ROH Final Battle 2017 Official Thread

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AlexROH
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Re: ROH Final Battle 2017 Official Thread

Post by AlexROH »

Solid show. Right people won, the stage/lights/production were amazing, and we had matches for everyone and even special entrances for the wrestlers. With the first hour, I thought this would be ROH's best live PPV, but then second part wasn't as good as I expected. People worked hard, but the quiet crowd really hurt the matches.

- Taven vs Ospreay ***1/2
- War Machine vs Addiction ***
- Lethal vs Scurll ***3/4 My MOTN, really liked how the played with the story of Lethal doing evil thing.
- MCMG vs Best Friends ***1/4 NYC hate the Machine Guns, but they really know how to play with the crowd. Good match, but this was the beginning of the quiet crowd. From here, they looked f'n dead.
- TV Title ***1/4 I'll have to re-watch this match without sound bc I really liked the structure but people didn't care about it. They had the longest match of the night at 18 minutes. At least people woke up for the final part with Silas winning. Martinez, who is normaly over, was ignored here.
- Street Fight ***1/4+ Good old-school brawl. But, again, people were a little bit more into this match, but so quiet for a ECW Originals and Briscoe's hardcore match in the Hammerstein. It was weird. Fun match with the right guys winning. The fact that they didn't fire the table and botched the 3-D helped The Briscoes to get even more heel heat.
- Trios title *** This was the biggest disspointment of the night, IMO. I was really looking foward for a crazy-short spotfest, just like the one in 2014 with Bucks/ACH vs Addiction/Alexander, but this was just a match. No crazy things. They worked like this was TV or a B-Show, IMO, specially the Bucks, they looked so lazy. Entertaining match, but man, even with the BC people was dead for the most part. Post-match angle is interesting. Scorpio in the addiction is something I want to see, but, again, people didn't care.
- Dalton vs Cody *** Good match. They had litte time. You can see that they had to rush it when they did the spot with Sincalir DQing the managers so early in the match. I liked the story they wanted to tell. With Cody doing a good heel work and bleeding. We didn't need a ref. bump, but hey, DALTON WON!

This was an entertaining show, not that show of the year that some were expecting, but a good event. Maybe live the crowd made more noise, but on PPV it really hurt my viewing experience. Better than BITW and WOTW NYC,a little worse than DBD XV and far away from mu fav show of the year, the 15th Anniversary. Had good matches, but lacked from that big/classic match. At least the booking was OK and we end 2017 with the right people over and as champions.

Final rating: 7/10.
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Re: ROH Final Battle 2017 Official Thread

Post by kovs27 »

AlexROH wrote: Sat Dec 16, 2017 3:03 am
kovs27 wrote: Fri Dec 15, 2017 9:57 pm
AlexROH wrote: Fri Dec 15, 2017 9:28 pm YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS CODY'S REIGN HAS ENDED AND DALTON IS CHAMP!!!!

Cool show, will write some thought tomorrow in the morning, crowd, at least on PPV, really sucked, they were dead for 2 hours.
The New York crowd is a Bullet Club crowd. Non-BC matches suffer. Plus they hate MCMG. I have no idea why.

Despite all that I had a great time. Super fun show and most of the guys I wanted to win did so. Hopefully Philly is just as fun tomorrow.
Yeah, but they weren't hot for the last two matches, that were the ones with the BC. Also, I felt like The Young Bucks didn't go with everything, when they usually try to steal the show.
I sat upstairs, maybe the noise from up there didn't translate to tv. The crowd for into the 4 way match after Taylor lost and with the beer bottle spot. Crowd was solidly behind Silas. A lot of people seemed to not know who Martinez was. The Hung Bucks for a loud response. The CMLL guys got some responses for their moves but nothing during the entrance. The main events had multiple dueling chants. People were split. Dalton eventually got more cheers. I honestly don't remember the crowd for the win because I was too invested in the match. The only times I really noticed a quiet crowd was Lethal entrance, MCMG for everything they did, the 4 way match until the beer bottle. Maybe with the way Hammerstein is set up the people making lots of noise up high is lost.
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TheROHbot
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Re: ROH Final Battle 2017 Official Thread

