Revisiting 00s US Indies #44

Nigel McGuinness v Austin Aries (ROH Rising Above, 12/29/07)

The Austin Aries hits keep on coming! I watched this over a decade ago and thought it was better than all but one of the Nigel/Danielson matches and this watch didn't change my mind. I'm not really a Nigel McGuinness fan but I thought he was great in this, even if some of it might've been circumstances beyond his control. Was his selling of being concussed and running on fumes at points terrific? Sure. Was he absolutely and legitimately concussed and running on fumes at points? You better believe it. Was some of the match an uncomfortable watch as a result? Well this is a post-Benoit world and we know what we know about concussions so it's hard not to feel at least a little icky about enjoying a match in which someone's clearly had their brain rattled. Nigel was already injured even before the concussion, coming in with a torn biceps from when he won the belt. He'd missed a few shows before this because of it so of course the ROH crowd were on his case. When Danielson was champ he wrestled hurt for like two months! What happened to putting your body on the line for the STRAP??? I'm not sure if they'd planned on eventually turning Nigel before this or he just went with the crowd reaction and played into it, but either way he was giving it back to a few fans at the intros. The opening few minutes are tentative, with Aries almost testing the waters by going for that taped up arm, not too aggressively but enough where you know he's willing to exploit it. And why wouldn't he, I guess? Then Nigel takes a powder to go at it again with a fan and Aries wastes him with a tope to the back. Nigel's head crashes into the guardrail and you can tell immediately that his lights are out, and a nasty cut opens up above his eye. For the next few minutes he's left staggering around, partly selling (probably?) but also not even close to being all the way there. It's maybe a wee bit hard to watch through current day eyes. Aries might've already been up on that CTE research way back in 2007 because he looked a bit tentative for a few minutes afterwards. The concern was probably legit and he wanted to kill some time to let Nigel recover, but regardless it worked for the pacing of the match and created a story of Nigel trying to keep his concussed head above water for the remainder, having to break his own momentum a few times and get himself right. The crowd do not give Nigel an ounce of sympathy during this and pretty soon Aries is like yeah sure maybe this guy is an asshole and starts throwing elbows to the head. The focus after that was Aries working over the cut and scrambled head of Nigel - which again, wee bit unsettling - while going after the arm when the opportunity arises. People continue to just eat this up and Nigel gets more and more belligerent (can you blame him?). When Aries tried the pop up dropkick out of a headscissors Nigel blocked it with his forearms, turning away while giving Aries the fingers - middle AND index like a proper Englishman. When Aries tried it again later Nigel blocked it the exact same way, this time giving him the middle finger with a bit more venom behind it. Aries just punted him in the face after that. Nigel had started using his new arm submission around this time so we get some duelling arm work in the back half and the crowd are invested in all of it. I'd forgotten about 99% of what actually happened in this as well so when Aries went for another tope later I wasn't sure if Nigel was enough of a lunatic to let himself be torpedoed into the guardrail again. The finishing stretch is BIG and there are some BUMPS and the transitions between everything are mostly on point. Aries takes a screwball flip bump off a lariat to the floor while he's seated across the top rope, then takes an even SCREWBALLER bump off the jawbreaker lariat at the end. I kind of hated that move after a while because, while the actual lariat part always looked good, the set up either ranged from daft to ridiculously contrived, mostly because he just wasn't quick enough to do the rebound part smoothly. Well Aries is the best I've ever seen at setting himself up for it and not making it obvious he's standing around hoping Nigel doesn't get tangled up in the ropes. Then he eats the lariat and basically spikes himself on his own head like a fucking stone cold psychopath. 

Revisiting 00s US Indies #43

ROH Manhattan Mayhem (5/7/05)

One thing I did not expect to want to do when I started going back through this stuff a few years ago (lockdown was a wild time), was sit down and watch a full Ring of Honour show. Full, in its entirety, from start to finish (in several sittings over the course of about five years). ROH holds fond memories for me and that '04-'07 peak will always have a special wee place in my heart, but my days of wanting to watch ANY 3-hour wrestling show in its entirety are really only reserved for 90s RINGS or WAR. But I watched the thing and it was not a terrible time whatsoever.  

