Not as good as I remember...

[DBSommer]

Been going over some of the early ROH stuff in chronological order lately. As per some things in life, I am discovering my memories of how good things were do not always match with what I am currently seeing. I know over time we evolve, and now I find my opinions are changing, but I'm wondering what the heck I was thinking in the first place in regards to some (nowhere near all, mercifully) of the matches and wrestlers.

Case in point: The Havana Pitbulls of Rocky Romero and Ricky Reyes. I had remembered their run as being very good and enjoying it a lot as they had great matches. Upon rewatching them, I'm wondering when that supposedly happened. Mind you, when Reyes went solo I realized he was one of the most boring, uncharismatic wrestlers on the planet (what was it Aries said about him only being over when he was loaded?), but I figured it was just him being solo and the tag action was better. But honestly, I can't find too many of their matches with them being good, as opposed to their opponents making them look good, like Punk and Cabana did in dropping the titles to them.

The good news is, it's allowing me to enjoy the current product more as it does compare quite favorably to at least some of the old stuff. So what parts of ROH history do you remember as being kick ass, then you went back, watched it again and said, 'I thought *that* was one of the best cards/matches/wrestlers ever? I'd rather see Mike Bennett in an Iron Man match than that again."?

[WrestlingMatters]

I used to go apeshit over any Scramble or Scramble Cage type spotfest. Looking back some of them were absolute crapfests of botched spots.

[supersonic]

I refuse to watch the First Anniversary main event.

[fm20000]

I've been having the opposite effect lately. With these best of compilations that I've been getting it's more for me like, HOLY SHIT this is so much better than the stuff going on now and than I remember. Rewatched Dragon vs Roderick from Vendetta... Holy shit that match blows away almost anything going on lately besides Elgin/Davey.

[supersonic]

That's because ROH is giving you largely the good shit (which is a great call.) They're not showing you utter shit like the Jacobs Ladder/Prince Nana match (under 2 minutes and still stunk up the joint), or the Christopher Street Connection, or the Carnage Crew gymbag defecation storyline. You're also missing out on Towel Boy, Vordell Walker, Ricky Reyes, and the average BJ Whitmer match.

[DBSommer]

I've been having the opposite effect lately. With these best of compilations that I've been getting it's more for me like, HOLY SHIT this is so much better than the stuff going on now and than I remember. Rewatched Dragon vs Roderick from Vendetta... Holy shit that match blows away almost anything going on lately besides Elgin/Davey.

Those are 'The Best Of's, (and the best of the best at that) so I would hope that they were the greatest matches the wrestler had to offer and the stuff was actually good. Now if they had released Roderick: The Weakest Matches of the Strong' which included the aforementioned Escalation KO match DQ, Running the Gauntlet against the ROH students at 'It All Begins', vs. Necro at Fueling the Fire (styles did not work at all) and Gen Next's opening round trios match against the ROH students, you might be singing a different tune. ^_^ At the same time, I'd wager a 'The Best of Reyes' compilation would not be successful no matter what point in his career you highlighted.

I do agree that some of those classic matches remain so over time. There were some battles that were good that I didn't recall being memorable the first time through. Scramble Madness was a pleasant surprise as I thought of it being a low end card, yet the Red-Jay Briscoe vs Mark Briscoe -Christopher Daniel, Joe vs Homicide, and Danielson-Williams Iron Man matches were all very good. But overall, it seems the Golden Years weren't as shiny for me as I remember them being.

[supersonic]

That Best of Reyes comp sounds like a challenge. Let's see how I can do with a one-disc.

Pitbulls vs. Briscoes - Reborn Stage 1
Reyes vs. Samoa Joe - Round Robin Challenge III
Rottweilers vs. Joe & Briscoes - Reborn: Completion
Pitbulls vs. Punk & Cabana - Testing the Limit
Pitbulls vs. Strong & Evans - Weekend of Thunder Night 1
Rottweilers vs. GeNext - Trios Tournament
Rottweilers vs. Joe, Lethal, & Gibson - The Homecoming
Pitbulls vs. Briscoes - Battle of the Icons

[ROH Fan 81]

I started last year watching all the shows from the beginning. I'm now up to Weekend of Thunder so i've watched almost the first 3 years. There is a lot of crap in there, but there is also a lot of really good matches. Most of these i'm seeing the first time and the matches are just as good as now IMO. The storylines might not be as advanced, but a lot of the wrestling back then was superb. There is a lot of crap tho mostly anything involiving any sort of scramble type match. However, i'm really enjoying Maff and Whitmer and John Walters. As well as all the obvious guys like Punk, Joe, Homicide, etc...As the original post mentioned i'm not that impressed with the Pitublls either.

On a side note while i'm typing this i'm watching Weekend of the Thunder night 1. A fan just came into the ring and got his ass kicked by the rotweillers for a good 2 minutes. Was this part of the show or did this guy really just get the shit beat out of him?

[YimYac]

Nostalgia blinds us all

[187_Joeism]

I used to go apeshit over any Scramble or Scramble Cage type spotfest. Looking back some of them were absolute crapfests of botched spots.

THIS, i remember that the Scrambles in 2002 blew my mind at the time and now i just a crappy match

[Granatapersempre]

Jerry Lynn vs Nigel McGuinness

[GrizzlyHorsemen]

I have certainly had this before, not too much though when I did a huge re-watch project of ROH, I still enjoyed most of the same Pitbulls matches as I did years ago, there was one match against Special K I really enjoyed from late 2004 I used to really like but didn't think it was quite as good on a re-watch but was still enjoyable. I always liked Romero more in the tag team and that was proven more once they went solo, Reyes is boring as hell.