Post by TheROHbot »

Thought the show disappointed in the long run. Taven/Ospreay was my favorite match. Dalton Castle's win was completely underwhelming.
Jim Cornette loves me.
MattMinus
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Re: ROH Final Battle 2017 Official Thread

Post by MattMinus »

AlexROH wrote: Sat Dec 16, 2017 4:52 am This was an entertaining show, not that show of the year that some were expecting, but a good event. Maybe live the crowd made more noise, but on PPV it really hurt my viewing experience.
Nah, I was there and the crowd was pretty flat. Everything was pretty good, but the matches and workers never succeeded in getting real heat. Sure, people cheered and booed, but the level of intensity was lacking.
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Re: ROH Final Battle 2017 Official Thread

Post by WebConn »

I reviewed Final Battle on this weeks podcast

https://soundcloud.com/websweeklywrestl ... -ever-hear
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Re: ROH Final Battle 2017 Official Thread

Post by The Dragon Saga »

Can I just say that whoever the drunk guy was shouting stupid shit like, "jiggle your fat ass for me" at Shane Taylor, I hope someone beats the fuck out of him. Literally epitomizes the old school type of ROH fan that the promotion no longer needs.
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Re: ROH Final Battle 2017 Official Thread

Post by Wilson »

Final Battle was a weird night. While being a much better venue to watch a wrestling show in, the Hammerstein's acoustics are always a problem (vaulted ceiling) and the crowd usually latches onto anti-fat heckles before they can even use drunkenness as an excuse. The crowd hurt the show almost as much as the finishes. Ref spots throughout the night were used to tedium.

The two matches without main New Japan hooks suffered miserable disaffection. Best Friends vs. Motor City was never going to be fair to the latter team, who were the wrong team to be champions in the first place to head into New York. (A part of me thinks that the finish was an audible to just get out of there.) The TV Title match was a damning indictment of the midcard. While elimination rules did no one any favors, the talent just did not hold up to their own. I usually defend Punishment, but the son of McFarlane looked less like someone being in ROH for two years and more like having only worked in the business in that period of time.(To answer a month-old question: no, I don't think anyone paid mind that Punishment won Survival of the Fittest.) He was easily the worst wrestler of the night. I wonder what this means for his push. I was really elated that Silas won, for the sake of the match and the direction of the company. Silas is great for the belt.

The rest of the night ranged from pretty good to good. I don't think the main event match was great, but it was the most effective I've seen Cody as a heel champion. Finally felt like there was some media literacy in portraying his character. If the match had more time, I think it actually could have been great. With a better booker, this moment could've had a dynamic like Okada vs. Cody did. Dalton winning is the biggest and best surprise in years.
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Re: ROH Final Battle 2017 Official Thread

Post by Mr. Mojo Risin »

Can't object to 3 things that happened here:

1) Matt Taven beating Will Ospreay: Taven is one of the few true heels on the roster. While he has many detractors here, I think this is good for the main event scene. I really think Taven vs.Castle could have some legs to it, would be better than people think, and would get Bullet Club out of the main event for awhile. Is that a bad thing? An aside here, I don't know if Ospreay is done with ROH or what, but I won't miss the guy because he was hardly ever here.

2) Silas Young winning the TV title. I would keep the belt on Young for awhile to help elevate the mid-card. Silas can work with anybody on the roster and is a classic heel. The TV title victory caps off a great year for the most underrated and unappreciated guy in ROH. Delirious has done a great job building Young up all year for this moment and it meant something.

