The Undeniable Breakdown

Ring of Honor — Undeniable by J.D. Dunn Original Airdate: January 18, 2008 From Edison, N.J.. Your hosts are Dave Prazak and Lenny Leonard. Opening Match: Claudio Castagnoli vs. Chris Hero (w/Larry Sweeney, Sara Del Rey & Bobby Dempsey). But wait! Super-agent Larry Sweeney isn’t happy with their deal, so he’s putting a stop to the match until he *is* happy. That knocks poor Claudio off the PPV entirely. The Age of the Fall is out to announce that they want power, and to get power, they need the ROH Tag Team Titles. Jacobs says they’ll work within the system to destroy it from the inside out. Opening Match: The Vulture Squad (w/Julius Smokes) vs. The Age of the Fall (w/Lacey) Jigsaw and Necro Butcher battle to the back right off the bat, leaving it a 2-on-2. Black cuts off a Ruckus dive and hits a Fosbury Flop-ish move. The Age isolates Ruckus. He comes back with a flipping neckbreaker and tags Jack Evans. Jack works in his usual flurry of spots before getting speared out of his boots by Jacobs. Ruckus makes the save and starts bouncing around like a pinball. He gets caught and hung out to dry by Black. They set him in a chair, and Jacobs planchas onto him. Jack tries to slingshot himself into a rana, but Black catches him and powerbombs him into the barricade. The Age rattles off a few doubleteams, including a senton Ode to the Bulldogs. That leads to the End Time (Front Guillotine Choke) at 5:35. Short and sweet way to get people into the show. Cool near-subliminal insert celebrates the Age of the Fall win with the tagline “Follow the Crowd: Fall in Line” with a picture of people jumping off a cliff. **1/2 Takeshi Morishima chases the cameraman out of the locker room. Profile of Erick Stevens. ROH *needs* more of these. STAT! Sweet ‘n’ Sour Inc. announces that they are still holding out because their demands have not been met. How prescient is that, given the writers’ strike. Instead, we’ll get a women’s match. Sara Del Rey (w/Sweet ‘n’ Sour Inc.) vs. Daizee Haze. Daizee sends her to the floor with a headscissors. She wipes out Del Rey and Dempsey with a flying crossbody off the top. Back in, Del Rey gets pissed and hits a Bridging Fallaway for two. Del Rey counters a Wheelbarrow Bodyscissors to an Ocean Cyclone for two. Claudio Castagnoli runs down to brawl with Hero. Sweeney distracts him long enough for Hero to jump him from behind and leave him laying. Inside, Daizee rolls off Del Rey’s shoulders into a sunset flip and picks up the upset win at 3:20. This was just here to set up the next segment. 1/2* After the match, Bryan Danielson comes down and says that Sween ‘n’ Sour is everything that is wrong with sports. He wants a match right now. Bryan Danielson vs. Chris Hero (w/Sweet ‘n’ Sour Inc.). Hero does his athletics exhibition early. Danielson just waits patiently and then goes about his usual task of dismantling his opponent. Hero refuses to cooperate with a Mexican Surfboard, so Danielson just stomps his kneecaps. Hero scrambles to the ropes to break up the Crossface-Chickenwing. Hero cheapshots him and then hits a Fireman’s Carry to a senton. A running atomic drop knocks Danielson into the corner. Seriously? An atomic drop in Ring of Honor? Danielson makes the comeback and goes up. Hero pops up and runs up to… apply the cravat. Ha ha! Danielson tosses him off and hits a missile dropkick. A Bridging German Suplex gets two, and Danielson floats over into Cattle Mutilation. Hero rolls through, hits an elbow, and drops Dragon with a suplex. He gets cocky and goes for Cattle Mutilation and a small package. He slaps Dragon in the face, which can’t possibly be a good idea. Dragon gets pissed, hits a Shining Wizard, and stomps Hero’s face to mush for the ref stoppage at 10:20. Mostly just an excuse for Hero to be an ass and for Danielson to get back on the winning track. They do both quite well, so it was fun. **3/4 Adam Pearce invites Kevin Steen out to the ring and offers to turn the Hangmen Three (plus one!) into the Hangman Four (plus one!). As an olive branch, Pearce offers up Steen’s former partner El Generico, the man who cost him the tag team titles on the last PPV. Whitmer and Albright hold Generico in place, but Steen suckerpunches Pearce to turn face. The numbers overwhelm him until Delirious makes the save. Six-Man Tag: Delirious, Kevin Steen & El Generico