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From the Highland Today Center in front of an estimated 200
– Albert Hardie Jr defeated Mansoor
– Reina Gonzalez and Taynara Conti defeated Karen Q and Xia Li
– Jeet Rama defeated Samuel Shaw
– Team 3.0 defeated Nick Comoroto and Cal Bloom (w/ Robert Strauss)
– Shane Strickland defeated Trevor Lee
– Oney Lorcan and Danny Burch defeated Rinku and Saurav
– NXT Women’s Champion Shayna Baszler defeated Kacy Catanzaro to retain
– Matthew Riddle defeated Punishment Martinez
Estimated attendance of 250
– MJ Jenkins defeated Deonna Purrazzo with a Gory Special
– Brennan Williams defeated Luke Menzies after a big side slam
– Wesley Blake defeated Denzel
The newcomer Denzel won the crowd over by repeatedly scoop slamming Blake but was put down by a big lariat.
– Aliyah and Reina Gonzalez defeated Jessie and Chelsea Green
– Keith Lee defeated Punishment Martinez
This was a good match that had plenty of time. There was impressive action by the two big men, a flying kick off the top by Martinez, and a huge power bomb by Lee to finish it off
– Street Profits defeated The Forgotten Sons
Ford hit a big frog splash to win for the Profits who the crowd loved tonight.
– Lacey Evans defeated Mia Yim and Io Shirai in a triple threat
Evans hit a Woman’s Right on Yim after she first pulled Shirai out of the ring
– The War Raiders defeated Oney Lorcan and Danny Burch
This was a physical match with the Radiers using the battering ram in the corner to win. The two teams showed respect post match.
Last night’s estimated attendance: 300 people.
– EC3 defeated Dan Matha
EC3 hit the One Percenter for the win.
– Xia Li defeated Chelsea Green
Li had a great showing here and won with a spinning kick.
– Matt Riddle defeated Punishment Martinez
They did everything you’d expect of these two. Martinez used torture racks, and Riddle hit the Bro to Sleep and Bro Stone. There were a lot of power moves and counters until Riddle won it with a knee strike.
– Humberto Carrillo & Raul Mendoza defeated Danny Burch in a handicap match
Burch claimed he didn’t know where Oney Lorcan was and faced these two alone.
– Lars Sullivan defeated Luke Menzies
Sullivan hit a pair of Freak Accidents to please the crowd.
– NXT UK Women’s Champion Rhea Ripley defeated Candice LeRae to retain her title
Great matchup — I’d like to see this on TV. Ripley was just too powerful for LeRae.
– War Raiders defeated Boa & Rocky (w/ Mansoor)
Mansoor berated Boa and Rocky for losing the match and then issued an open challenge, which was answered by Babatunde.
– Babatunde defeated Mansoor
Babatunde won with a huge slam.
– NXT Champion Tommaso Ciampa defeated Velveteen Dream
A TakeOver preview match here. It opened as hard-hitting and they threw each other to the outside to brawl. Ciampa hit the draping DDT to get the win.
Image: JJ Williams
From the Fort Pierce Armory in front of an estimated 300 people.
– Nick Miller (w/ Shane Thorne) defeated Punishment Martinez
Martinez’s NXT debut was thwarted by a Thorne distraction as he was setting up a chokeslam. Miller hit a slam of his own to steal the win.
– Mia Yim & Lacey Lane defeated Aliyah & Vanessa Borne
Yim ran wild with kicks including a shotgun dropkick and Seoul Food to win it for her team.
– Babatunde Aiyegbusi defeated Dan Matha
Babatunde hit a huge slam to win this hoss fight.
– Lars Sullivan defeated EC3
Sullivan hit the Freak Accident for the win.
– Danny Burch & Oney Lorcan defeated Humberto Carrillo & Raul Mendoza
This was full of great action as the young luchadors always impress crowds that may not know them yet.
