Category: Ring of Honor

ROH this morning announced that Samoa Joe’s first match back in the company will be 6/20 in New York at the TV tapings at Terminal Five, will be a non-title match with ROH tag champs Christopher Daniels & Frankie Kazarian vs. Samoa Joe & A.J. Styles.

Quinn “Moose” Ojinnaka was announced today as having signed a new deal with Ring of Honor.  His contract expired next month and he was in high demand from almost every direction.  ROH reported that he signed his new contract in Toronto.    

Submitted By Dave Musgrave

– Dark Match: Rip Impact, The Romantic Touch and Pepper Parks defeated Ashley Sixx, Davey Vega and Kenny Lush

– Nigel McGuinness announced the following for the Best In The World on June 19: Roderick Strong vs Michael Elgin vs Moose for #1 contender spot, World Champion Jay Briscoe vs TV Champion Jay Lethal title vs title

Kushida defeated Will Ferrera by submission

– The Addiction said that Fish and O’Reilly have been complaining about wanting a title shot for weeks.  Kazarian said they get it “next week” and next week only

Silas Young defeated Takaaki Watanabe

Moose defeated Colby Corino

Moose was supposed to wrestle BJ Whitmer but Whitmer gave the match to Colby Corino after teasing giving it to Adam Page. Moose destroyed Colby including a powerbomb on the apron and one in the floor before pinning him

The Briscoes defeated Donovan Dijak and J Diesel (w/Jay Lethal and Truth Martini)

Jay Briscoe gave Jay Lethal a Jay Driller after the match

ROH Tag Champions Daniels and Kazarian defeated Kyle O’Reilly

Daniels and Kazarian said that Bobby Fish is not medically cleared to wrestle and if he and O’Reilly don’t come down they forfeit their title shot. O’Reilly came down by himself. At one point he had Daniels and Kazarian seated on each other on a chair at ringside and did a missile dropkick on both of them. Daniels and Kazarian beat on him after the match and Matt Sydal and ACH made the save

Jushin Liger defeated Dalton Castle

Fun match with great reactions

Bob Evans vs Cheeseburger ended in a no contest

Match ended when Evans gave Cheeseburger a brutal sidewalk slam from the apron through a table at ringside

Mike Bennett and Matt Taven vs Karl Anderson and Doc Gallows ended in a double DQ

DQ happened after Anderson and Bennett both pushed down referee Red Shoes several times.  Anderson and Gallows had Maria up for their finisher after the match but Bennett saved her and then got beat down by Anderson and Gallows.

BJ Whitmer and Adam Page vs. War Machine

Whitmer gave Colby Corino his place in the match again saying his father didn’t get it two weeks ago. Colby got destroyed again by Hanson and Rose when Page refused to tag in. Whitmer then had a face-off with Steve Corino who was on commentary.

Cedric Alexander defeated Moose

Cedric Alexander came out and said this time last year he was the breakout star of 2014 but he no longer he is. He said he needs to start picking up wins and his first challenge is to the undefeated Moose. Match ended after Moose was holding a wrench Veda Scott gave him but Cedric got it from him and punched him out with it for the pinfall. Good match.

Hiroshi Tanahashi and Tetsuyo Naito defeated ACH and Matt Sydal

This built really well and tore the house down. ACH came off as a star and has stepped up to another level in 2015.

– Nigel McGuinness comes to the ring and calls out Jay Lethal and Jay Briscoe for a contract signing. They faced off and signed the contracts. Lethal said the only reason he doesn’t put Briscoe through a table is because he needs him at his best on June 19 so there are no excuses when he beats him. Briscoe says that after he gets done with Lethal he will need to go back to being Black Machismo.

Shinsuke Nakamura defeated Roderick Strong

Strong really dominated here with lots of backbreakers. Nakamura came back and got a Bom A Ye that Strong kicked out of at 1. Strong then hit one and Nakamura got a second one for the pin.

Michael Elgin beat Gedo

This was a bit of a death spot for this match and the crowd was tough. It might have done better elsewhere in the night.

AJ Styles and The Young Bucks beat Kazuchika Okada, Trent Barretta and Ricky Romero

Styles and the Bucks are amazing together and the parts with Okada vs Styles were unbelievable. This might have been Okada’s best of his three Toronto matches. The Bucks did a Meltzer Driver on Barretta, Styles picked him up for a Styles Clash and let the Bucks super kick him before song the clash for the pin. Taven and Bennett came out. Okada hit a rainmaker on Styles and CHAOS and The Kingdom celebrated.