vs. The Hangmen Three (w/Shane Hagadorn). The masked men doubleteam Whitmer. Delirious slams Whitmer’s face into the buckle and hits a Fireman’s Carry press to a senton, which is odd because Hero used the same sequence in the previous match. Pearce tags in and chokeslams Delirious. Albright delivers a delayed vertical suplex. Delirious comes back with a rana and tags in Kevin Steen. Leg lariat to Whitmer. Elbow to Albright. He crotches Pearce and enzuigiris him to the floor. Albright cuts him off and gets jumped by Generico. The Yakuza Kick leads to the Swanton on Whitmer. Pearce makes the save but gets clotheslined to oblivion by Delirious. Whitmer boots Generico but takes a thrust kick and flying jawbreaker from Steen. Delirious tries to feast on Pearce (num, num, num) but leaves himself open to the Half-Nelson Suplex from Albright at 7:55. Another fun, fast-paced match. I’m surprised at how well Steen segued from heel to babyface. **3/4 Nigel McGuinness talks about the importance of tonight’s title match and how he loves pro-wrestling. #1 Contender Match: Austin Aries vs. Roderick Strong. This is to decided, once and for all, who the better man on the team was (at least as far as PPVs are concerned). Strong loses a mat sequence and bails. Back in, he shoulderblocks Strong down and spits on him, so Aries armdrags him down and paintbrushes the back of his head. Strong segues to a headscissors, but he, of all people, knows that YOU CAN’T HEADSCISSOR AUSTIN ARIES! In this case, he just slips out. A dropkick sends Strong to the floor. Back in, Aries hits the running elbowdrop for two. Strong comes back with a pair of backbreakers for two. Aries elbows out of a chinlock but runs right into a dropkick. Strong drags Aries off the ropes into another backbreaker. Aries punches his way back and hits the 10-punch pummel in the corner. Strong just dumps him over, though. Strong sets up for the Tiger Driver on the floor, but Aries backdrops out of it. Aries hits the corner dropkick against the barricade. Back in, the twisting slingshot splash gets two, but Strong gets the knees up to block the quebrada. Aries improvises with a running kick to the face for two. Strong hits a Half-Nelson Backbreaker for two. A second one sets up the Tiger Driver, but Aries counters to a huracanrana. Aries puts Strong down with the shinbreaker into the backdrop suplex. Strong puts him on top, though, and hits a backbreaker on the top turnbuckle. Well, that’s inventive. RODERICK…GET THE TABLES! He sets up the table across the apron and barricade. Aries slips out of his Crucifix Bomb, though, clotheslines Strong out, and hits a suicida. Back in, Aries fires off a flurry of elbows and drops Strong with a Brainbuster. ONE, TWO, THR-NO! Strong crotches him on the top to block a 450-splash. Aries knocks Strong off the top and hits his 450-splash. ONE, TWO, THRE-NO! Strong plays dead and then rolls Aries into a small package for two. Aries powers up into a backslide and gets two of his own. He reverses the Stronghold to a rollup for two. Strong boots him right in the face and hits the Tiger Driver! ONE, TWO, THRE-NO! They brawl to the apron, and Aries hits a Brainbuster through the table! Back in, Aries hits a 450-splash (hitting Strong with his knees like Kurt Angle did to Sting). That picks up the win at 20:57. Solid win for Aries, and I love the pace and storytelling. **** ROH World Tag Titles: The Briscoe Bros. vs. Davey Richards & Rocky Romero. This is from Dayton because ROH doesn’t want the Age of the Fall and the Briscoes in the same building. Davey sends a message with a wild roundhouse kick early on. He and Mark mat wrestle to a standstill. Romero tags in but gets isolated, and Mark works in the football sled drives. Mark wipes out Davey with a plancha, and Jay follows with a rolling plancha. Back in, Richards knees his way out of a suplex and snaps Jay’s shoulder onto the canvas. The heels go to work on Jay’s arm. Jay blocks Richards’ charge. Mark gets the hot tag and counters Romero’s springboard to a T-bone. That leads to a fast and furious series of doubleteam maneuvers from the Briscoes. Mark works in his springboard Ace Crusher, adding a dropkick to Romero on the way down. Richards comes off the top – right into a thrust kick. He gets his knees up to block the springboard twisting splash, though. Cool moment as