Steel cage warfare?

[SundownMotel]

Hey Pholby, howsabout postin' yer thoughts?
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And this is a promise, because this is true. This is real. This is Straight Edge.

[pholby]

I'll start at the very beginning. The two preshow matches were guys from Pro Wrestling Iron.

Oliver John def. Ryan Drago

This week in questions with obvious answers: Is it wrong to throw a half-nelson suplex in a pre-show match? Yes. Yes it is. That suplex is so brutal that unless your name is Kobashi, you shouldn't be allowed to use it outside of main events or grudge matches. So if you see this Oliver John, you tell him I said he either doesn't understand the concept of a 'preshow', or he's just an idiot. Possibly both. I nicknamed Drago "Fatlegs the Russian." His legs jiggled a lot. Anyway, this match ended with John hitting a Death Valley Driver off the second rope, further proving that he doesn't understand the concept of a preshow match. Also, both men threw some pretty weak strikes. And when you're following weak strikes with half-nelson suplexes and Death Valley Drivers, that's just lame.

Apollo Kahn def. Joey Harder

Joey here shows us that the standard for stupid names in wrestling is getting ever higher. Seriously, Joey Harder? What the fuck is that? These two had a tough act to follow (the ROH crowd loved the previous match, but they love lots of things that they shouldn't.) They didn't help matters by being pretty mediocre. But they didn't actively piss me off like the previous two.

And thus ends the preshow.

Jason Blade and Kid Mikazi def. Dunn and Marcos

I like Dunn and Marcos. Blade and Mikazi (again with the fucking name issue) are your average indie cruiserweight tag team, with the spinning and the double team moves. They won, because they wouldn't get booked anymore if they lost. "Big fucking deal, you beat Dunn and Marcos!" I yelled.

Davey Andrews def. Pele Primeau

Pele's gimmick consists mainly of getting his ass beat. And by mainly I mean "exclusively". Davey is good at that kind of thing, so this was a fun 90 seconds. Both men were seconded by two or three other students. Hey, remember how Ricky Reyes has been squashing students left and right for the past two months or so? Yeah, well this time he came out and talked some shit, and then beat up the students, including hitting Davey with his "Top of the Class" trophy. He broke it too, that fucker. He beat Davey up, but Davey's no punk. This one's going somewhere good.

Tony Mamaluke and Sal Rinauro def. Colt Cabana and Milano Collection AT

This was for the tag titles, and Cabana and Milano made a good, fun team. Mamaluke was all pissy about Milano claiming to be Italian. Then they had a match and at the end, Mamaluke was all about showing respect and giving Milano his Italian flag. This match continued the trend of the results being fairly predictable.

American Dragon Bryan Danielson def. Rocky Romero

This was what everyone expected it to be, a total stiff-fest. Romero was looking for the armbar early, and every time he got it Danielson would hurry to make the ropes. So Romero changed up his strategy and started working Danielson's leg. At one point Romero had a leg lock on, and Dragon just grabbed onto his ear and twisted it until Romero let go. Dragon worked the leg throughout, which is consistent with Dragon's previous strategies as champion: Either busting out a submission to finish a guy off (chickenwing, half crab, fujiwara), or throwing elbows to knock a guy out. Danielson jawed with the crowd, but only the people who were heckling him, keeping him firmly in 'tweener' status, which I like. Not like I'd boo him anyway, but still. After the match Lance Storm came out and cut a promo putting over Danielson and ROH, then Danielson got on the mic and put over Storm as paving the way for smaller wrestlers.

Jay Lethal def. Samoa Joe

Lethal was getting beaten, so when Joe went for the running facewash, Lethal rolled out at the last second, then wrapped Joe's leg around the ring post and hit it a couple of times with a chair. Then he pulled Joe all the way out of the ring and went nuts on his leg with the chair. Ladies and gentlemen, meet Jay Lethal, heel. So he continues the match, with Joe selling the leg quite well, but Jay did the heel thing so early in the match that he wasn't able to sustain it, and so when he won, the audience popped and applauded. Way to go, Jay. (As you can tell, I blame him for not working the heel thing hard enough. I mean, Joe can be superface when he wants to so it sure isn't his fault.) Also, you know that move where someone runs at Joe and he just slams them down? They went to do that out of a springboard off the ropes by Lethal, and Lethal missed. That would have been really cool, but oh well.

Steve Corino def. Homicide

Right as the match started, a masked man (WHO YOU CAN'T PROVE IS COLT CABANA) ran out and took a pipe to Julius Smoke's knee. Smoke's selling the knee was the funniest thing of the whole night. He was carried out by Reyes and Romero, and was hilarious. The match, meanwhile, was kind of disappointing. I had high hopes, and it just didn't live up. I suppose since their feud has been non-existent in ROH for so long, this felt like they were going through the motions of what a match between the two should have, and that was it. That said, it was pretty fucking bloody. Homicide hurt his shoulder pretty bad, but that didn't stop him from fucking up Corino's ear with his fork. So despite the match falling short, Corino's ear filling with blood is an impressive visual. I could tell the match wasn't everything it could have been when I spent most of my attention studying the respective blading techniques, and how Homicide works the fork shots. So after some brawling and Homicide hurting his arm, the masked pipe-wielding maniac came out again, and knocked Homicide out, then pulled Corino on top of him. (Just so you know, ROH Commissioner has told both Cabana and Homicide they would be heavily fined if they interfered in each other's matches. So it's a good thing Cabana kept his wits about him and stayed backstage.)