– Keith Lee defeated Kassius Ohno
This was a big man spectacle with the two doing lucha spots and showing incredible athleticism for their size, Ohno got caught with the SuperNova by Lee for the win.
– NXT UK Women’s Champion Rhea Ripley defeated Nikki Cross
Ripley followed up a rake of the eyes with a pump handle slam to retain her title.
– Heavy Machinery & Stacey Ervin Jr. defeated The Forgotten Sons (Wesley Blake, Steve Cutler & Jaxson Ryker)
Machinery hit the Trash Compactor to finish off the Sons and send everyone home happy.
Punishment Martinez is heading to WWE after finishing with Ring of Honor tonight.
PWInsider first reported that Martinez is finishing up with ROH following tonight’s tapings, dropping the ROH Television title in his final night with the company. According to our own Dave Meltzer, Martinez is headed to WWE.
Martinez, 36, started wrestling in 2004 and trained at the Monster Factory in New Jersey. After wrestling a few dark matches the previous year, he returned to the promotion to compete in the 2016 ROH Top Prospect tournament, losing to Lio Rush in the semifinals.
He signed with the promotion shortly after the tournament and aligned himself with Kevin Sullivan and BJ Whitmer. He also competed at last year’s Honor Rising show, and competed against Jay White for the IWGP United States title during this year’s War of the Worlds tour. He defeated Silas Young for the Television title back in June.
ROH World Champion Jay Lethal came to the ring to talk about his Iron Man match with Jonathan Gresham from last week. After listing some of the classic matches he’s had in ROH against opponents like Roderick Strong, Samoa Joe, and AJ Styles, he called the match with Gresham his favorite.
Lethal then went on to issue a “Lethal Challenge” to any wrestler in the world.
Will Ospreay appeared on the video screen and accepted the challenge for a World title match in Las Vegas at Death Before Dishonor on September 28.
A SoCal Uncensored promo aired. They talked about how they will beat The Briscoes & Punishment Martinez in tonight’s six-man tag team main event.
Brandi Rhodes joined Caprice Coleman and Ian Riccaboni to call the next match.
Sakai put a hurting on Steelz in the opening sequence, but Steelz landed a springboard bulldog for a two count. She went for the Boricua Butterfly, but Sakai countered into her Smashmouth finisher for the three count.
Backstage, the Bullet Club talked trash about the other factions in New Japan Pro Wrestling.
Riccaboni got in the ring with Sakai and stated that the Women of Honor Championship is now known as the Women of Honor World Championship. Sakai took the microphone, said ROH is her home, and then challenged Tenille Dashwood to a match. Dashwood came out and accepted. She said the title match will be at Death Before Dishonor.
Riccaboni stayed in the ring to speak with Gresham. Before Gresham could finish, Bully Ray came to ringside. Ray claimed he single-handedly sold out Madison Square Garden and then called Gresham a jobber. Gresham took the mic and challenged Ray to a wrestling match, not a fight. It was neither as Ray immediately kicked Gresham low and the referee disqualified Ray.
Ray went for his chain, but Flip Gordon came out to make the save for Gresham. However, he ran into a big boot and looked to be in trouble too. Then Lethal came to the ring to make the save for both men. He fired up on Ray until Silas Young came out and landed Misery on Lethal.
Backstage, Lethal and Gresham went off on Ray and Young and challenged the two to a tag match on ROH TV next week.
Chris Sabin was on commentary to scout Martinez for their upcoming ROH TV Championship match.
SoCal Uncensored jumped their opponents and turned this into a brawl at the beginning. The Briscoes took over on Daniels and used quick tags to isolate him. Martinez and The Briscoes were working well together until Daniels was able to land a Blue Thunder Bomb and tag in Sky.
Wheel kicks and cutters galore sparked SCU, but Sky walked into a Spicolli driver from Mark Briscoe and a Silencer from Martinez.
