My Ring of Honor Wrestling Overview (December 3, 2017)

Ring of Honor Wrestling

Lakeland, FL

RP Funding Center

Match #1

Non-Title

Singles Match

IWGP Junior Heavyweight Champion, "The Villain" Marty Scurll defeats The Beer City Bruiser by pinfall after using his signature umbrella.

I really enjoyed the story being told in this match in regards to the rivalry between Scurll and Jay Lethal (who was standing on the stage watching a lot of this match). "The Villain" has been trying to get Jay Lethal to bring out his own villainous side back to the surface since that was when Lethal was at the top of ROH as both the ROH World Champion and the ROH World Television Champion.

After BCB missed a diving body splash, Scurll would start bringing the thunder. First, Scurll took down BCB with a tornado divorce court, followed by a superkick from Scurll who was on the apron to The BCB who was on the floor. Then Scurll hits a fakeout superkick to the knee and it's not too long before Scurll actually powerbombs the massive BCB who was standing on the middle rope. Bruiser misses an apron dive on the outside which prompts Scurll to run back into the ring and pursue a count out finish. BCB beats the count and nothing that Marty has dished out has put down The Bruiser. He slaps on an octopus and attempts to go for his chickenwing to no avail. What I enjoyed is that usually a lot of guys will counter a lot of the moves that Marty went for here and BCB just took it. I was expecting a counter every time Marty went for something and was actually surprised when it wasn't reversed. Isn't it supposed to be the other way around? 

But here we are. Scurll has hit The BCB with everything in his repertoire and nothing has gotten the job done. So BCB misses a corner splash and takes out the referee before missing another corner splash that takes him down. Scurll picks up his umbrella, looks over at Jay Lethal on the stage and then wacks BCB in the face with the umbrella which results in the three count. Marty might as well have just named this match the "Hey Jay, Shit Gets Done When You Cheat" match.

Next up is a sit-down interview with Dalton Castle who is facing ROH World Champion, Cody at Final Battle for the ROH World Championship. He outlines his career in ROH thus far and talks about losing to Christopher Daniels in a ROH World Championship match at Supercard of Honor earlier this year as well as his issues with Cody all throughout the year. These are great and always help to keep the wrestlers from becoming "just another guy on the roster" which is someone that WWE really needs to work on. Everything about Castle is just great. Even here, Castle speaks with great charisma and very expressive facial expressions. This dude is money.

Moving right along, The Briscoe Brothers invade Bully Ray and Devon's wrestling school as they smash some pictures off the wall and beat down two of their students. There are only so many guys in pro wrestling today that emit that bad ass aura. Brock Lesnar is one of them, Minoru Suzuki and guys like Bad Luck Fale all have that aura. You can go ahead and add The Briscoes to that list. With Mark also turning heel it almost seems like they're building to a match with The Briscoes vs The Dudleys (or Team 3D). The snag is that Devon works as an agent in WWE so I would assume that this match is probably not going to happen barring some type of deal being made. I'm guessing that Jay vs Bully is the primary program and The Briscoes versus a team like Bully Ray and Tommy Dreamer is more likely since Dreamer has already been featured as a part of this feud.

Coleman's Pulpit is up next with his very special guest, his own damn self! Dalton Castle isn't the only super charismatic guy in ROH. Caprice Coleman is a guy that I feel that everybody sleeps on. These Pulpit segments are great because they do a lot to really showcase Caprice's charisma. He is in a four way match at Final Battle for the ROH World Television Championship. Honestly, I would either have him win the thing or kickstart a program for the title in that match.

Next up we have an ROH World Tag Team Championship match taking place at the War Memorial Auditorium in Ft. Lauderdale, FL. 

Match #2

ROH World Tag Team Championships

Tag Team Match

The Motor City Machine Guns (Alex Shelley & Chris Sabin)(c) defeat The Kingdom (Vinny Marseglia & TK O'Ryan) to retain the ROH World Tag Team Championships with what looked to be a double one-winged angel.

No crotch biting spots in this one. Then again the spot would only would with three guys out here as oppsosed to two. This was a fun house show match that was full of fast-paced action. The Kingdom have this one uniquely innovative double team move where Marseglia picks up his opponent in a fireman's carry and then Marseglia himself is picked up by O'Ryan in a fireman's carry which allows Marseglia to hit a form of a rolling death valley driver.

When the original kingdom of Adam Cole, Michael Bennett and Matt Taven broke up they left some big shoes to feel. When Vinny Marseglia and TK O'Ryan were first hyped and introduced as the new members of The Kingdom, I felt like a lot of the fans were like "Um, who?". I would have intro'ed them differently to avoid that type of reaction. However, I feel like they have really come into their own this year and it won't be long (it may have already happened) before people associate The Kingdom with these guys.

Match #3

Normal

Flip Gordon defeats Hangman Page by pinfall with what looked like a corkscrew springboard cutter.

This looked like an upset to me since I didn't really Flip on Page's level. This was a big win for him here. The match itself was entertaining and the crowd seemed to really dig it.

After the match, Flip is attacked and laid out by The Young Bucks to end the show.

It was a fine show in general. I feel like if there wasn't so much wrestling content on during the week that this show would stand out more.