Lacey's Angels v Dixie & Azrieal 

This was supposed to be a 3-way tag match where the losing team would be forced to disband. Quite a severe stipulation for a curtain-jerker, but this is ROH's debut in New York - even Jay-Z is in the building, apparently - so I guess we're pulling out all the stops. Before it starts the Carnage Crew run out and annihilate Dunn and Marcos and tell the crowd they can kiss their ass, then they spit on the Ring of Honor turnbuckle padding, then leave. So it becomes a regular tag match instead, though the stipulation remains. I'll be honest, it's been so long since I've watched anything involving any of these guys that I had no clue who was who for a while, and possibly still don't. Lacey's Angels are Izzy and Deranged and they come out to the ring wearing tuxedos (without Lacey, who has a business meeting with P. Diddy, which I'm sure she regrets deeply now), while Dixie and Azrieal are part of Special K, which is the stable/group/unit that Jay Lethal was once a part of (under the name Hydro). So there you go. Do with that information what you will. I figured this would be your standard sort of 2005 ROH opener fare, and it probably was in all honesty, but it totally did the trick in the same way any good opener from any promotion or any era should -- it got the crowd fired up and ended with an awkwardly brutal headscissors takeover-reverse rana thing that probably could've killed someone. Deranged was pretty amusing in this as a skinny maniac. He took some impressive bumps, did a bit of stooging, got into a shoving match with an even skinnier referee, hit his offence nicely, a real fun ten minutes' worth of work. Dixie - or maybe it was Azrieal; I know it was one of them - definitely comes from the Dynamite Kid line of stocky juniors who work very intense, as he slashes a thumb across his throat and shouts "IT'S OVER" before grabbing a rear waistlock on Deranged and rolling backwards into a camel clutch. That was done to set up a top rope double stomp that, unfortunately for our man Dixie, went horribly awry, as one of those other people involved in the match intervened and instead it was Dixie - or possibly Azrieal - who got double stomped on the back of the head. For a spot-a-thon opener this ticked pretty much all of the boxes. They did cool shit that looked like it might even hurt, they fit in an actual heat segment, the crowd were red hot and that finish was a proper finish. 

Colt Cabana v Nigel McGuinness 

I don't really have much use for either of these guys but for a WHIMSICAL lower midcard match this was fine, if maybe a little too cute at points. Cabana is very jovial and he's here to have a nice sporting contest. Nigel is less jovial but seems to be on board with the sporting contest. The Euro style matwork was all neat enough and they ran through it at a decent pace. Like, you can tell that both of them have been doing this for a while so even the more elaborate and tricky sequences come off smoothly. There's a bit of comedy in there, some light-hearted parity stuff, all-around acknowledgment of the other's prowess, but then Nigel visibly starts to get a little more frustrated. There are about six exchanges in a row where Nigel tries to tie Cabana down and Cabana escapes every time by literally crawling away, once while Nigel rode his back like Cabana was a Shetland pony. The next time Cabana tries to shoot in for a leg Nigel just boots him in the mouth, and in that moment we all live vicariously through Nigel McGuinness because who hasn't wanted to boot Colt Cabana in the mouth at least once? Things never get properly surly and the matwork stays pretty light right until the end, but I thought the finish was cool as an idea, even if they had to just up and redo it because they made an arse of it the first time. 

James Gibson v Black Tiger IV

This was fine. Black Tiger is Rocky Romero and I can't really say I've ever been arsed about anything involving Rocky Romero, but Gibson was on a hot streak in '05 and they both meshed pretty well. A lot of Tiger's offence in the first half of the match consisted of him grabbing a cravate and ramming Gibson's head into things, sometimes the turnbuckles, sometimes the ring post. That was pretty neat. I actually really dug the last few minutes, and the best part is that a move I thought was sort of stupid initially wound up being the thread that ran through the best bits. Tiger going to an ankle lock straight out of a tiger driver or something (I genuinely don't remember the move now) felt kind of silly initially, and I wouldn't even say I'm someone who's particularly tied to the idea that submission moves need a ton of limb-focused build up. Fujiwara never spent every match working the arm but when he grabbed that armbar you knew the people bought it. This just felt more along the lines of being flashy for the sake of being flashy. HOWEVER who really gives a shit anyway and Tiger kept going back to it and Gibson sold it really well and it had a by god payoff in the end so who are we to complain? Who has given us that right? A perfectly okay wrestling match, this was. 