Kazarian took the tag from Sky and landed a DDT on Mark Briscoe. The match broke down as everyone landed big moves. Mark Briscoe got a chair and wanted to hit Kazarian with it but accidentally nailed referee Paul Turner. That allowed Martinez to hit Kazarian with the chair. The Briscoes nailed everyone with chairs — and that caused Sabin to head to the ring to attack Martinez. The two of them brawled to the back, and Sabin used a shoe to hit him.
In the ring, Daniels and Kazarian finished the match with the Best Meltzer Ever on Mark Briscoe to get the win.
Ring of Honor has confirmed the Television title match for next month’s Death Before Dishonor pay-per-view and announced one of NJPW’s top stars for the post-PPV tapings.
Punishment Martinez will be defending his TV title against Chris Sabin at Death Before Dishonor. Sabin defeated Silas Young in a number one contender’s match in June to get the title shot.
The Bullet Club (Cody Rhodes, The Young Bucks, Marty Scurll & Hangman Page) vs. Chaos (Kazuchika Okada, Tomohiro Ishii, Rocky Romero, Beretta & Chuckie T) in a 10-man tag match, Jay Lethal vs. Will Ospreay for the ROH World Championship, The Briscoes vs. Christopher Daniels & Frankie Kazarian for the ROH Tag Team titles, and Sumie Sakai vs. Tenille Dashwood for the Women of Honor Championship are the other matches that have been made official for Death Before Dishonor.
Jushin Thunder Liger will also be wrestling at the PPV.
Death Before Dishonor is taking place at the Orleans Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada on September 28. The venue will host a set of ROH TV tapings the next night, and ROH revealed today that Hiroshi Tanahashi will be wrestling on the tapings. Like KUSHIDA, SANADA, EVIL, and Chase Owens, Tanahashi is only advertised for the tapings.
Two more names have been added to the Over Budget Battle Royal at All In: Zero Hour.
Punishment Martinez and Brandon Cutler have been added to the match over the lastcouple of days. Martinez is the current ROH television champion. Cutler has been regularly working in the California area in the last year, and has previously wrestled for PWG and Championship Wrestling from Hollywood.
Already announced for the battle royal are Jordynne Grace, Brian Cage, Moose, Billy Gunn, Rocky Romero, Jimmy Jacobs, Marko Stunt, Colt Cabana and Ethan Page. This brings the current total to 11, with four more spots still unannounced. Also set for Zero Hour is a tag team match pitting the Briscoe Brothers against SoCal Uncensored’s Frankie Kazarian and Scorpio Sky.
All In: Zero Hour is the preshow that will be held right before All In’s main card goes on the air. It will start at at 6 p.m. EDT on WGN America.
Episode #353 of Ring of Honor television was taped in New York City at the Hammerstein Ballroom.
Dalton Castle and The Boys kicked things off with a promo about the upcoming three-way World title match at the Best in the World pay-per-view this Friday, June 29 in Baltimore, Maryland.
Castle said he’s not afraid to get into the ring with two men (Cody Rhodes and Marty Scurll) because he used to play semi-pro Jai alai in Tampa. He then attempted to use a pretzel as a metaphor but acknowledged that he was not sure what a metaphor was, but said that the title will remain his for a long time.
A highlight reel of Jay Lethal avenging his recent losses aired. Next on that list was Chuckie T.
Respectful chain wrestling started it off. Chuckie got the advantage early, taking time to pose during a submission. He went for a moonsault and landed on his feet, then knocked Lethal down with a dropkick.
After the commercial, Lethal connected with his patented triple dive sequence and took control of the match — that was until Chuckie connected with the Soul Food boot to the jaw. A ton of reversals with each man landing on their feet repeatedly went until Chuckie landed outside and Lethal snapped off a Lethal Injection on the floor. Chuckie barely made it back into the ring before the 20 count expired.
Chuckie was able to stick Lethal with a snap piledriver for a two count. He then went for the Awful Waffle, but Lethal countered and landed the Lethal Injection for the victory.
