McXal's Reviews

It is a week of debuts as the ROH Pure Title Tournament First Round concludes. Rust Taylor faces 'Hot Sauce' Tracy Williams, whilst Tony Deppen makes a much-awaited debut against PJ Black. After three weeks of well-received, competitive, Covid-secure professional wrestling. ROH have made some bold choices and I'm curious to see who rounds out the field for the next round. Ian Riccaboni and Caprice Coleman are in Baltimore, MD. Quinn McKay is our host once again...

You can find my previous Pure Tournament Reviews below:

LAST WEEK - Fred Yehi proudly talks through his win over Silas Young. He recognises his history with Tracy Williams (they are former stable-mates and Tag Champions in Evolve) but doesn't care who he faces in the next round...

LAST WEEK - Josh Woods' first question after getting back to the locker room following his victory is asking 'how did Silas do'. Unsurprisingly, he thinks the judges made the correct decision in him awarding the win, and is sure Silas will cheer him on in Round Two!

When the Covid-19 pandemic forced ROH to cancel their original plans for the Pure Title Tournament, then rebook the whole thing with a host of new participants, I don't think it is unfair to say that Taylor was one of the more unexpected names. With extended spells in PWG, Championship Wrestling From Hollywood and debuting in the early 2000's he certainly isn't lacking in experience. Coming out of the SoCal scene, he talks about learning grappling and technical wrestling from the likes of Jesse Hernandez, Rocky Romero, TJ Perkins and more...but getting rejected after a WWE tryout almost derailed his career, so in many ways this appearance represents something of a re-emergence from the wilderness for him. He speaks superbly by the way, arguably the best interview of all the debutants. Tracy's interview is interesting too. Understanding how he has incorporated multiple combat sport disciplines into his style is noteworthy, as is his discussion of his debut against Jon Gresham, but it's his thoughts on the goals and failure of Lifeblood that really grabbed me. He talks about this tournament a 'beacon' of hope after the failure of that group and his part in it. It's a 'reset button' for him as much as it is for Ring Of Honor more generally.

Taylor is in superb physical condition and has an entrance theme that I don't completely hate too. Tracy comes out throwing up the Catch Point hand signal, which Riccaboni points out. They kick off with some intense lock-ups and probe each other for weaknesses. Rust grabs an arm and tests out just how healed Williams' notoriously bad shoulder really is, but finds Hot Sauce more than capable of countering out. It gets to the point where they have hold of each other's arms and are quite literally working back and forth with arm holds. Taylor throws a few kicks...so Tracy grabs the leg and cranks onto an STF, forcing Rust to utilise his first rope-break. Taylor's response is to hit some mounted strikes to the bad shoulder! Williams fights back with a body slam - and even then it is noticeable that Rust hasn't actually relinquished hold of that arm. During the break Taylor continues to pile the pressure on that injury but wasn't able to force Williams to surrender any of his rope-breaks. He peppers the arm with kicks and forearms - but Tracy dips into his MMA training and is happy to trade strikes with his opponent. Taylor goes to another armbar - which Williams counters using a headscissors and dropping a knee across the neck. All of that will help to soften Taylor up for the Crossface. Five minutes left in the time limit and this is too close to call. CROSS ARMBREAKER by Taylor! Now Tracy has no choice but to grab the ropes for the first time. Taylor stalks him mercilessly with kick after kick...and Williams needs another rope-break to break the ensuing pin. Rear Choke by Tracy...COUNTERED by grabbing the bad arm and converting to a Rings Of Saturn. In just minutes he has forced Williams to burn all of his allotted rope-breaks! London Dungeon locked in...and Tracy grabs the ropes to no effect! In the end he throws his own body out of the ring to the floor to break the hold. Williams can barely stand, with less than 90 seconds left. Taylor - knowing he is ahead on points - starts striking at Hot Sauce...who out of nowhere grabs the JUMPING PILEDRIVER! CROSSFACE! From the jaws of defeat Tracy grabs a win! He advances at 11:53 (shown).