the NRC goes for stereo running kicks, but Jay comes out of NOWHERE to tackle Romero. The Briscoes team up for a Splash Mountain Neckbreaker. A DVD gets two and leads to a missed Springboard Doomsday Device. Well, that made the Briscoes look stupid. Richards hits the Handspring Kick but eats a lariat on the rebound. Both teams chop it out, and the Briscoes hit double shouldertackles. Romero takes Jay off the top with a flying armbar. Jay squirms to the ropes. The NRC team up for a Doomsday with the knee. Richards takes Jay up top, but Jay counters to a sitout superfacebuster. ONE, TWO, THRE-NO! This time the Springboard Doomsday hits this time, and the Briscoes retain at 18:18. Typical Briscoe title defense, which is not a bad thing. The NRC displayed more chemistry than I’m used to seeing out of them. ***1/2 Age of the Fall subliminal cuts interrupt the Briscoe’s celebration. Jacobs promises that this is just the beginning. ROH World Heavyweight Title: Takeshi Morishima vs. Nigel McGuinness. Nigel goes for the Jawbreaker Lariat early, but Morishima blocks and tries to counter to the Backdrop Driver. McGuinness rolls through, though. They trade forearms, and Morishima counters another Jawbreaker Lariat to a Bossman Slam. McGuinness rolls to the floor but loses sight of Morishima and gets jumped from behind. He tries another lariat but it misses. See, it’s not that he’s nothing but lariats like his critics say; it’s that he’s establishing the lariat as an important part of his strategy in the same way that the power sweep was to the Green Bay Packers or the inside fastball is to Roger Clemens. It sets up a narrative, and if the opponent figures out how to take that away from him, it throws an obstacle in Nigel’s way that he has to overcome to be successful. It’s just simple storytelling really. Morishima hits a series of armbreakers and locks in the Fujiwara Armbar on the inside. Nigel gets defiant and slaps him, so Morishima nails him with a forearm and a Yakuza Kick in the corner. Nigel teases a TKO but makes it up at nine. He shifts his weight on a Backdrop Driver attempt. A lariat just pisses Morishima off, but a second one gets two. Morishima blocks another lariat and gets two off a missile dropkick. Nigel tries a sunset flip and gets squashed like a bug for two more. Morishima comes off the top – right into a lariat. Morishima kicks him right in the face to break up the handstand. That leads to the Backdrop Driver. ONE, TWO, THRE-NO! He is like a piece of steel. Morishima blocks the Tower of London, so McGuinness improvises with a superplex for two. Nigel rolls through a Backdrop Driver and hits the JAWBREAKER LARIAT! ONE, TWO, THRE-NO! A sunset flip bomb gets two. They trade open-hand chops, setting up a lariat. ONE, T-NO! Morishima kicks out at one! He hits a buttbutt, but Nigel rebounds with another Jawbreaker Lariat to finish Morishima’s reign once and for all at 14:22. A lot of people may complain about the use of lariats, but like I explained, it’s just a part of the narrative Nigel went with. It would be like complaining that Ricky Steamboat uses a lot of chops and armdrags in his matches with Ric Flair. It’s true, but each one leads into or out of a new sequence. That being said, there *are* some legitimate problems with the match. It didn’t really have the epic feeling I was expecting (although it was definitely grander than the last world title switch). Nigel’s win, while welcome, felt anticlimactic after a year of build. Definitely a worthy main event but by no means a classic. *** After the match, the locker room empties to congratulate McGuinness, but Bryan Danielson has to be a douchebag and ruin the moment by getting in Nigel’s face. Austin Aries tells Bryan not to be That Guy. The 411: Another solid PPV from ROH, although this is probably the weakest of the bunch. I was disappointed until the Aries-Strong match. After that, it was golden – a tale of two PPVs really. I question whether this is really the way to sell more DVDs given that they tend to vaguely hype the ROH site rather than “Pick up Reckless Abandon to check out the Aries vs. Strong Ironman Match” or “Check out ROH’s next show to find out what happens next” which, I think would help a lot more than just hoping people will go to the site. As a PPV unto itself, though, it’s another great night of action. Thumbs up.