With one week to go before next Friday’s Death Before Dishonor, the pieces will continue to be put into place on tonight’s Ring of Honor on HonorClub.
ROH Women’s World Champion Athena and ROH Women’s TV Champion Billie Starkz will be on hand to share some thoughts ahead of Athena’s title defense against Queen Aminata and Starkz’s defense against Red Velvet.
Both Aminata and Velvet will both be in action as Aminata faces Mackenzie Morgan while Velvet takes on Maya World.
In trios action, Dalton Castle & The Outrunners will face The Righteous & Lance Archer while former ROH Six-Man Tag Team Champions Cage of Agony (Brian Cage, Bishop Kaun & Toa Liona) will take on Austin Valtino, Cappuccino Jones & Harlon Hutchinson.
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With only two weeks until Death Before Dishonor (Friday, July 26th) Ring of Honor kicked things off with a recap of Dalton Castle Vs Roderick Strong on Collision last week. The winner faces Marc Briscoe at Death Before Dishonor. Strong won the match, and ROH World Champion Marc Briscoe cut a promo saying that he was looking forward to facing Strong.
The show proper actually began with a promo segment as well.
-ROH Women’s World Champion Athena and ROH Women’s TV Champion Billie Starkz joined the show. Athena suffered an injury several weeks back, but lately has been seen moving pretty well for someone who’s supposed to be walking with crutches. Starkz is set to face Red Velvet at Death Before Dishonor, and regardless of injury status, Athena is scheduled to face Queen Aminata.
Athena made excuses for being seen walking around without crutches last week, saying it was pure adrenaline. Starkz grabbed the mic and confirmed the injury, then called out Red Velvet saying she will outsmart her. Athena said that if she is forced to defend her title at Death Before Dishonor, she’ll do it and win.
Athena said that next week Lexy Nair will interview Queen Aminata for five minutes of “uninterrupted time.” Aminata and Velvet were on the night’s card, so it remained to be seen if this was the last we saw of the Minions.
Lance Archer & The Righteous (Vincent and Dutch) defeated Dalton Castle & The Outrunners (Turbo Floyd and Truth Magnum)
Before the match, previously taped footage was shown of Castle being approached by the Ourunners. They treated him like a Superstar, fanboying over Castle. They offered to be Castle’s partners and flexed to show they had the goods. Castle was impressed and the team was formed. New boys, perhaps?
Archer and The Righteous have been running through the ROH Trios division as of late and there was never a more opposite and yet perfect set of opponents than Castle and The Outrunners. It was Spooky vs Goofy with the added excitement that everyone was anxious to hit each other.
Castle and Vincent kicked things off while the Outrunners rallied the crowd to the cause. Vincent threw Castle out of the ring and he ran circles around it three or four times. Vincent tagged in the beefy Dutch and Floyd begged until Castle tagged him in. No wrestling had taken place thus far in the match.
When they got down to it though, Floyd and Dutch hossed it up with heavy strikes and a few big impact moves. Magnum jumped in to double team dutch which brought in Archer to clear the ring. Dutch continued to impress, moving like a man half his size and hitting with the strength of a man twice his size.
The match itself moved like molasses. Fortunately it featured some really great characters who know how to play to the audience, so the crowd was paying attention. Eventually, Castle and Vincent were in the ring as the legal combatants. Castle tried a Bangarang, but Archer interfered causing a sneak tag to Magnum. Archer quikcly hit a Blackout and got the pin to win the match for his team.
-Another vingette for the MxM Collection aired next. They represent the three “F’s:” Fashion, Fitness and Philanthropy. The rest of it was a lot of Blue Steele mugging for the camera.
Red Velvet defeated Maya World
Velvet was gearing up to face ROH Women’s TV Champion Billie Starkz at Death Before Dishonor and she was looking to make a statement in this match with World, who was a student of Athena. Coincidence?
World had a slight size advantage on Velvet, and was able to keep up with her on both offence and defence, but the real question was would Athena, Billie Starkz or another Minion interfere?
In the end, Aminata got the pin on World with reverse front DDT, capping off a solid outing, but was looking over her shoulder the whole time.
