Ring Of Honor
"Do Or Die 2" and "At Our Best"
Rexplex, Elizabeth, NJ
3/13/04

No need to worry about losing my notes for this show, because I didn't take any. I originally wasn't planning to write about the show as I didn't want to make myself a target, however obliquely, for the controversy that has surrounded ROH for the last two weeks.

I've already said my piece about that whole situation on the message board. I will add only that I have looked into it extensively, spoken with people who have the full story, and I am satisfied that Feinstein the kid toucher is truly gone from ROH and the hopefully-soon-to-be-renamed tape company. Unlike some people I don't fancy myself to be some indy wrestling version of Mike Wallace, so I won't get into the details here, especially since much of it is not public knowledge. It's pointless anyway since people will make up their own minds regardless of what I say - and that is exactly what they should do. Decide for yourself, either way, rather than letting someone tell you what to think. In my opinion, the company definitely does need to do a better of job of cleaning up the legal stuff and of explaining themselves to the public. However that is their job to do, not mine to do for them. If they don't do it properly at the end of the day they are the ones who will suffer. For myself I know enough to be comfortable supporting the product. Believe me, I would not do so if I thought any of my money was going to Feinstein. [btw If you are one of those who are serious about not wanting to support a pedo's creative output - and if you are then hats off to you - you might want to do a little research into the career of director Victor Salva, of "Powder" and "Jeepers Creepers" fame, before you decide to rent or buy his films. But I digress. Again.]

Since Sean will already have submitted a detailed recap, I'll do what I did with JCW and just give some thoughts and impressions.

I rode down with the Boston bus crew and we were pretty late, so I missed the first couple of afternoon matches, arriving during Rainman vs Coleman. Overall I really didn't think the afternoon show was worth much in itself. Definitely not as good as the afternoon show at Final Battle. This one was more like an extended showcase. The good news is, it didn't cost much either, so even though I wasn't knocked out I definitely got at least 5 bucks worth of wrestling.

I was getting some much needed refreshment so I missed the short womens' match. I definitely DIDN'T miss the Punk/Whitmer brawl that followed, as they plowed directly through the spot where I was standing waiting for a hot dog. Nice energizing start to my ROH day!

Jacobs vs Bradley was an okay big man vs little man but a little too long. HUSS!

Hydro vs Roderick Strong and Aries vs Danny Daniels were both decent but didn't fully hold my attention. Some nice moves from Strong. The scramble was, well, a scramble. Again some good stuff but it felt like a prelim bout, which I suppose is what it was.

Match of the afternoon for me was Super Dragon vs Excalibur. That was really good stuff. I actually met Dragon last year at a Cinema Wasteland convention.
[SEMI OFF TOPIC CHEAP PLUG: check 'em out at www.cinemawasteland.com. They deal primarily in horror and exploitation but they have some good wrestling related stuff too. Next show is April 2-4 with a Texas Chainsaw Massacre cast reunion. I've already got my ticket.] Anyway Dragon was at the Wasteland show with the editor of FROM PARTS UNKNOWN magazine as part of a presentation on Lucha Va Voom, Kaiju Big Battel, and Dragon's own Revolution Pro. This ROH show was the first time I saw him wrestle outside of a highlight tape, and I was definitely impressed. I liked the way he'd tease a lucha move and just do a stiff-as-hell kick or stomp instead. They did some sick moves in this one. Definitely wouldn't mind seeing these guys again.

It was VERY f'ing cool getting to meet Dusty Rhodes before the evening show. I've seen him act a bit lethargic in some appearances but he was very high energy Saturday and seemed into it. We had a funny conversation about one of the items I brought him to sign, the Ric Flair dvd. I really mark out for the old NWA guys.

The main show started out well with the six man 'mayhem' match. I had reservations about this one since six guys is just too many to have in the same match, but it came off well. Great to see Red back in action. It'll be interesting to see how he modifies his post injury style, if he does so at all. This was also my first time seeing Jack Evans and the infamous Teddy Hart live. Gotta say I was little underwhelmed. Gentlemen, I have seen the Hart Foundation, and you are no Hart Foundation. You have great flips, and Teddy has a good gimmick. Now please learn some more fundamentals. That said, they did what they were supposed to do within the context of the match, and people clearly were enjoying their performances. Personally my fav part of the match was when Evans was flippy-flipping all over the ring in post match celebration [of losing?] and Sonjay Dutt just went over and kicked him in the face. Of course, I was supposed to like that, so I guess the booking worked. Speaking of Dutt, I'd rather see him get a chance to shine in one on one or tag team action than in one of these clusters.

Middle of the card sagged a little. There was nothing really wrong with any of the matches, I just didn't get into them that much.

Xavier and Slyk Wagner brown actually had a better match at CSWF with a broken ring than they did here in front of 1500 plus people. Nerves? Who knows. Crowd wasn't really into the match either which hurt it. Would have been a great match on a smaller show but somehow just didn't quite click here. They need to do a better job of capitalizing on Xavier's awesome ladder match from Final Battle to keep him looking like a major player in the eyes of the fans. I suspect this match was intended to elevate Slyk a little, which isn't a bad idea, but I'm not sure it worked out that way.

Lynn/McGinness just dragged. At least the right guy won. If this sets up Lynn vs Styles then I'm happy, but on its own the match didn't do a lot for me.