3) Dalton Castle winning the ROH World Championship: The right call. Castle will never be the 5 star wrestler, but what he is, is what ROH desperately needs at this point. Young, charismatic, and the most over babyface on the roster. This is a crucial point for Delirious when booking Castle now. They have needed someone for years to fill this role and now they have it. Delirious failed miserably with Kyle O'Reilly for a variety of reasons. To take the belt off of Castle too soon would be his death knell. Bullet Club can be out of the main event scene for awhile. In fact, it needs to be.

Overall? Cautiously excited to see the company's direction in 2018.
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Re: ROH Final Battle 2017 Official Thread

Post by Big Red Machine »

ROH Final Battle 2017 (12/15/2017)- New York, NY

WILL OSPREAY vs. MATT TAVEN (w/The Kingdom)- 7.5/10
The Kingdom made their entrance accompanied by goofballs in costumes which the announcers battered into our head were “conspiracy figures” like a “fishman” and a “reptilian.” I will admit that I would not have understood this without the announcers pointing it out to me (although part of that is due to the fact that they seem to be conflating cryptozoology with conspiracies)… but if I need the announcers to point it out to me, then your entrance doesn’t make your point clear enough on its own and thus isn’t worth doing.
We started out hot with dives, but rather than being dives for the sake of being dives to start off hot, they were dives that made logical sense. Ospreay hit a big kick on Taven, then continued on with his momentum for a dive to take out Taven’s pals out the outside… and then Taven took advantage of Ospreay being on the outside after that dive to hit Ospreay with a dive of his own.
That sequence also helped to set up the Kingdom’s interference as one of the stories running through this match. While that story was told well (including a callback to the opening spot later on in the match), it was not without flaw. Specifically, Vinny Marseglia and his axe. Yes, an axe.
At one point, while the referee was distracted and Ospreay was on the apron, Marseglia tried to cut Ospreay’s leg’s off with his axe. For real. Why is Marseglia allowed to bring a f*cking AXE to ringside with him? And even if you want to brush it off by saying that “we see lots of potentially lethal weapons brought to ringside in pro wrestling, there is still the inherent logic issue created by scenarios like the following: A few moments after the attempted dismemberment, Marseglia got the chance to attack Ospreay on the outside… and rather than hit him with the axe like he had tried to do mere moments ago, he just threw him into the barricade.
Aside from the interference of The Kingdom, the we also got stories of Ospreay working over Taven’s head and Taven working over Ospreay’s back, which were both told well until we came to a relatively clean finish. I say relatively clean because there was the interference a few minutes earlier, but it’s not like there was a weapon shot or feet on the ropes or some other heel tactic that directly lead to the finish. The finishing sequence was Ospreay going for his finish and Taven countering it into his.
THIS is what ROH should be giving us on every show. Guys going out there- especially young guys like these two (well… Taven is young in terms of years of major exposure), and a relatively unique match-up- and impressing us with their wrestling skills. Not being goofballs like Marseglia or wasting half of their match doing stupid comedy.

THE ADDICTION vs. WAR MACHINE- 6.5/10
On commentary, Colt Cabana thanked the New York State Athletic Commission for letting Rowe compete tonight despite his recent kayfabe suspension for accidentally hitting a fun during a brawl with The Addiction, and he specifically mentioned the commissioner, “Mr. Frobel.”
This was perfectly fine for a second-on-the-card grudge match, and was a nice combination of brawling and these guys hitting their respective style of offense, so it felt like the grudge match that only these two teams could have together. I also appreciated the spot where Daniels pulled the referee in the way in the corner, which was a little callback to the last match these two teams had in this building.

