Several NJPW stars will be part of tonight’s Ring of Honor on HonorClub — a show that will also feature a men’s TV title defense.
In a non-title match, NEVER Openweight Champion Shingo Takagi will battle Ariya Daivari in Takagi’s first match for the promotion since June 2023.
NJPW men’s Strong Openweight Champion Gabe Kidd will battle Angelico in non-title action. It’s Kidd’s second ROH match and first since October’s title defense over Anthony Henry.
Tomohiro Ishii will face Mike Bennett as he looks to keep momentum going ahead of his challenge of ROH World Champion Chris Jericho Wednesday.
Kevin Knight will make his ROH debut as he faces Serpentico.
ROH men’s TV Champion Brian Cage defends against AR Fox while ROH Women’s World Champion Athena will also be in action, taking on Leila Grey in a Proving Ground match.
Shane Taylor & ROH Pure Champion Lee Moriarty will face JD Drake & Beef while The Righteous will make an appearance.
**********
All right, friends! You know the drill: Thursday, Ring of Honor, Honorclub. Now let’s get to the fights!
NJPW STRONG Openweight Champion Gabe Kidd defeated Angelico
KIdd brings to ROH the NJPW STRONG Openweight title, which you know is important because it has a lot of CAPITAL LETTERS. He retained that title against Anthony Henry on episode #85 of ROH on Honorclub back in October. Angelico would love to add that title to his collection, but sadly, this was a non-title match. No worries though, he’s cool.
Kidd started things off just like his title; strong. He rained down chops, shoves, kicks and stomps on Angelico. It wasn’t until Angelico managed to duck a lariat and deliver his own clotheslines that he got some offence in. Once he got moving though, Kidd seemed confused b the fluid style of Angelico. A punch to the face fixed that and brought the match back under Kidd’s control.
Kid launched himself at Angelico and managed to fold him up like an accordion. 1-2-3 and it was over, Kidd wins, and delivered a parting kick to the head for good measure.
Shane Taylor Promotions (Lee Moriarty & Shane Taylor) defeated BEEF & JD Drake
STP beat up a lot of people a couple of weeks ago. After adding The Infantry and Trish Adora to their ranks, they brawled with some nameless NPC’s in the back, and made their intentions to take the ROH tag belts away from Dustin Rhodes and Sammy Guevara vary, very clear. BEEF and Drake (which sounds like an excellent dinner special at a mid-sized pub) have been reluctantly teaming together since BEEF’s 2nd cousin and Drake’s normal tag partner Anthony Henry got hurt.
Moriarty and Taylor are an excellent team. They both have a particular set of skills that perfectly compliment each other. Drake started off against Taylor, but tagged BEEF in fairly quickly. The crowd was chanting for BEEF, but Taylor’s experience level was too much for him and Taylor sat him down hard.
This match was interesting in that it featured a lot more yelling at each other than a normal match would. Taylor’s trash talk is legendary, but BEEF was able to get a few shots in verbally too. Moriarty tagged in and matched up with Drake, who brought the chops until Taylor made a blind tag and clotheslined Drake into next week.
Taylor and Drake stood each other up and spent about 60 seconds just hitting one another. Not wrestling, just a brawl, and it was awesome. Drake got a hot tag to BEEF who fed some right hands to Moriarty. BEEF hit a big bulldog (or BEEFdog, as they kept calling it) and drake tagged in to slam Moriarty. Drake missed a big splash from the top and Taylor tagged in got a big splash on Drake to get the pin.
After the match, Top Flight jumped in and all of STP laid a beating on Drake and BEEF. Suddenly, they were interrupted by the Undisputed Kingdom of all people! Bennett and Taven ran off STP and jawed at them as the helped BEEF and Drake to their feet.
-The Righteous cut a promo from an undisclosed location. Dutch read a poem to Dustin Rhodes, his “long-lost brother.” He talked about how Rhodes’ father Dusty had loved him like a son. Soon, the Righteous will take those tag titles, and then everyone will know who Dusty really thought of as his son.
Kevin Knight defeated Serpentico
Kevin Knight (who I discovered quickly is NOT my cousin of the same name) has been hanging out in NJPW for the last couple of years with a guy named KUSHIDA. This would be his ROH debut, and who better to go up against than the Laid-Back Luchadore, Serpentico? Last week he and his SAP partner Angelico picked up a win (and Angelico a singles loss this week) and a singles victory would be icing on the very delicious cake.
Knight had a bit of a size adventage on Serpentico, buy you can never count Serpentico out (unless he leaves the ring for 20 seconds. But that didn’t happen). Anyway, it was a fast one off the top with Knight showing why his nickname is “the Jet” and Serpentico keeping up in a neon green blur.
Serpentico laid in a bunch of SuperPunches on Knight in the corner, but couldn’t put him away. Knight fought back and took Serpentico’s head off with a lariat. Knight hit a sky high slam followed by a running frog splash that was really impressive. Knight hit one hell of a kick (clearly inspired by Sami Zayn) and follow it up with a big clothesline to put Serpentico down for the count.
Tomohiro Ishii defeated Mike Bennett
You have to go all the way back to May of this year to find Bennett’s last singles match, which was a loss to Matt Menard. Since then, he’s been a big part of the Undisputed Kingdom stable, winning (and losing) the ROH Tag Titles and warring with The Conglomeration. Said Conglomeration features the membership of Tomohiro Ishii, so these two know each other well. Ishii has a date with Chris Jericho for the ROH title in the wings on Dynamite, so this was a heck of a warmup.