Officially announced for the 6/19 PPV show from New York:

– ROH World Champion Jay Briscoe vs. ROH TV Champion Jay Lethal in what is billed as the Battle of the Belts

– Michael Elgin vs. Moose vs. Roderick Strong for the No. 1 contender position

Thanks to Dave Musgrave

Hi Dave,

What an amazing show last night at Global Wars!

If I had more than two thumbs they would all be thumbs up.

Best Match- 10 man tag main event but ACH vs Nakamura was a very close 2nd

Worst match- Moose & Gedo vs. Takaaki Watanabe & Silas Young by default. You know Moose is limited so wasn’t expecting a lot here

Crowd was hot all night and arena seemed sold out to me with standing room only. Didn’t seem as packed as last year but that is just gauging it by the beer crowd line-up!

Long lineups for the NJPW stars autographs.

Some technical difficulties with the lights going out a few times in the arena.

There were some crazy spots in the main event and so much action to follow. Roddy’s superplex spot outside the ring was wild as was Hanson’s flip dive to everyone to the floor. That was a lot of weight and momentum to try to slow down.

AJ got a huge reaction live as did all the New Japan stars

Card top to bottom was top notch and hope they continue to make this an annual event

Looking forward to the TV taping tonite.

UFC Fight Night

Thumbs in the middle

Not a must see card

Best Performances: Neil Magny, Li Jingliang

Faber vs Edgar was a fun super fight on paper. Edgar more aggressive but was hoping for more fireworks and a finish.

Nice see Munoz win in his retirement fight, especially since his last few fights have had quick finishes. I’m glad they gave him time for a classy speech on his way out.

Magny looked impressive surviving the 1st round storm and coming back to win in decisive fashion.

Check out my current ebay auctions featuring some great wrestling memorabilia. Seller name is grantsindex

Email me for some recent wrestling observer specials including UFC, Royal Rumble, Survivor Series, Wrestlemania and more.

grantsindex@nexicom.net

Grant Zwarych

Wrestling Observer Index

Thumbs Up

Best Match: 10 Man Tag Main Event

Worst Match: Moose/Gedo vs Young/Watanabe

Stream worked great all night for me. I was in Philly live for both of the shows there and thought the difference in crowd really stood out (we’ll see how that comes across on VOD I guess), with Night 2 in particular being a really hot crowd. This was very good, but I thought both Philly shows were better.

Dan Babic

Thumbs in the middle
Best match:  Tied between Nakamura/ACH and Okada/Alexander

Not sure if my expectations were just too high given the talent lineup, but I thought this was just a good, not great, show.  One of the problems may have been that you could read the lineup and easily predict who was winning each match.  I think that hurt a lot of the matches.  Worth my money and time for sure.  The stream held up too which may be a first for ROH.  If they can keep that up I’ll be a regular customer.

The New Japan guys were clearly a cut above most of the ROH guys, which is both a compliment to just how good the NJPW guys are how indy some of the ROH guys are in many ways (even if undeniably talented).

It’s a shame Chris Sabin developed his personality after injuries wrecked his body.  Nakamura is ridiculously talented – I know, news flash.  Elgin/Tanahashi was very good in some ways, a bit clunky in others.  Elgin is missing something.  The main even didn’t do a whole lot for me, I thought it was a disjointed mess with no real story, just a bunch of stuff happening.  At the same time, all ten of those guys are so talented it couldn’t be bad.

I’m torn on the commentary.  At times I thought they were effective, other times I thought they were lost or just plain annoying.  That said, still better than the mannequins that call Smackdown.

-Richard Karels
Wrestling Hullabaloo

Thumbs Up
Best Match: Team ROH vs. BULLET CLUB
Worst Match: Gedo/Moose-Young/Watanabe

This was a weird show, because on one hand there was absolutely nothing bad (even the “worst match” was totally fine), but until the main event nothing really delivered on quite the level I was expecting either. Like you I was pretty underwhelmed by the crowd, especially after having been in attendance this past Wednesday night in Philly; we were much, much louder throughout the show and I would suspect were more knowledgeable on the New Japan guys too, given the staggering amount of NJ t-shirts being worn. I think once those Philly shows come out on VOD you’ll see what I mean. Either way, I only went to night 2 and I thought that show was a lot better than this one.

Still, again, nothing on the undercard was bad, and then the main event was absolutely fantastic, jaw-dropping stuff, so I don’t see how you can go lower than Thumbs Up here. Between the crowd being much quieter and most of the guys having wrestled two shows just a few days ago, it’s understandable that the show wasn’t quite up to the same lofty standards they had set a few days back.

John Carroll
Bronx, NY

The reason Truth Martini and Bobby Fish weren’t on tonight’s ROH/NJPW Border Wars show in Toronto, Canada, is there were issues at the border for both of them. Donovan Dijak replaced Martini and Kyle O’Reilly was moved to another match.