A video recap played of Bully Ray low blowing and mocking Flip Gordon leading to their matchup at Best in the World.
It took about 30 seconds for this one to break down into a wild brawl. The Bucks briefly took out Martinez with a double dropkick. Page landed a Shooting Star Press off the apron, then the Bucks double teamed the Briscoes and had control until Martinez came back and landed an insane flip dive off the cap of the ring post onto the Bucks and Page.
The Briscoes set up a table on the outside, with Mark Briscoe landing a huge elbow off the top rope onto Matt Jackson through it. The referee had been distracted by Martinez. Finally, Nick Jackson landed a huge dive, wiped out the Briscoes, and tagged Page, who landed his dropkick moonsault combo. Martinez and Page had a standoff until Page spit in his face and sent him outside with a clothesline. Page then hit a gigantic moonsault on all three opponents from the corner to the floor.
The Bucks hit a combo splash moonsault of their own on Martinez. It looked like the end, but the Briscoes broke it up. The Bucks were able to apply double Sharpshooters on the Briscoes, but Martinez grabbed their throats until Page connected with the Buck Shot. Martinez was in trouble after a draping 450 by Nick, but he kicked out at two.
The Briscoes took control and seemingly landed a Doomsday Device, but Matt landed on his feet. Martinez hit his psycho driver and a curb stomp on Matt, but he kicked out at two as well.
Nick bounced a chair off of Mark Briscoe’s dome, which led to a super kick party on Jay Briscoe. It looked like it was all over, but Mark cut off the Meltzer Driver with an insane cutter off the top rope. Jay landed the Jay Driller on Matt, but Page broke up the pin. Page then took Martinez off the apron and powerbombed him through a table. The Briscoes went for the Doomsday Device, but Matt ducked and was able to get the pin with the victory roll.
Cody made the save for the Bullet Club team as the Briscoes tried to attack them after the match.
Heading into their Best in the World pay-per-view, the Ring of Honor Television title changed hands on Saturday night.
ROH’s State of the Art show in Dallas was headlined by an instant reward proving ground match between then-TV Champion Silas Young, Punishment Martinez, Hangman Page, Jonathan Gresham, Scorpio Sky, and Cheeseburger. The stipulation was that, if Young didn’t win, the winner would get an immediate shot at his title.
Page hit the Rite of Passage on Cheeseburger at the end of the match, but Martinez stomped him and hit the South of Heaven chokeslam on Cheeseburger for the win. Martinez then defeated Young with the chokeslam in a short, back-and-forth match to win the TV title for the first time.
Martinez and Page have been in a program together recently, and they have a match scheduled for Best in the World in Baltimore on June 29th. ROH teased whether the title would be on the line for Martinez vs. Page as Saturday night’s show went off the air.
Ring of Honor television from Stage AE in Pittsburgh featured a wild brawl and also a challenge that will assuredly lead to others brawling in the future.
War Machine battled the sinister BJ Whitmer and “Punishment” Martinez in a no disqualification match in the main event. Elsewhere on the show, Cody (Rhodes) issued a challenge to Jay Lethal using a classic prop from Dusty’s past.
In continuing the trend of rotating guest commentators, Alex Shelley joined the current lead voice of ROH, Ian Riccaboni, in calling most of the show.
Taped weeks before the 15th Anniversary pay-per-view and airing in syndication the weekend of the PPV, this episode was a lame duck of sorts with certain storyline advancements. It still looked towards the next major card, Supercard of Honor on April 1st in Lakeland, Florida.
While the show built towards the future card, the taping for this episode took place before recent developments that left this show with one glaring timeline issue related to the tag team titles.
The Young Bucks, in a showcase match on this episode, were still the ROH World Tag Team Champions despite them recently losing the titles to Matt and Jeff Hardy. Nonetheless, Nick and Matt Jackson’s storyline with the Hardys was a constant thread throughout the opening match on this show.