Jimmy Jacobs & BJ Whitmer v Roderick Strong & Jack Evans 

I enjoyed this about as much as I possibly could've hoped for. There were some iffy moments, some bits of questionable selling, a few parts where something didn't come off great, but for the most part it was a pretty awesome blend of workrate and traditional tag. It followed a fairly linear shine-heat-finishing run template and each segment was strong on its own, and that finishing run never stuck around too long and ended with a man nearly impaling himself head first on the canvas so we certainly can't complain about an anti-climax. This was whimsical mini-Brody Jimmy Jacobs rather than stab you in the head with a railroad spike and drink your blood Jimmy Jacobs, but whimsical Jacobs is still fun and he'll bump wildly if called upon. His personality is infectious and nicely offsets the lack thereof brought by his partner. Whitmer isn't even someone I actively dislike, he's just one of the least interesting wrestlers ever. He was mostly here to hit cool offence and make it look good though, and in fairness it all had some impact behind it and I guess that's enough. Him and Strong also chopped each other hard so there's another thing that happened. The transition to Jacobs in peril was truly ludicrous, as Strong flips Evans off his shoulders into a moonsault double stomp while Jimmy is lying prone in the corner across the middle ropes. For a second you wonder how his spine wasn't mangled and I guess Gabe did as well because he shouted "DANGEROUSSSS!" and I can't even tell you the face I made. The doomsday contra code at the end was very ridiculous and Jack Evans is a screwball. What a fun wee match. 

Samoa Joe v Jay Lethal

I liked the story of this. They didn't necessarily thread it through a ton of the match, it was more backstory narrative that the commentators explained until I muted it when Gabe got to talking about something or other, but knowing what that backstory actually was accentuated some of the moments. Joe had taken Lethal under his wing a while back and taught him how to BE A MAN. Lethal is now ROH Pure Champion and wants to prove that he has not only BECOME A MAN but become his OWN man. So a play on teacher versus student when you boil it down. A few of the broader story points were fairly self-explanatory. Lethal has been Pure Champion for a couple months and is familiar with the rules and strictures of a Pure title match. Joe has never been in a Pure title match and takes a while to collar how best to operate within one. He gives up two rope breaks early because going to the ropes to break a hold is what he'd do in a regular match. Then he loses his third break by throwing two punches. The first warning is met with annoyance, probably at himself as much as the rule that you can't punch someone in a wrestling match. I liked the spot because it wasn't telegraphed for dramatic effect, he just threw one of his regular combos because he's been doing them for years. It was muscle memory as much as anything. Then he throws the second one and right away he knows he's fucked up, which was cool because it gave you the sense that he was absolutely taking Lethal seriously. As the match goes on it feels like Joe is the most likely to actually win, but Lethal understands the challenge a little better, and if nothing else can maybe manipulate Joe into shooting himself in the foot. Lethal beat Spanky on a previous show by using a rope-assisted submission (which Spanky couldn't break because he'd used up all his rope breaks). This time he locks in a choke while both guys are on the apron, using his legs to wrap the ropes and keep Joe pinned. So Joe bites the bullet and just hurls the both of them through a ringside table. The final transition was a little weak, with Joe kicking out of the dragon suplex and just reversing another attempt into his own string of offence, but the stretch run itself was pretty tight and they never went crazy so you take the good with the questionable. Maybe the best Jay Lethal match of them all. Do with that what you will. 

CM Punk v Jimmy Rave (Dog Collar Match) 

This was kind of long and drawn out as a match-angle segment, but the Punk/Rave feud has been fairly enjoyable on re-watch and I at least appreciated them keeping the match itself relatively short. Part of me was worried they'd go 30 so I was pleasantly surprised when they went like 14. Punk is obviously a huge Piper fan so you knew he'd have some gnarly stuff up his sleeve. Sure enough the point where Rave had the chain across Punk's mouth as he shoved his face into it with his boot was disgusting, but then he took it a step further and turned it into a chain-assisted curb stomp! It looked very brutal. They also didn't do anything overly flashy or INNOVATIVE and leaned into wrapping a chain around their fists and throwing punches, which of course I liked a lot. Punk taps a gusher and his blood-loss selling was pretty great, staggering across the ring to get at Nana only to be cut off when Rave yanks the chain up into his privates. This is building to a cage match in Chicago a week later so there's plenty of interference, I think in the end from every single person in the Embassy, so eventually the numbers catch up to Punk and Rave yet again stands victorious. I've watched this feud in smatterings over the past five years so it's not like much of it is fresh in the memory, but they've built Rave well over 2005 and overall it's been a really fun pairing. 