Katsuyori Shibata defeated Evil Uno
-Uno entered the ring in a Mick-Foley-esque shirt and tie combo and clearly had something on his mind. He grabbed a mic and cut a promo about how he’s been working hard for 20 years and has done it all. He said that the easiest way to be considered one of the greats is to battle the greats from around the world. He called out an open challenge and it was answered by former ROH Pure Champion, Shibata.
The impromptu match kicked off with a series of tieups and locks. Shibata used Uno’s tie against him, choking the masked man. Uno slid out of the ring to remove the tie and the two entered into a classic test of strength.
Uno threw Shibata into three sides of the barricades on the outside. Back in the ring, Shibata no-sold a series of big chops, at one point begging for more. Uno then as a no-sell of his own as a big boot from Shibata caught him right in the face.
Shibata caught Uno in a tight armbar in the centre of the ring and held him tight until the ref broke up the hold. Unfortunately, the hold injured Uno and the ref was forced to stop the match, awarding the win to Shibata.
Cage of Agony (Brian Cage, Bishop Kaun, Toa Liona) defeated Cappuchino Jones, Harlon Hutchinson & Austin Valtino.
Brian Cage on ROH was an excellent, excellent choice in this writer’s opinion. Cage is a fantastic worker, and getting to see him in this trios match was a treat. I was less familiar with his partners, but Liona has had some really great matches in ROH and Kaun is downright scary.
This was less of a match and more of an assault as Liona and Jones started things off. There were moments where there was genuine concern that Liona would eat the smaller man. Liona beat him from post to post, tagging in Kaun, presumably because he got bored.
Kaun then tagged in Cage who has his turn with Jones. He spent some time curling him like a barbell until Jones squirmed away and as he got a hot tag, the match devolved into Cage of Agony just beating up the other three men.
Eventually, Cage pinned one of them and the match was over.
Queen Aminata defeated McKenzie Morgan.
With the injury status of ROH Women’s World Champion Athena in doubt, Aminata was looking to put a metric ton of fear into Athena’s eyes before they clash at Death Before Dishonor. Morgan seemed like a pretty good opponent to give her a chance to do just that.
Aminata controlled things off the top, confidently strutting for the camera. Morgan was able to use her speed to keep up and managed to keep Aminata on her toes. Aminata delivered a massive boot in the corner that bent Morgan in half.
Aminata hit Morgan with an Air Raid Crash and got the pin. Afterwards she strut around the ring motioning to an imaginary belt around her waist.
Diamante defeated Leyla Hirsch in a Lights Out Match
The Main Event of the evening was a Lights Out match! What’s that, you ask? According to Wikipedia, “An Unsanctioned match is a match that has no rules and is not recognized as an official match. There is also a version called a Lights Out match where the lights in the arena are dimmed.” So, that’s what this contest between Diamante and Hirsch was, but the lights were not actually dimmed.
The ring was littered with chairs, kendo sticks, tables and other assorted weapons as Dimante in street gear went straight for Hirsch, tagging her with a garbage can. Hirsch fought back, jumping Diamante from the barricade. The brawl continued outside the ring, into the crowd, and back to the barricade where Diamante used a chair on Hirsch.
The ref made Diamante take Hirsch back into the ring to attempt a pin, but it was only a two count. Hirsch reversed an attack with a toilet plunger which she stuck on Diamante’s face. Hirsch took her turn with the chair, drop kicking two of them into Diamante’s face in the corner.
Hirsch grabbed a bag from under the ring that contained thousands of thumbtacks. She then succumbed to a drop toehold onto a chair, and Diamante narrowly missed suplexing her onto the tacks.
Hirsch drew Diamante to the outside with a kendo stick and laid her out on a nearby table. Hirsch climbed to the top rope and hit a moonsault on Diamante through the table!
Hirsch moved back into the ring to set up a fresh table. Diamante joined her along with a kendo stick. She choked Hirsch with the stick before setting her up on the top turnbuckle. The two battled until Hirsch pivoted over Diamante to attempt a suplex. Diamante stayed on the top rope and Hirsch climbed up as well and the two exchanged blows.
Diamante then delivered a massive Code Red to Hirsch, driving her through the able, and getting the pin!
