McXal's Reviews

Rather than forming part of a larger narrative, it actually feels like each episode of Ring Of Honor television right now is its own separate entity. Wrestlers do have characters and storylines, but they appear so infrequently on a week-to-week basis that there feels like very little progress and evolution of character. Something you watched a week ago may have piqued your interest...but the likelihood is you won't see those guys again for weeks and will have forgotten what they were doing by the time they come back. This week the 'Future Of Honor' system comes to the fore as talents from that system feature in every match. The rivalry between PCO and Sledge (which has largely been relegated to brief exchanges on Week By Week) explodes in a singles match, and in the main event Dalton Castle's attempts to make Dak Draper and Eli Isom stars culminates in a triple threat match. Quinn McKay is back as host, with Ian Riccaboni and Caprice Coleman providing commentary in Baltimore, MD.

LAST WEEK - The Allure cheated again to ensure Mandy Leon won her match against Quinn. After the bout Brian Zane interviews them, and they poke fun at her for failing to get into the tournament for a second time.

NEXT WEEK - The Women's Championship Tournament begins...

The Mercenary is preparing for his World Title shot at Glory By Honor; an opportunity he secured by winning a Battle Royal at Free Enterprise last year. It comes at an awkward time having just lost a high profile match to EC3 at Best In The World, so he desperately needs to recover with a win over CB...

CB has spent a lot of time in the Pure division and it shows as he goes to ground and wrestles to negate his opponent's skills. He stays illusive; sticking and moving as Gordon struggles to establish himself in the opening minutes. Flip snaps eventually and punts Burger through the ropes...for a German suplex on the floor! He's not content there either, throwing Burger over the guardrails and landing a flying axehandle smash into the empty crowd area. Burger trips him into the ringpost, exacerbating an arm injury he'd suffered earlier in the match...and follows it with a stomp and a superkick to the same arm. Ian points out that it is the same arm that Flip injured at Best In The World 2019. Kinder Surprise scores though...and Gordon locks in the STF to win at 07:43 (shown)

Rating - *** - As I said in my introduction, as part of the 'larger narrative' this was pretty terrible. Trying to promote Flip as a credible World Title contender by having Cheeseburger almost break his arm is unbelievably poor booking. But if you can get past that and look at this as a match unto itself, it's rather good. The structure was so smart and easy to follow; Burger uses the rhythmic skills he's developed in the Pure division to unsettle Gordon whilst attacking a prominent previous injury of his...before Flip shows his power and quality to overcome and win the match. 

The Bouncers and Ken Dixon come through the curtain to start bullying Ian Riccaboni and intimidating Caprice. Bruiser says they are coming for the Six-Man Titles...

Ian informs us that this is a 'highly requested bout', which I rather struggle to believe. PCO and Sledge don't get along and have shared a number of tense exchanges, most of them on Week By Week. At Best In The World we saw Sledge come out to get in PCO's face after his match, with PCO's oddball partner Danhausen having to separate them. They meet in the ring tonight, with Danhausen on commentary.

PCO tries to show off some of his BJJ training, which proves fruitless as Sledge drags him to the corner and bootscrapes him. You can tell how (un)interesting the early exchanges are because the commentators basically ignore it to goof around with Danhausen. They continue to trundle around absent-mindedly clobbering each other; Sledge showing his toughness by not backing down an inch from the former World Champion. They spent about thirty seconds holding each others throats and circling...until PCO at last shoves his foe to the floor and hits a tope con hilo. QUEBEC CANNONBALL TO THE APRON! Despite hitting that, PCO has an electrical malfunction - which causes him to sit on the guardrails in perfect position for Sledge to kick him apparently. They brawl around in the empty crowd area, refusing to come back to the ring. Joe Mandak calls for a double disqualification at 08:41 (shown)

Rating - DUD - The pandemic and empty arena wrestling doesn't play into PCO's skillset. He is an uncouth, unorthodox monster who pops live crowds by doing insane stunts. Having him wrestle singles matches, without fans, basically deprives him of his entire act...and what we're left with isn't pretty. He still did a few crazy spots here, but hidden amidst a veritable sea of appalling, basic and completely uninteresting 'wrestling'. PCO revealed pretty early that he wasn't renewing his ROH contract at the end of the year, and if this is the best they have for him then they may as well save some money on travel/accommodation and just pay him to stay at home. His team with Danhausen has some value, this feud with Sledge does not. 

Security has to separate them because they won't stop fighting, which Danhausen thinks is great. 

The Mile High Magnum says he doesn't play well on teams, but worked with these guys at Best In The World for the opportunity to become a champion. He blames them both for their defeat at the hands of Shane Taylor Promotions and plans to make them pay with another loss tonight. Last time we saw Eli on television it was in the final two of the Survival Of The Fittest tournament. Dalton, meanwhile, is just looking for drama and entertainment it seems...

Castle charges into the ring throwing punches at both opponents, but as the ring clears Isom takes out Dak with a spectacular somersault plancha. Draper brings it into the ring and grounds Eli, which isn't entertaining enough for Castle so he and his Baby Chickens start grabbing at him from outside the ring. Back suplex from Isom to Dalton as everyone heads to the floor again. Dak throws Castle over the guardrails after they have another argument about the match not being entertaining enough. In doing so he turns his back on Eli who delivers a springboard moonsault to the floor. Castle throws a chair into Isom's face...then orders Dak into the ring with him to 'do something cool'. Magnum KO nailed (as the Baby Chickens do a Magnum KO dance on the apron) giving Draper the win at 06:20

Rating - ** - I'm somewhat interested in where the story goes here, as it feels like a practical outlet for the talents of guys like Dak, Eli and Dalton. But lets be honest, this wasn't good enough as a TV main event. There is so much choice out there and this isn't what Ring Of Honor should be presenting as the feature attraction on their show. As a match it was generic triple threat fare at best, and one can hardly call this Castle/Eli/Dak angle must-see television either. 

Tape Rating - * - It has to be said, this was another rather poor show. Ring Of Honor is having such a weird 2021. They were rightly praised for their work in the second half of 2020 and the quality of the programming when centred around the Pure Tournament...but as many predicted, Delirious has really struggled with his ability to widen the focus of the product and deliver a strong week-to-week wrestling show which makes the best use of his roster and limited TV time. There is almost zero connective tissue on a week-to-week basis and precious few storylines (that don't really go anywhere anyway) which means the quality of the show each week is dictated by how good the matches contained within it are. This week had a competent six minute Flip/CB match which did absolutely nothing to promote Gordon as a World Title contender, an abysmal PCO/Sledge match then a forgettable main event. I felt that ROH didn't do enough to capitalise on the boost in interest the return of fans for Best In The World provided, and the ensuing two weeks of TV have been even worse. From next week we start to focus on the Women's Title Tournament. Like the Pure Tournament last year, that will give structure to the TV show so the quality and consistency of these episodes should improve...but at the expense of the rest of the product being completely marginalised when they should be building to Glory By Honor. Too many wrestlers, too many matches, nowhere near enough TV time. How often are we going to have to say that about ROH?