The Coast to Coast tag team is Leon St. Giovanni and Shaheem Ali, and they have previously appeared on ROH TV in other matches against established tag teams in the promotion. Riccaboni on commentary referred to this as a “proving ground match” for Coast to Coast.
In the match, The Young Bucks dispatched Coast to Coast to the outside leading to them teasing doing the Rise of the Terminator spot. However, Ali tripped the Jacksons as they ran the ropes. Giovanni then springboarded off the top rope into a tumbleweed onto the Jacksons at ringside.
Coast to Coast isolated Matt Jackson for a short time as the show went to commercial. After the break, The Young Bucks were making a comeback leading to a parade of moves until Coast to Coast cut them off.
Ali and Giovanni executed their namesake double coast-to-coast finisher on Matt. Nick broke up the pin, and, shortly thereafter, he and Matt were running wild and cleaning house.
Giovanni went for a last ditch springboard off the middle rope and got superkicked to set up him being draped on the rope. Matt held him in place so Nick could jump off the top rope with a 450 splash. Matt then hooked a leg and covered Giovanni for the pinfall.
Afterwards, the then-champions sent a message to the Hardys by mocking them. Matt gave Ali the twist of fate and Nick did a swanton bomb. As he stood on the top rope, Nick encouraged dueling chants of “delete/suck it” before jumping into the swanton.
Though that is very much out of place in the current climate amid the tension and legal wrangling over ownership of the Broken Hardy gimmick (as detailed in the lead story of the newest Observer), this episode was taped before the Hardys left Impact Wrestling and the legal issues began.
At this point in the timeline, the Hardys were only advertised as appearing on the Supercard of Honor card in Florida during WrestleMania weekend. The Hardys subsequently departed the Impact promotion and signed on for a more enhanced run in ROH.
Moving on, a video package chronicled Lio Rush and his issues with The Rebellion, leading to Riccaboni interviewing Rush. He likened The Rebellion to children playing games, so he played games on the last episode. He is “sick” of dealing with The Rebellion.
Kenny King of The Rebellion interrupted the interview, asking if Rush just called him a clown. He actually had not for the record. Nevertheless, King called Rush an “ungrateful piece of garbage” before saying they were no longer playing games with Rush.
King then continued cutting a promo on Rush. He hyped a match between the two for next week’s episode. He concluded with a declaration, “Everybody’s going to know it was Kenny King that put the hush on Lio Rush.”
The story was the wily veteran facing a young up-and-comer. Brutal Bob Evans joined commentary alongside Shelley and Riccaboni.
On commentary, they noted the tournament was not so much about finding young talent, but also giving other talented, yet possibly overlooked, names an opportunity. Preston Quinn fit the latter as a 43-year-old veteran with many years of experience.
His manager, Andy Vineberg, looked to have transported through time from a territory long ago with his antics and monogrammed powder blue sports coat.
At the outset during the Code of Honor handshake, Vineberg also wanted to shake hands with Stallion. The gesture was a ploy for Quinn to suckerpunch Stallion before the bell.
Later in the match, Vineberg caused another distraction when he tripped Stallion. Quinn thus underhandedly gained the advantage until Stallion made a comeback for a near fall. Quinn cut him off and delivered a piledriver.
With Stallion prone and close to defeat, Quinn jumped off a middle rope only to miss a flying elbow drop. Stallion capitalized by using a flying headbutt before covering Quinn for a three count and the upset victory. Stallion advances to the second round of the tournament.
In the next segment, “The American Nightmare” Cody cut a promo in the ring issuing a challenge to Jay Lethal for a Texas bull rope match.
Cody first asked the crowd in Pittsburgh if they knew the whereabouts of Jay Lethal, insinuating cowardice. He asked someone in the first row of ringside about Lethal, and the fan hurled an insult about Cody’s wife. Cody called him a liar, regrouped, and used the word “extrapolating” in transitioning into him introducing Hangman Page.
