lockup and then go for a test of strength. Daniels goes for the arm and they chain wrestle back and forth. Edwards keeps pace with the veteran, until Daniels uses Edwards’ own momentum to send the TV Champ crashing to the floor. Back in the ring Edwards is the aggressor but Daniels weathers the storm and reclaims control with a headlock. Daniels stays in control and hits an Arabian Press for two. Edwards comes back with a hiptoss to the floor and follows him out with a suicide dive. He whips Daniels into the guardrail and then hits an Ole Kick. Back in the ring Edwards wisely goes after Daniels’ leg. After a few minutes Daniels makes the comeback and hits the Fall From Grace for two. Daniels goes up top and Hagadorn shoves him down. Edwards accidentally kicks Hagadorn off the apron, and then rolls through an Angel’s Wings attempt and wrenches Daniels’ leg. He hits the Backpack Jawbreaker but Daniels kicks out at two. A running knee to the face gets another near-fall. He goes for a double stomp off the top rope but Daniels moves and catches him in a Death Valley Driver for two. They get up and trade strikes. Daniels wins that battle but when he tries a springboard back elbow Edwards catches him and locks on the Achilles Lock. The hold is broken when Daniels reaches the ropes. Daniels comes up and hits the Uranage Slam out of nowhere and then hits the Best Moonsault Ever for the win at 17:49. That was solid and well worked for the most part, but that finish came out of nowhere, and for having his leg so injured Daniels sure sprung up for that moonsault pretty easily.
Rating: ***

Daniels gets on the mic to talk about how great Eddie Edwards is and how much he wants to wrestle Davey Richards and be the best in the world and all that.

Backstage earlier tonight, Daizee Haze gets Delirious fired up for his upcoming match with Austin Aries. Delirious has nothing to say.

MATCH #5: Grudge Match – Austin Aries vs. Delirious

Aries is wearing a suit. He gets on the microphone to insult the fans. He then announces that he has obtained his manager’s license. He doesn’t want to wrestle anymore, so he calls Delirious and Haze out to apologize to them. I lose interest as he brings out a “golden snack cake.”

Delirious does not accept the apology and the match is underway. Obviously Delirious takes control of the ill-prepared former two-time ROH World Champion. He throws Aries around for a bit and then nails him with the Cobra Clutch Suplex. He then locks on the Cobra Camel Clutch and the crowd isn’t reacting to this at all. Delirious wraps his tassels around Aries’ neck and won’t release it so referee Todd Sinclair disqualifies him at 2:25. Now Delirious looks to hit Aries with the ring bell, but Kenny King and Rhett Titus come out to make the save. They throw Haze to the floor and try to re-injure Delirious’ throat. Haze comes back and tries to fight off Aries. King, Titus, and Aries set up for a spike piledriver on Haze but Delirious comes to her rescue. As a match it was almost nothing, but they were really going for angle advancement. Unfortunately the crowd didn’t seem too into it so it kind of came off flat.
Rating: ¼*

Earlier Tonight Colt Cabana was bouncing around all excited about his match with Kevin Steen tonight. The fans are picking the stipulation for this one.

MATCH #6: 34th Street Last Man Standing Death Match – Kevin Steen vs. Colt Cabana

Cabana comes through the crowd and the fight is on. He hits Steen with a chair to bust him open and then throws him into the guardrails. He sets up a table and takes Steen up to the apron for a piledriver attempt. Steen blocks it and superkicks Cabana down to the floor and then hits a Cannonball up against the guardrail. He brings two chairs into the ring and cracks one on Cabana’s back. He sets up the other chair and goes for the pumphandle neckbreaker but Cabana blocks it and delivers a spinebuster through the chair instead. Ouch. Cabana hits the flip flop and chair shot to the head. He tries the Flying Apple but Steen catches him and drops him on the floor. Steen throws Cabana back in the ring and then introduces a ladder. Cabana blocks the ladder shot and hits Steen with it. Steen comes back with a spinebuster right on top of the ladder. He continues using the ladder as a weapon, but Cabana comes back with a bodyslam on the open ladder. That looked pretty damn painful. Cabana goes under the ring and finds a bag of thumbtacks. He sets Steen on the top rope and hurls him down into the pile of tacks! Now Cabana grabs one of the chairs and hits Steen’s back. Then he sets both chairs on top of Steen and hits a moonsault off the top rope. Before the 10 count can be completed, El Generico’s music hits, and a little kid in a fake Generico costume comes out to distract Cabana. That gives Steve Corino the chance to come in and kick Cabana in the nuts. It turns out the fake El Generico is Colby Corino, Steve’s son. Colby hands his dad a barbed wire baseball bat. Cabana avoids being hit with the bat, delivers the Flying Apple to Corino, and then blats Steen with the bat. Steen makes it back to his feet, and when Cabana goes for a Piledriver, Steen hits a low blow with the bat and then lands the Package Piledriver onto the pile of tacks. Cabana gets back to his feet so Steen drags him down into a Crossface. Corino tells Steen to accentuate the Crossface with the bat, and Steen obliges. Cabana looks out, so the referee breaks the hold and starts the count. The ref gets to ten at 14:17 (though I never heard an opening bell). The match was brutal and made me uncomfortable in some instances, but they’re really going all out to get this feud over. The bit with Colby drags the match down a bit, as it was not really necessary to get where they wanted to go, but overall this was still a pretty good hardcore match.
Rating: ***¼