Austin Aries v Alex Shelley

Honestly, I keep waiting for the point where I'm over Austin Aries. I don't even really know why, maybe because he's a real-life shithead or whatever, but I always expect to go back and revisit something and think he maybe wasn't as good as I used to for a while there. He was my favourite guy in ROH when I was following in real time from around '05-08, then when I fell out of that loop he was someone I'd still check out from time to time if something caught my eye. When we did the PWO GWE project in 2016 he made my list (at #99) and then when I started going through this stuff again in 2020, everything with him in it held up great. Maybe at this point I should just embrace the fact he was kind of fucking awesome? I thought this was an excellent match and I thought Aries' performance was absolutely top banana. He was an offensive dynamo here. He's quite often an offensive dynamo, but what really impresses me isn't just that he a has LOT of offence. I mean he does have a lot of it and all of it looks great, with real snap and intensity and impact, but if you've bothered reading more than five entries of this stupid blog over the last 15 years then you'll probably gather that I don't really need a ton of varied offence in my pro wrestling to enjoy it. What I like most about Aries is how he uses all of that offence - his offensive REPERTOIRE, if you will - and builds compelling control segments and cut-offs and sure, at the end of the day some of it just looks badass as fuck. His work on Shelley's neck was tremendous - varied, targeted, focused, paced well, the lot. It was an awesome control segment and kind of brought to mind Eddie working over Rey in their Smackdown! match a month after this, albeit played to an audience that was looking for different things. The original transition was great, with Shelley being rocked and stood dazed by the ropes, Aries catching him with an amazing Randy Savage style clothesline, snapping Shelley's neck back over the ropes as Aries himself landed outside the ring. This was lightning quick, even faster than Savage and he LEAPT into this thing, almost making it a flying cutter/clothesline combo. He followed up with a brutal looking apron neckbreaker across the middle rope and to borrow another page from the Eddie Guerrero playbook, a hilo across the neck, rolling up and sprinting to the opposite ropes, hitting a flying kneedrop to the neck on the way back. The coolest part of the workover is that it actually felt organic, even when he was doing some complex stuff. It didn't look choreographed or mapped out to the letter. I guess you could call it innovative or whatever, but it was reactive rather than wanky and he did it in response to whatever the situation gave him. Those neckbreaker variations obviously looked great. The twisting one off the middle turnbuckle also made sense in the moment because it was a reaction to Shelley trying to superplex him. The snap neckbreaker onto his own knee is always a cool spot. He didn't just do it to be flashy though; it was used to cut Shelley off when he tried to run the ropes and build up momentum. His signature stuff was geared towards the neck as well, like the pendulum elbow while Shelley was on all fours, then later he grabbed him in a crossface and tried to twist his head around by fish hooking him (which would've fucking ruled no matter what). And then he has the brainbuster to set up the 450, so it all built back from his killshot. I liked this a ton. 

Samoa Joe & Jay Lethal v Low Ki & Homicide 

I watched both of the wild Joe/Lethal v Rottweilers matches from '05 about 12 years ago and thought they were just about the best tags to ever happen in an ROH ring. Unless the rematch from later in the year doesn't hold up then my opinion has not been SWAYED by the passage of time. This was a fantastic balls out sprint and the crowd were nuclear from the jump because it was impromptu. Homicide and Ki were a pair of maniac bastards here and tried to murder Jay Lethal several times. Lethal and Joe had already gone through their Pure Title WAR - skirmish at minimum - earlier in the show only to be jumped post-match by Ki and Homicide. So this is payback, but the promise of revenge can only carry you so far, as my great grandmother would always say, and pretty soon fatigue kicks in. When it does the Rottweilers isolate Lethal and get to the killing. Ki's tree of woe double stomp to Lethal's chest might be the craziest version of that move ever, and that includes the times he did it to Necro Butcher's face and willy. Joe coming in off the hot tag was molten but I love how even his adrenaline could only last so long. He ends up hanging between the ropes and Ki hits a double stomp to the back from the top rope with such force that he bounces himself all the way across to the opposite corner. It was like Joe was a trampoline. How they never honest to god killed Jay Lethal with that double stomp/Cop Killa combo is a mystery. A fucking absurdity of a thing, I'll tell you. These four should've had a dozen 10-minute matches that year.