Steel Cage Warfare: Generation Next def. The Embassy

Austin Aries and Jimmy Rave started out. Then Alex Shelley came out, then Matt Sydal, then Abyss, then Roderick Strong, then Prince Nana, then Matt Sydal got eliminated, making it four on two, Embassy advantage. Eventually Jack Evans came out and went nuts. You know, triple back flip off the cage, double moonsault, all kinds of crazy shit. Oh, and somewhere in there Jade Chung came out and distracted Nana and various other Embassy members. She stayed out there, too. The whole time Nana seemed pretty worthless as wrestler, but then again, so is Jack Evans. (OHHHHH.) Anyway, Roderick Strong got Jimmy Rave in a torture rack while standing on the top rope (not in the corner, but on the rope, in the middle), so Evans climbed to the top of the cage, jumped from the corner over to Rave, stomped on Rave, then backflipped into the cage onto Abyss, who was being held in place by Aries. So he Ode to the Bulldogged from the top of the cage, off of Rave, onto Abyss. Then he pinned Abyss, eliminating him. There's only one small problem: He came off Rave crooked, and hit Aries instead of Abyss. So let that be a lesson to you, kids: Doing crazy wild things is pointless if you can't do them right. Aries had to roll him up on top of Abyss, then Aries climbed on too and they both made the pin. Later Evans got Emerald Frosioned off the second rope by Shelley, then pinned. Some idiots towards the back started chanting "bullshit", because Jack Evans rulz and shouldn't be eliminated. I stood up and yelled "IT WAS A FUCKING EMERALD FROSION OFF THE SECOND FUCKING ROPE SO SHUT THE FUCK UP!" I mean, seriously. Nana got taken out, which left Rave and Shelley vs. Strong and Aries. To make a long story short, Strong busted out at least 8 straight backbreakers on Rave, and Aries brainbustered Shelley onto a chair. Aries pinned Shelley while Strong applied the Strong Lock, and right after the three count was made, Rave tapped out. And that was that.

Minor asside regarding the steel cage match: Austin Aries goes "DOOF" when he throws big punches, and I find it to be hilarious.

All in all, it was a good show. It wasn't spectacular, it wasn't the best show I've ever been to, but it was worth the money and time I spent. (Since I live in MA, and the show is in NYC, it takes up basically my entire weekend to go to a show. But it was worth it.)

Also, when Shelley entered he was wearing a Generation Next t-shirt that he had crossed out the GN logo, wrote "FCK Gen Next" on it, amongst other things. (Spelling was never ALX's strong suit.) You can see the shirt (but not read it) here. Anyhow, eventually someone ripped it off of him, and later on Abyss got tired of seeing it so he threw it out of the cage. Now it's mine. This would be much cooler if I were a big fan of Alex Shelley. Oh well, it's still pretty neat.

[SundownMotel]

Thanks so much for your info, Pholb. Sounds like a fun show. I too have noticed the "DOOF", and I love it.

So, regarding the pre-show opener, were the strikes like Jay Lethal-level weak? Because nothing's THAT weak.
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And this is a promise, because this is true. This is real. This is Straight Edge.

[Rogue]

The pre-show guy's name was Joey Harder? Nothing will ever be gayer than that.

Good show, though the results were largely predictable as Pholby mentioned. It was a good 'ol happy ending kind of show. The only muck I saw in his write-up was saying that Nana being taken out midway through the match. He was actually the last one eliminated; after the double elimination, he was completely squashed by Aries and Strong.

Oh, and Pholby's a cool guy. During intermission, he came up and introduced himself to me. I, being dumb, had no idea how he recognized me until he pointed out that I had the same shirt on that I wore in my Introduction pic. Makes sense.

I go to the Photosite tomorrow to pick up my pictures from the show, and they better have come out. 4 rolls ain't cheap.

[B]

[SundownMotel]

That is not a flattering picture of Jamie Kennedy.
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And this is a promise, because this is true. This is real. This is Straight Edge.

[Rogue]

Aw man, Harder's gonna need to focus all his gay if he wants to out-gay that pic. He better be up to the challenge.

[pholby]

Also in the running for gayest of all time: Danshoku Dino, who, rumor has it, is shoot-gay, not worked gay.



See also: http://homepage2.nifty.com/owf/waza_dd001.html
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"You're a pussy, Strong!"

"Woah woah woah."

[Jim]

Definitely mad gay.


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