MATCH #7: ROH World Tag Team Championship – Kings of Wrestling vs. Motor City Machine Guns

The Kings of Wrestling have been the champions since 4.3.10 and this is their first defense. They’re accompanied by Shane Hagadorn and Sara Del Rey. Sabin and Castagnoli start the match. Castagnoli shows off his superior power over the much smaller Sabin. He sets him up on the top turnbuckle just to be a jerk. Sabin comes back with an around the world headscissors and then shows Castagnoli where he’s from. Tags are made and the crowd appreciates both Hero and Shelley. They take it down to the mat. The fans are so into the match that they manage to chant “f*ck TNA.” Shelley gains control of the taller Hero, using leverage and agility. Hero comes back with an elbow strike and then makes a tag. Castagnoli takes a powder and the Guns are having none of it. The Guns use their exciting tandem offense to wear the champions down. They isolate Castagnoli in their corner. Out of nowhere Castagnoli decides to go on offense and the Kings target Sabin. Shelley gets tagged and he pitches Hero to the floor. He holds the ropes for Sabin to hit a suicide dive through the ropes on Hero. Back In the ring Shelley hits Hero with a missile dropkick. Shelley goes to work on Hero, using Hero’s long hair against him. The Kings use some synergistic albeit illegal double-teaming to take Shelley and Sabin down with boots to the faces.

The Kings work on Shelley now, using their strength advantage and teamwork to keep him down. Hero clobbers Shelley with an elbow to the back of the head and Sabin has to break up the cover. Shelley keeps going for the hot tag but the Kings make sure it doesn’t happen. Castagnoli hits Shelley with a running European Uppercut for two. Finally Shelley is able to make the comeback and throws all kinds of DDTs at Castagnoli and Hero. Sabin gets the hot tag and he is a house afire. He drills Hero with a tornado DDT but it only gets two. The referee loses control as there are Guns firing all over the place. The Guns hit the Skull and Bones and Castagnoli breaks up the cover. Castagnoli then throws Sabin to the floor. He tries the UFO but Shelley avoids it. Next he tries the Ricola Bomb but Sabin breaks that up, only to get jacked with an elbow by Hero. Shelley takes out Hero with an STO into the buckle, and Castagnoli blasts Shelley with a clothesline. Castagnoli delivers an impressively high Pop-Up European Uppercut but it only gets two. He then delivers the UFO while taunting the Machine Guns at the same time. That is why Claudio rules this company. Hero pulls Shelley to the floor and throws him into the barricade. The Kings execute their own version of the Hart Attack (with Hero hitting an elbow strike), and that leaves Sabin in perfect position for the Giant Swing capped off with a kick to the head from Hero for two. Hero goes for the Liger Bomb but Sabin counters with an inside cradle for two. Sabin hits an enziguiri and then makes the tag. Shelley tries a frog splash but misses and Hero hits him with an elbow for two. Hero hits another hard elbow strike but Shelley kicks out again! The match breaks down to a brawl with everyone in the ring, and the Guns are dominant. They hit a series of kicks on Hero for a two-count. The Guns go for Made in Detroit but Castagnoli breaks it up. Del Rey gets on the apron to distract the referee, allowing Hagadorn to toss Hero the elbow pad. Then from out of nowhere, to the thunderous boos of the crowd, Jay and Mark Briscoe come running out and attack the Kings. The Guns are disqualified at 22:06.