JAY LETHAL vs. MARTY SCURLL- 7.75/10
The story of this feud is that Marty was given the chance to pick his opponent for tonight and said he wanted to face Jay Lethal… but he essentially told Lethal that he wanted to face heel Jay Lethal not babyface Jay Lethal. Lethal refused to be a heel, and even told Marty (paraphrasing) “I cheated because I wanted to. You cheat because you have to” leading us to tonight’s match-up of… good vs. evil? Maybe? We’ll see how it played out:
Marty is dressed in almost all white (including a white umbrella) rather than his standard villainous black. Whether this was done to mock Lethal or to try to lull him into a false sense of security (with the idea being that Marty is trying to make Jay think that he would wrestle him cleanly to prove that he, too, cheats because he wants to, not because he has to). Either interpretation is equally valid, but I think the latter plays a bit better into the story of the match, and offers a better of explanation of why Marty would break cleanly in the ropes in the beginning.
Marty would eventually try to cheat, using things like weapons and illegal leverage. One spot I really liked was Marty trying the Eddie Guerrero “smoking gun” spot, but Lethal outsmarted Marty by playing dead and wrapping the chair around his own head after Marty threw it to him, showing that although he is currently a babyface, Lethal still remembers all of the old tricks of being a heel.
Marty eventually got one over on Lethal by thinking one level above him, setting up a spot where Lethal expected a weapon shot so Lethal went to block it but Marty instead put the umbrella in Lethal’s hand, and while Todd Sinclair started to yell at Lethal and took the umbrella away, Marty grabbed his usual black Bullet Club umbrella from under the ring and hit Lethal with it to set up an excellent false finish. Lethal kicked out and the other umbrella once again wound up distracting Todd Sinclair… and this time, when Sinclair turned his back to get the weapon out of the ring, Lethal kicked Marty in the nuts to set up the finish.
Colt Cabana noted on commentary that Lethal did not look very happy about his win, so there is definitely something brewing here. Whether this is supposed to be the first step in Lethal being seduced back to the Dark Side of The Force or merely just a set-up for a rematch with Marty now able to turn Lethal’s accusation about not being able to win without cheating back on him, I like the possibilities this finish provides. I also loved how all of Marty’s cheating set up for Lethal using a low blow to feel completely justified, so that if this is the beginning of a gradual flirt with villainy for Lethal, it will feel much more organic than simply having the switch in his head be thrown from babyface to heel.

ROH WORLD TAG TEAM TITLE MATCH: Motor City Machine Guns(c) vs. Best Friends- 6/10
Before this match we got promos from each team. MCMG were completely serious and talked about how much the title meant to them. Best Friends treated everything like a complete and total joke. This did not make me want to see Best Friends win under any circumstances.
They had a match that was mostly just moves. It would have been a lot better without Best Friends’ inherent goofiness, and I really HATED the finish, which saw Sabin essentially no-sell a Piledriver in order to roll Trent up with a jackknife pin (or at least delayed-sell, but I still didn’t like it). Piledrivers are just one of those moves that should not ever be no-sold.

FOUR-CORNERS ELIMINATION MATCH FOR THE ROH TV TITLE: Kenny King(c) vs. Punishment Martinez vs. Shane Taylor vs. Silas Young (w/the Beer City Bruiser)- 7/10
The announcers seemed to think that there were count-outs in this match, but neither the wrestlers nor the referee ever acted like there were. Martinez took out Taylor with a big splash, Silas took Kenny King out with a beer bottle to the head, leaving us down to Silas and Martinez. Martinez had things won but Bruiser pulled Silas out on the ring. Martinez took BCB out with a dive, but at the cost of extreme damage to his own ribs. He sold this well I enough that I thought it was totally legit. Silas would spend the rest of the match targeting Martinez’s ribs to cut him off or put him down, then switching to his head once he was down, eventually picking up the win via Misery for his first ever title in ROH, something that was both well-deserved and much needed, as it breaks a streak of Silas being given the win in big feuds only to be sent right back down to the mid-card.