With a noose hanging around his neck, Page joined Cody in the ring. Page untied the noose, leaving just a long length of rope he presented to Cody.
As Cody received the rope, he vowed to attach a cowbell to the “gift” given by Page, saying it will be the same cowbell used by his father in a bull rope match against Superstar Billy Graham in the 1970s.
By attaching the cowbell, Cody declared it would be a “Texas bull rope” as he went on to challenge Lethal for a match at Supercard of Honor.
The Texas bull rope match is scheduled for April 1st at Supercard of Honor, though Lethal has not yet accepted the challenge in the storyline narrative on TV.
In a pre-taped segment, Jay Briscoe cut a promo ahead of a return match against Jay White in the main event on the next episode of ROH TV. The two previously met in a match on TV that went to a time limit draw.
They had a babyface match with them doing chain wrestling sequences that usually ended in stalemates. Neither had the upper hand with it being nip-and-tuck throughout.
Their reversals and counters were really good. Gresham even countered Castle’s finisher at one point before sending him to regroup outside the ring.
Gresham followed with a flying knee off the apron, and he appeared to have Castle reeling. Or did he? Gresham jumped off the top rope into the waiting arms of Castle, who delivered a Bang-a-Rang.
Castle then pinned Gresham to end a good match where Gresham shined despite losing. Castle himself also remained strong as the number one contender ahead of his upcoming challenge for the ROH World Championship.
In a pre-taped promo, ROH World TV Champion Marty Scurll plugged Supercard of Honor and encouraged the buying of tickets to see him.
For the TV main event, Mark Briscoe provided guest commentary for a wild brawl. Fittingly, Briscoe himself is very familiar with wild brawls so he was right at home and gleeful at times when calling the melee.
The back story was that the two teams met in a previous bout at the TV tapings in Atlanta, and the match was thrown out after an uncontrollable brawl erupted. This episode featured the return match with a no disqualification stipulation to settle the score.
In a sneak attack during the spooky entrance of Whitmer and Martinez, War Machine entered the scene like Vikings on a raid. War Machine attacked them unmercifully.
Hanson did a cannonball splash off the theater stage and Rowe threw superman punches. War Machine pummeled Whitmer and Martinez around ringside, throwing them into guardrails as they brawled on the floor.
In the ring, Hanson took an unprotected chair shot to the head thrown by Whitmer. Hanson gave him his back for another shot. Whitmer and Martinez had Rowe isolated before a commercial break.
Upon the show returning from break, War Machine were already making a comeback with Hanson throwing clotheslines. He also did a cartwheel for good measure.
Martinez stopped the flurry of offense when he jumped off the ropes with a flying spin heel kick. A moment later, Rowe superman punched Martinez only to get folded up with a nasty German suplex from Whitmer.
Everybody was down selling when Whitmer and Rowe got to their feet to slug it out. Martinez jumped in to allow Whitmer to execute an exploder suplex for a near fall. Whitmer and Martinez tried to single out Hanson, but Rowe made the save.
War Machine did a double team move on Martinez where Rowe launched Martinez in the air, and Hanson caught him on his shoulder for a running powerslam. Martinez kicked out at two for a near fall.
War Machine set up a table in the ring. Whitmer fought back against Rowe and Hanson before all three spilled to the outside. As the three brawled at ringside, Martinez ran corner-to-corner across the ring and did a flip dive over the ropes to the floor.
For the finish, Hanson and Martinez were perched on the ropes fighting when Martinez chokeslammed Hanson off the ropes through a table. With Hanson laying in the debris of the demolished table, Martinez pinned him.
On the next episode of ROH TV, Jay Briscoe and Jay White collide in a return match after they previously wrestled to a draw in their last encounter.
The newest episode begins airing this weekend in syndication so check local listings. The show is then available Monday evening via the FITE TV app before airing Wednesday at midnight ET on Comet TV, including that channel’s free online live stream. The episode is then available to watch on Thursday via the official ROH website.