The crowd is pissed to say the least, so the Briscoes try to make up for it by hitting Del Rey with the Jay Driller, but they still get booed. I understand that the Guns probably weren’t allowed to job clean or whatever, but they damn sure should have found a better way to end the match than that. Alternatively, don’t book yourself into the kind of corner that necessitates a fuck finish that’s just going to piss off the entire crowd in your number one market. Great match, lousy finish.
Rating: ****

Austin Aries is backstage talking about, or rather not talking about what happened to him earlier tonight with Delirious. For some reason Julius Smokes is backstage, so Aries chats him up about being a manager. For some reason Smokes has a DVD copy of one of the Weekend of Thunder shows in his hand. As far as I know Smokes isn’t back or anything.

MATCH #8: ROH World Championship – Tyler Black vs. Roderick Strong

Black has been the champion since 2.13.10, and this is his fifth defense. Boo birds are out for the champion. The last time these two had a one-on-one match back at From the Ashes, Strong defeated the ROH World Champion. They definitely have a big match feel going early on, which is always a plus. They aggressively wrestle to a standoff and soak in the chants of the crowd. Black hits a solid dropkick and goes to the arm. Strong comes back with a leg lariat. Black gets up and they exchange chops. Strong wins that battle and then hits a vertical suplex for two. Black fights back with a short arm clothesline for two and then a stomp to the jaw for another two-count. A solid knee drop gets another two-count. Strong comes back and sends Black down to the floor. He tries to dropkick him from the ring but Black moves and throws Strong into the barricade. Black tries a springboard moonsault off the barricade but Strong avoids it and catches Black in a rack backbreaker on the ring apron.

Back in the ring Strong is firmly in control, working on the back. Strong drills Black in the face with a hard dropkick for two. He brings Black to the floor and hits a vertical suplex. They engage in fisticuffs on the floor and Strong wins that battle, and then hits a superkick. Back in the ring Strong resumes going to work on the back and ribcage. The fight migrates to the apron and Strong hits the back suplex on the edge of the apron for a two-count. Strong looks frustrated. He hits a snap powerslam for another near-fall. Black avoids the gutbuster and hits a flip-over slam. Both men are down and when they get back up Black goes after the arm. Black hits a standing shooting star press for two. They trade counters until Black straight up bodyslams Strong to the floor and then wipes him out with a Hilo. Back in the ring Black gets a two-count. Strong blocks Paroxysm and hits a reverse suplex for a two-count. He hits a Falcon Arrow for another two-count. He tries the Stronghold but Black kicks his way out of it. Black hits a kick to the head and sets up for a superkick, but Strong catches him and dumps him to the floor. Strong tries a leap off the apron but Black catches him and hits an F-5 on the floor! He barely makes it back into the ring. Black hits a running forearm in the corner and then the Warrior’s Way. He lands Paroxysm but Strong kicks out at two. He tries the Phoenix Splash but Strong avoids it and hits a kick to the face and a uranage backbreaker for two.

Now Strong brings Black up to the top rope for a backbreaker on the turnbuckle. Strong locks in the Stronghold right in the center of the ring. Black is able to crawl to the ropes. They counter each other some more and Black hits God’s Last Gift but Strong kicks out! Black hits a Buckle Bomb and Strong charges out of the corner with a big boot. Strong gets a two-count.

They exchange holds and counters once again, and Black goes for a superkick but accidentally hits Todd Sinclair! Strong hits a rack backbreaker and a Sick Kick and referee Paul Turner comes sprinting out but only counts two! He argues with the referee and Black hits a Superkick, a Buckle Bomb right onto Turner, and then another Superkick. A third referee makes his way out and trips on his way into the ring and once again it’s only a two-count! This time Black is pissed at the referee and while he argues with him, Strong pushes Black into the third ref, knocking him to the floor. Strong hits a Half-Nelson Backbreaker and Sinclair is back to make the two-count! Both men rise and start trading chops and forearms. Strong hits a half-nelson backbreaker for another two! Black hits a superkick but Strong counters with two enziguiris, a gutbuster, and a Gibson Driver but Black kicks out at two! Strong sets up for a Super Gibson Driver, but Black counters with an enziguiri and finishes Strong off with a Super God’s Last Gift at 27:09. These two have amazing chemistry as opponents and this was their best match yet. The crowd was super hot, both guys were going 100 miles per hour, and it felt like a legitimately competitive match. This is definitely the ROH match of the year up to this point.
Rating: ****½

After the match, Black offers his hand but Strong slaps him in the face instead! That ignites a brawl that security has to break up. Jim Cornette even comes out to help restore order. Strong gets on the mic and says he got screwed over tonight.

Backstage Roderick Strong says he’s going to keep coming back for more. He also found somebody who will tell him the Truth. Who could that be?

I grew up and now I write for Inside Pulse. Oh, and one time I saw a blimp!