Walters vs Striker brought out a little too much of the strong style in Walters for my taste. Striker's matches can be great, but when they go bad they are like watching paint dry. I know Gabe Sapolsky supposedly loves this style so it will probably always be on an ROH show but it doesn't do much for me. Fans didn't seem into it either and some people actually heckled the match. That should NEVER happen in a John Walters match. Maybe they should think about re-igniting Walters vs Xavier again. Either that or team them up. Both guys have a chemistry with each other that they didn't have in their respective matches tonight. Why not continue to exploit it in some way?

I managed to miss both The Solution's afternoon match and their confrontation with the Dunn & Marcos, so I have no idea how they did Saturday. I do think there is a potentially good spot for them in ROH if they're presented right. ROH has very few tag teams that are real full time tag teams, as opposed to throw-togethers like Maff/Whitmer or Samoa Joe/various partners. With CSC gone, you've only got the Backseats, Briscoes (champs), and Carnage Crew potentially in the tag title picture with Ring Crew Express and Outkast Killas basically there to do jobs for the first 3 teams I listed. Another strong team, if booked in a way that will get them over, could freshen up the tag team scene.

Second City Saints vs Prophecy definitely brought the show back to life in a grand fashion. I think Ace Steele is the secret weapon in this combo. He's consistently good and he was excellent again in this one. The Prophecy thing definitely helps Whitmer as it gives him an attitude and something beyond his (excellent) work to with which to connect to the crowd. I assume the Whitmer/Maff conflict is considered resolved since they functioned very smoothly as a team here. Colt Cabana's dead-serious promo set the table for the match perfectly when he dropped his comic person and just said "BRING THEM OUT HERE SO WE CAN KILL THEM." The only unsatisfying part of the match was the finish, which the crowd clearly hated and booed heavily. One understands the need to prolong the feud, but most people, including me, didn't even know a double DQ was possible under ROH rules. The unsatisfying finish was somewhat redeemed by the great pullapart afterwards. When I first started watching wrestling I saw a lot of AWA and NWA matches where they'd do the big post match melee and I've always liked that kind of stuff.

Styles vs CM Punk was as good as I expected it to be, which was very. Really liked the use of the rope break rule for drama, and also really liked the shock of Punk successfully using AJ's own finisher against him. Needless to say I marked out like a mofo just seeing Ricky Steamboat, one of my all time favorites. My only gripe, and it's a small one, is that the finish came off a little weird since Styles' arm really DID go down for three, which basically meant CM Punk had a legitimate grievance. Got to wonder if they're going somewhere with that one.

The post match confrontation was one of the two high points of the show for me. I love it when a wrestling show sneaks past all my defenses and gets me to shut off the rational part of my brain entirely and just go nuts. HUGE F'ING MARKOUT MOMENT when Steamboat had enough of Punk and armdragged and chopped him in classic Steamboat style. YYYYEEEEEEEAAAAAAAHHHHH! I hope ROH does more with Steamboat, they are a perfect fit for each other.

Prior to the Jay Briscoe/Samoa Joe cage match I was actually complaining to some people that I though the Joe/Briscoes thing had been overdone. Pass me some ketchup because I'm going to have to eat those words. I knew the match itself would be good, but I had no idea it would be this good. This match was AMAZING! Definitely the best match I've seen this year and one of the better live matches I've seen, period. I have never seen Jay Briscoe be this good as a single, and this may well have been Samoa Joe's best match to date also. And speaking of red stuff, without a doubt this one also goes on the short list of the 2 or 3 bloodiest matches I've seen live. [The only other comparable candidates that come to mind are Balls Mahoney vs Nosawa last March, and maybe some ECW Raven/Dreamer stuff from 95/96.] Both men were literally covered in Briscoe's blood. Great wrestling, great blood, great drama, sick finish. Just frigging awesome.

Scramble Cage 2 started out under basically the old NWA Wargames rules, which I liked. Unfortunately once the last Carnage Crew guy was in it seemed like it degenerated into a big mess rules-wise as we went from having one entrant per minute to all of a sudden having 4 Carnage Crew guys and about 20 Special K guys. From that point on it was just a big highspot festival, but they were very good highspots. Sick moment of the match had to be when the huge Masada went OFF THE TOP OF THE CAGE onto the floor. That is a crazy move for anybody, let alone a dude that big. I kept waiting for him to tease the spot and then climb down, but nope, he went sailing right off that sucker. Really scary looking, but in the right way. A lot of this match wound up spilling out to the floor, which kinda sucks since unless you're right up front you can't see squat when that happens. I figured Dusty would get involved in this one, and loved seeing all the K guys line up to walk into the bionic elbow like it was 1986. I gather Dusty wound up getting into it with Ox Baker during this one, which I missed entirely from my perspective in the bleachers. That would make Ox Baker officially the most unlikely Special K member ever. Finish of this one had a big challenge to meet in order to be sicker than the finish of Briscoe/Joe - and they succeeded. A spike piledriver off the top of the cage through two tables! Woah! Insane spot that looked it HAD to kill everyone involved in it. I give Angel Dust/Azreal major credit for taking that one. In one of those details that ROH and the Crew are often so good at, I noticed that they had the presence of mind to have Justin Credible hold the tables in place so that the tables didn't escape from under the guys and get someone [even more] hurt, which I've seen happen in these kinds of spots. Smart. Could have done without the Austin-esque beer drinking at the end, but I did think it was cool that DeVito [or was it Loc?] got on the microphone afterward and thanked the fans for showing up.

Overall good show that definitely sent me home happy. I was iffy at the halfway mark but the last three matches totally redeemed it for me. I just wish I didn't have to wait two months now for the next one.