NEW YORK CITY STREET FIGHT: The Briscoes vs. Bully Ray & Tommy Dreamer- 6.75/10
Yup. ROH is in the ECW nostalgia act business almost seventeen years after the company died. And speaking of such things, Tommy Dreamer has his polka-dotted Dusty Rhodes tribute tights on. And of course those tights (as well as Tommy’s shirt) have the House of Hardcore logo on them.
Ian Riccaboni was completely unbearable during this match. So was the stupid spot with the lightsabers. It’s a f*cking no DQs grudge match blow-off to something that has been building up for six months! Can we please take it seriously? And combined they were atrocious, as after the lightsaber spot, Ian said that “it’s all fun and games.” In a match where just a few moments ago he wanted me to worry about Bully suffering permanent brain damage because he was getting punched in the head.
They did their stuff with their weapons. It was fine for what it was. Unfortunately, their big finish was kind of killed by table not breaking correctly.

TOP FIVE MOMENTS IN FINAL BATTLE HISTORY- Just to compare, I came up with my own list, just to see how it differed from theirs. Mine was:
5. Dragon & Morishima finally get their blow-off (2008)
4. Aries ends Joe’s title reign (2004)
3. Nigel McGuinness turns on the fans (2007)
2. Steen turns on Generico (2009)
1. Homicide wins the ROH World Title (2006)
(with Honorable Mentions to Hero returning at FB 2013 and Matt Hardy appearing on the Tron last year).
Their list was:
5. Homicide wins the title
4. Lethal beats AJ (2015)
3. Dragon & Morishima finally get their blow-off
2. The two Steen vs. Generico matches (2010 & 2012- and picking two for one is bullsh*t, IMO)
1. Aries ends Joe’s title reign… which I assume means that Aries is coming in soon. If not tonight.

WOMEN OF HONOR ANNOUNCEMENT- they’re doing a title tournament next year, starting in January. Do you know what would have been great? If they had the women come out in wrestling gear instead of f*cking evening gowns.

YOUNG BUCKS & ADAM PAGE PROMO- they said nothing, but at least it was short.

ROH WORLD SIX-MAN TAG TEAM TITLE MATCH: Bullet Club (Adam Page & the Young Bucks) vs. Flip Gordon, Titan, & Dragon Lee- 6.75/10
Scorpio Sky joined Colt & Ian commentary. He said he was a little disappointed that Flip didn’t choose him to be on his team because they’re such good friends, so hopefully this actually leads to something rather than them flying Scorpio Sky across the country just to have him do commentary.
The match was your predictable FLIPZ. I just can’t get behind a dude named “Flip,” who just does flips, especially when the angle is based off of something they’re doing on the Young Bucks’ goofy webshow.

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- good
Scorpio Sky went to go check on Flip. Meanwhile, The Addiction showed up and attacked the Buck from behind. Sky then turned on Flip (though the camera missed it) and posed with Kaz and Daniels, so we’ve got a new trio and two new feuds. Unfortunately, one of those feuds is heel vs. heel, and another involves a babyface named “Flip.”

ROH WORLD TITLE MATCH: Cody Rhodes(c) (w/Brandi Rhodes) vs. Dalton Castle (w/the Boys)- 6.5/10
Dalton got a big entrance with lots of Boys. Cody has dyed his hair an atrocious shade of blonde, marrying his own ugliest features with that of his brother to combine to form some sort of ultimate monster of hideousness.
Once again our world title match went less than thirteen minutes, including some stalling by Cody. We also got a ref bump and a visual tap out, and a spot designed to stall by having the Boys and Brandi ejected from ringside, but was done in an idiotic manner because it came right after they set them up to get a big pop by having Brandi dive onto the Boys. Yes, you read that right: Brandi- the heel- was the one who got to do the big dive for big pop.
Dalton won the belt, and quite, frankly, it doesn’t feel like that big a deal to me. Dalton Castle doesn’t feel like a main eventer. He feels like a popular singles upper-midcarder. Being a main eventer in ROH requires a proven track record of top-notch singles performances and Dalton doesn’t have that. Factor in that the guy he took the belt from doesn’t have that, either, and that guy won it from a clearly-aged Christopher Daniels who wasn’t even given the time to have great title defenses due to Delirious’ poor time management, and we’ve got what really feels like a midcard belt right now.