Rating - **** - It didn't have the accessible theming of King/Woods, and it didn't quite have the pace and dynamism of Gresham/Yuta...but for the sheer quality of the wrestling this is arguably the best match so far. Physically Taylor looks completely ripped, and he really excelled in this technical clinic. His mat wrestling, countering and all around presence were fantastic. Anyone familiar with Tracy's work will know exactly what he brought to the party too. His wrestling is always superb, but for me what always captures my attention is his ability to sell and convey vulnerability. It meant that, even when this wasn't necessarily outrageously exciting, the precision of Rust combined with Tracy's selling meant this felt gritty and realistic. For fourteen minutes they barely let go of each other. They fought ferociously and delivered a match which puts over Taylor as much in defeat as it does Williams in victory. There is absolutely a spot on the roster for Rust Taylor if ROH is serious about becoming a more wrestling-centric, sporting, athletic product...

Deppen was a skateboarder and a punk-rock kid and brings what he learned from those scenes into wrestling. Namely getting back up and going again when you fall, and taking a 'DIY' attitude to his career - which has seen him go through CZW, GCW, Chikara, PWG, Black Label Pro and more. He fights for his family and comes in as an unknown - which, unlike PJ, makes him harder to research. Wrestling and sports are in PJ's DNA, with his father a former wrestler and athletics going back several generations. But he also brings experience, a variety of styles, and all manner of eclectic tastes; from the heights of WWE superstardom, the Temple of Lucha Underground, base-jumping in his spare time to training with tribal shaman. He plans to use the tournament to prove that he's actually a better pure wrestler than he is a high-flyer. His protégé Brian Johnson will be in his corner...

Deppen tries to grapple with Black but quickly finds the veteran is more than equipped to trade holds with him. He's also bigger and more powerful - giving the impression that the debutant is completely out-matched in the early-going. When Deppen does finally create some space, the Darewolf closes it quickly and almost decapitates him with a flurry of kicks. His dominance is such that it is almost a surprise when Deppen finds a way to lock in a stepover toehold and Black dives right for his first rope-break. PJ leaves the ring...and hammers Deppen with a superkick on the floor. Black sensibly brings it back to the ring and once again looks to capitalise on his power and speed advantage. Johnson, by the way, has spent the entire first five minutes loudly barking orders at Black...it's very off-putting. In the ring the Darewolf punishes the arms with multiple submissions, putting Deppen in serious pain. Black goes for a springboard dropkick...COUNTERED with a dropkick out of mid-air by Tony. After the break the newcomer slams into Black with a double knee in the corner but is so beaten down he can barely capitalise afterwards. He misses a flying double stomp...and is emphatically put down with a roundhouse kick to the back of the head. Deppen somehow goes back to the legs and grabs an STF, drawing a second rope-break out of the Darewolf. Black actually leaves the ring to kill his momentum. TOPE CON HILO BY DEPPEN! Black Diamond by PJ...ONE COUNT of disrespect! Black can't believe that, but finally finishes Deppen with a Crucifix Driver at 10:42 (shown)

Rating - *** - A lot of people were excited to see Deppen in this tournament and he gave a good account of himself here...but he wasn't the story or focal point of the bout at all. The central premise here was all geared towards rebuilding PJ Black. Even as age and injuries catch up with him he remains a remarkable athlete...but here the point was rebranding him as a lethal technical wrestler and genuine contender to win the tournament. In a way they almost traded on Deppen's legitimacy as a respected grappler to put Black over. Deppen came in as the hotly recruited, 'pure' wrestler. But he was dominated, picked apart, out-wrestled, out-struck and over-matched by the veteran. Your mileage on this will vary on how much you enjoy PJ, and on how much you were looking forward to seeing Deppen. But the idea here was very much to position PJ as a serious threat and, on that front, it was a successful match. 

Round Two is complete and lines up as follows:

Red Block: Lethal vs Finlay and Yehi vs Williams

Silver Block: Gresham vs Sydal and Woods vs Black

The episode ends with a video package urging you to 'control your own narrative' - teasing the arrival of EC3...

Tape Rating - *** - Inside the ropes, the wrestling was high class once again this week. I don't think the straight-laced, intensely ground-based Taylor/Williams match will be for everyone but to my taste it was one of the best matches in the tournament so far. And I can see Black/Deppen being controversial for the way it somewhat marginalised Tony in favour of positioning Black as a contender. Critically though, whether you agreed with the creative direction of either contest, I don't think many would argue that the matches were done well, treated seriously and presented as a hard-fought, sporting contest. That really is the kind of Ring Of Honor show I want to watch so you won't hear any complaints from me. I can't pretend I'm the biggest EC3 fan in the world either - but I have enjoyed the presentation of his character post-WWE release. Can ROH find a way to blend that character, presentation and interview skill into the new style of product they are building?