Jay Briscoe Explains Why He Vacated Tag Titles

Tuesday, May 13, 2008

One half of the ROH World Tag Team Champions Jay Briscoe shocked everyone when he vacated the belts immediately after his match at the 5/10 Manhattan, NY event. Briscoe had just come through the curtain after defending the belts with Austin Aries as the replacement partner for Mark Briscoe. Mark is slated to miss 3-6 months with a wrist injury that occurred when Jimmy Jacobs stabbed him deeply in Chicago, severing some ligaments. There will be a tournament on the June 6th event in Hartford, CT to determine the new champs.

We recently sat down with Jay Briscoe, who explained his decision to vacate the titles. Jay & Mark Briscoe had just won the titles for a 5th time right before the injury to Mark happened. Austin Aries is said to have no problem with Jay's decision and is now focused on The Age Of The Fall and Jimmy Jacobs in particular. Here is what Jay had to say:

"I gotta admit everyone in the family has been pretty depressed since Mark was injured by Jacobs. I know Mark is hurtin' worse than all of us, but we are all feeling it. When Jimmy Bower called me to say that the ROH higher ups decided to let me pick a partner to replace him, well, I thought about it for a minute and figured I would do it. I'm not going to let Jimmy Jacobs cost us the damn belts by putting out my brother. I talked to Mark about it and he seemed cool with it so it didn't take long to figure on Austin Aries as my new partner. We both want to put a beatin' on Age Of The Fall so he was happy for any opportunity to get into the ring with them.

I was feeling pretty good about things going into the match. Mark was really disappointed he couldn't be on ROH's first show at the Hammerstien, I mean it was killin' him, but he was happy that I was defending the belts and getting a chance to throw some fists with Jimmy and Tyler.

Well, it was a hell of a match, maybe I lost too much blood and was hallucinating, but it felt like everything was right in the world when I instinctively got Tyler on my shoulders and Mark executed the springboard clothesline. Goddamn you gotta give Mark a whole world of credit for springboarding with one arm with a heavy cast on the other arm. Like I said maybe it was all the blood loss and I was woozy, but right there all the pain and depression that came from Mark being injured went away and I thought it was me and Mark that had just defended the titles.

I was so fired up that my brother was back at my side that I just got out of there to celebrate with Mark, but I saw his wrist was in a lot of pain just from the impact of the landing. Then reality came racing back. Mark was hurt and I didn't defend the belts with him. Then everything just felt wrong. I knew at that moment that I can't defend the ROH World Tag Team Titles without Mark as my partner. It just didn't feel right.

Now it hurt a lot to leave those belts behind. Me and Mark want nothing more in the world than them titles. We want to be the Babe Ruth of those titles, but it is something we have to do together. I spoke to Austin and he isn't upset, he is like we are right now and that is focused on one thing. We all want to get The Age Of The Fall in the ring and beat them senseless and that is what we are going to concentrate on now. Then when my brother is back we'll become six time champs."

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