This was yet another ROH PPV that was hurt by Delirious’ poor time management. The “old guys doing plunder” match does not need to get sixteen minutes (second longest on the show, down to just the TV Title match), and the all-flips match does not need to go fifteen. Chop three minutes off of each other those and give them to the ROH World Title main event, which absolutely NEEDS to go at least seventeen to feel worthy of the lineage of the ROH World Title. ROH World Title matches should feel like a war where guys leave everything in the ring, and this one- like many in the past few years, was WAY too short, especially on a PPV. Look… I loved the Ospreay vs. Taven match, but if you can’t fit everything into the show that you want to, you need to cut that match, stick the Kingdom on the undercard as a trio, use Ospreay to replace Titan to save time on your show for the things that need it. Delirious doesn’t get that, and it is hurting the product, on both TV and especially on PPV. This show would have been good as a regular show, but for a PPV- and FINAL BATTLE no less- this was just plain unacceptable.
Big Red Machine
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Re: ROH Final Battle 2017 Official Thread

Post by Big Red Machine »

ICHIFUJI wrote: Sat Dec 16, 2017 1:55 am HONOR RISING 2018
Dalton with boys vs. Yujiro with girls.
Now I'm going to be disappointed because this will never actually happen and I so badly want it to.
Big Red Machine
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Re: ROH Final Battle 2017 Official Thread

Post by Big Red Machine »

I'm currently listening to Observer Radio and laughing my ass off at supposed wrestling expert Dave Meltzer thinking that Cabana thanking the commission for letting Rowe wrestle was a legit thing and that Rowe must have had some sort of injury when even paying attention to the pre-match video package would have made it easy to figure out that Colt was referring to the worked suspension in the angle.
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Re: ROH Final Battle 2017 Official Thread

Post by WHG »

Big Red Machine wrote:
Dalton won the belt, and quite, frankly, it doesn’t feel like that big a deal to me. Dalton Castle doesn’t feel like a main eventer. He feels like a popular singles upper-midcarder. Being a main eventer in ROH requires a proven track record of top-notch singles performances and Dalton doesn’t have that. Factor in that the guy he took the belt from doesn’t have that, either, and that guy won it from a clearly-aged Christopher Daniels who wasn’t even given the time to have great title defenses due to Delirious’ poor time management, and we’ve got what really feels like a midcard belt right now.
Man, this sums up my feeling on the World title right now perfectly. That title should really, above all else, be reserved for great in-ring workers and this year has really damaged that. Cody's financial success with it likely has killed the in-ring prerequisite forever.
FanSinceHDNet
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Re: ROH Final Battle 2017 Official Thread

Post by FanSinceHDNet »

Big Red Machine wrote: Sun Dec 17, 2017 4:42 pm I'm currently listening to Observer Radio and laughing my ass off at supposed wrestling expert Dave Meltzer thinking that Cabana thanking the commission for letting Rowe wrestle was a legit thing and that Rowe must have had some sort of injury when even paying attention to the pre-match video package would have made it easy to figure out that Colt was referring to the worked suspension in the angle.
I read "Commissioner Froebel" being a shot at Michael Elgin, who, I believe, last name is Froebel.
Zhuge1
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Re: ROH Final Battle 2017 Official Thread

Post by Zhuge1 »

TYFDK wrote: Tue Dec 12, 2017 11:00 am http://rohwrestling.com/news/pre-show-m ... nal-battle

Pre-show matches that will be shown later on YouTube:

Josh Woods vs. Jonathan Gresham

The Dawgs vs. Cheeseburger and a mystery partner


I really really wish they'd show these live as a pre-show on YouTube. I don't know if WWE has an exclusive deal with that or what, but it'd be great to see that done.
I hope that's the end of this feud. The mystery partner being Delirious was predictably boring.
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Re: ROH Final Battle 2017 Official Thread

Post by TYFDK »

Part of the Hung Bucks vs. Titan/Lee/Gordon match has gone viral on Twitter with UFC fighters and esports....guys are commenting on it.