Ishii refused a code of honor from Bennett and the two locked up. Ishii had the power, but Bennett was able to match it as they two traded chops for what seemed like 45 minutes. It was actually about 5 though, as Ishii nailed Bennett with a shoulder and sent him into the corner. Bennett fought back with a lariat and knocked Ishii off his feet.
Bennett hit Ishii with a spear, but it seemed to hurt him more than Ishii. A big spinebuster followed that, but Ishii kicked out at two. Bennett tried to go up top but Ishii caught him and put him in a stalling suplex from the top rope. Ishii went for a brain buster and that was it for Bennett. Ishii nailed it and got the pin.
ROH CLASSIC MATCH: Jay Briscoe & Mark Briscoe vs. Katsuhiko Nakajima & Kensuke Sasaki (Final Battle 2008, December 27, 2008)
The attempted to give a reason for showing this match that made sense in-story, but it did not work. I’m pretty sure they showed this classic ROH match because it’s someone in production’s favourite match. That’s not a bad thing, mind you because it was a very, very good match! It deserves to be the favourite of the guy in production! Anyway, back in the here and now:
Shingo Takagi defeated Ariya Daivari
Takagi spent a lot of time in ROH between 2005-2008, but has only made a handful of appearances since then, choosing NJPW as his home where he’s done, well, just about everything. His last ROH match was in 2023 as part of a 6-man affair against pre-crisis Cage of Agony, The Mogul Embassy (Bishop Kaun, Brian Cage & Toa Liona). Daivari has been having mixed singles results lately, having lost to Tomohio Ishii, Komander and Sammy Guevara. With Mark Sterling in tow, Daivari and the Premier Athletes as a whole, needed a win here.
Daivari’d have his work cut out for him though with the much larger Takagi standing across the ring. Trying to outpower him did not work as Takagi returned everything Daivari threw at him with gusto. Even a cheap shot from behind that sent Takagi out of the ring didn’t really seem to do much to hurt him.
Daivari relied on his technical skills to work the arm of Takagi, taking away his big lariat. Takagi fought back though, drawing his second wind from the turnbuckle. He peppered Daivari with massive elbows, both front and back. Takagi went for a pumphandle slam but Sterling caused a distraction, letting Daivari hit a hammerlock DDT.
Daivari tried a clutch, but Takagi fought out of it and delivered a DDT of his own. Daivari ascaped up the ropes and tried a frog splash, but Takagi wasn’t done. On pure instinct he hit a massive lariat and then Last of The Dragon, a truly terrifying finisher, to get the pin.
PROVING GROUND MATCH: ROH Women’s World Champion Athena defeated Leila Grey
For those just joining us, this was a Proving Ground match. If Grey could pin the champion or last to a 10-minute time limit, she would get a shot at the ROH Women’s World Championship at a later date. Athena retained her title in October against Abadon, but there are plenty of women waiting in the wings to try and dethrone the Forever Champion, including disgruntled Minion in Training, Billie Starkz.
Athena took things with her usual seriousness, playing with Grey’s hair and running around the ring like an airplane. Grey jumped on this underestimation though, and got a couple of near falls off of some hard-hitting offense, and then sending Athena to the outside.
Athena turned the tables there, sending Grey’s face into the steel steps. Athena returned to the ring and Grey followed, right into the hands of the Champion with over three minutes gone in the match. All Grey had to do was last seven more minutes and she would get her title shot.
Grey started to pick up steam, hitting a bulldog that Athena kicked out of at two-and-three-quarters. Athena then started to bring out the big guns. Handspring slams in the corner, big power slams and lariats. She went to the top rope for the O Face, but Grey beat her to it and hit a sunset bomb from the top rope!
Time was running out though and Athena resorted to raking eyes and drawing Grey into a triangle choke. Grey lasted a few seconds, but was forced to tap before time ran out, dashing her hopes of a title match.
ROH WORLD TELEVISION TITLE MATCH: Brian Cage ( c) defeated AR Fox
In the Main Event: AR Fox has actually been on something of a roll in ROH the last couple months. He’s posted wins over Jack Cartwheel and Josh Woods and was part of a few tag victories as well. This is enough to earn him a shot a Brian Cage’s ROH World TV Title. This will mark Cage’s second defense of the belt, as he retained vs Komander a few weeks ago and has been hanging out with the Don Callis Family ever since. He even brought a Lance Archer with him!
Cage, in a very subdued outfit compared to his usual gear, was the same height as Fox, but about twice as wide. In a normal situation, this would be a case of Speed vs Strength, but as anyone who’s seen him wrestle knows, Cage has just as much speed as he does strength.
Fox tried everything he could including a Shooting Star Press and then a full moonsault onto Cage on the outside. Cage was resilient though, getting to his feet every time. Fox let Cage get to close, and got his eyes raked for his trouble. Cage moved into a series of power moves and suplexes to knock Fox silly.
Cage did some bicep curls with Fox, ending his set with a slam. From there, Cage tried a simple chin lock to wear down the challenger. Fox battled back though, hanging Cage up in the ropes. Fox pulled an Elix Skipper and matrix-dodged a big lariat. Cage looked a little sluggish at this point as Fox hit a DDT.
Cage managed to catch fox and hit a blue thunder pumphandle bomb. He tried to lock in a reverse cloverleaf, but Fox was able to get to the ropes. Fox responded with a Code red, but only got the two count. Fox then hit Cage with a spiccoli driver followed by a big 450 splash. Somehow, Cage kicked out though.
Fox set Cage up on the top rope, but Cage swatted him down and hit a satellite DDT, followed by a series of powerbombs, but still, Fox kicked out. Cage hit a discus lariat and a brainbuster and that finally put Fox on his back and out of his misery. Excellent match though! Excellent show!