It's obviously not all positive, but it's being discussed all the same.
Big Red Machine
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Re: ROH Final Battle 2017 Official Thread

Post by Big Red Machine »

FanSinceHDNet wrote: Mon Dec 18, 2017 8:29 am
Big Red Machine wrote: Sun Dec 17, 2017 4:42 pm I'm currently listening to Observer Radio and laughing my ass off at supposed wrestling expert Dave Meltzer thinking that Cabana thanking the commission for letting Rowe wrestle was a legit thing and that Rowe must have had some sort of injury when even paying attention to the pre-match video package would have made it easy to figure out that Colt was referring to the worked suspension in the angle.
I read "Commissioner Froebel" being a shot at Michael Elgin, who, I believe, last name is Froebel.
That was my assumption as well (and because I am a nerd I did, in fact, go to the NYSAC website to make sure that this is no legitimate commissioner with that name).
Big Red Machine
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Re: ROH Final Battle 2017 Official Thread

Post by Big Red Machine »

TYFDK wrote: Mon Dec 18, 2017 10:43 am Part of the Hung Bucks vs. Titan/Lee/Gordon match has gone viral on Twitter with UFC fighters and esports....guys are commenting on it.

It's obviously not all positive, but it's being discussed all the same.
Dave's thoughts on the match were one of those really foreboding (in my opinion) signs about the current state of the business. He said that stuff they did was the very dictionary definition of "overkill" and exactly what you're taught not to do... but it worked. And because it worked they're just going to keep doing it. There is a real split coming in wrestling between the Young Bucks/Kenny Omega/PWG "flippy & funny" guys and the Cornette/Rip Rogers/New Japan/Gabe "serious and storytelling" guys (with CHIKARA still managing to paradoxically occupy both ends of the spectrum at the same time), and I kind of wish it would just happen already so that I know which promotions to watch and which to avoid like the plague.
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Re: ROH Final Battle 2017 Official Thread

Post by famicommander »

I really hate this notion that if anyone does a flip in a match at any point, suddenly there is zero storytelling. As if there is only one story to tell during a match and only one way to tell it.
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Re: ROH Final Battle 2017 Official Thread

Post by King of Indy Style »

famicommander wrote: Mon Dec 18, 2017 11:33 am I really hate this notion that if anyone does a flip in a match at any point, suddenly there is zero storytelling. As if there is only one story to tell during a match and only one way to tell it.
What, you say that there is another way to tell a story besides overly long headlock segments? [cornette]
famicommander
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Re: ROH Final Battle 2017 Official Thread

Post by famicommander »

Funny you should use the Cornette face, because he and Dave Meltzer just had a funny exchange on Twitter relevant to this storytelling discussion. It started with Metlzer comparing the Young Bucks to the Midnight Express, which of course set off everyone's favorite psychotic manchild, but then Dave said this:
Dave Meltzer wrote:Okada & Omega 2017 will be viewed same as Flair & Steamboat among those in Carolinas in 1977. Reaction is identical. Most loved them, big business, old-timers said they were fake & killing business with all their high spots. Kids grew copying, became template for great work.
Jim Cornette wrote:Flair & Steamboat were grown ass men, hitting each other hard & working at the highest level in the sport, & never exposed the business in their matches or outside the ring. These jackoffs are kids playing wrestler & laughing at how they tell people it's fake. They're a disgrace.
Jim Cornette is the extreme personification of this viewpoint, but he's ultimately who I think of when people make criticisms about "spotfests" or "fake looking moves" or "no storytelling/psychology". The storytelling and psychology are there, they've just passed you and your era by. And the barebones moves of wrestling look just as fake as the craziest high spots; you're just used to seeing them so it doesn't bother you. The irish whip or the arm wringer are every bit as stupid as any high spot. And in 20 years the 450 splash will be just as basic as a DDT is today.
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