Ring Of Honor TV Recap: Jay Briscoe Vs. Jay White, CMLL Debut And More

RING OF HONOR TV

EPISODE #257

AIRING IN SYNDICATION, THE FITE TV APP, ROHWRESTLING.COM AND WEDNESDAYS ON COMET TV

TAPED AT THE 2300 ARENA ( FKA The ECW Arena) IN PHILADELPHIA, PENNSYLVANIA

Ring of Honor is coming off a highly eventful pay per view this past friday with Death Before Dishonor XIV. A new world champion in Adam Cole and normally the TV show that follows a PPV has great interest based on the fallout and the potential followup. Unfortunately in this case, This show was taped weeks ago . Despite the quality of wrestling in this week's ROH TV show, No mention or followup to what took place at the ppv. Instead, this episode features three singles matches with an emphasis on the future of the company.

ADAM "HANGMAN" PAGE DEFEATED JONATHAN GRESHAM

The 25 year old Page is coming off of the best performance of his career against Jay Briscoe friday. With the exception of what Brock Lesnar did to Randy Orton at the end of their match on sunday. The most violent match of this past weekend took place between Page and Jay Briscoe friday night in Vegas.

This was a simple showcase match for Page. Gresham who has wrestled in Philly with CZW and as "Suicide" under a mask, had a decent showing in this one but this was all about Adam Page. Page wins this match with his finisher a back to belly type piledriver he calls, "The Rite of Passage". The same move he beat Jay Briscoe with at the ppv.

-The Cabinet does a promo complete with presidential music. Running with the theme of "Making Wrestling Great Again"... Somehow they forgot about Darren Young. The Cabinet continues their message of being on a mission to clean up wrestling. They plan on continuing their campaign next week on ROH TV when they face Dalton Castle and his boys.

- Kevin Kelly at ringside promotes next week's ROH show. He announces that The Addiction will defend their titles against The Young Bucks and that The War Machine will face off with Keith Lee and Shane Taylor. Next week's ROH TV will be the last from these set of tapings in Philly before the recent tapings in Vegas begin to air in September.

- An NJPW on AXS TV ad airs. A few of these ads actually aired during ROH's PPV on friday. The cross promotion continues.

KAMAITACHI DEFEATED STUKA JR

This was billed as a New Japan vs CMLL match with Stuka Jr. being the first CMLL wrestler to ever appear in ROH. Stuka Jr. is a veteran CMLL wrestler who adopted the junior tag from his brother. Stuka Jr. had an unprecedented 4 and a half year tag title run in CMLL. Kamaitachi despite being billed as a New Japan wrestler with dojo training . His best success has actually come in Mexico with CMLL and is a former Light Heavyweight Champion.

Kamaitachi was accompanied by Christopher Daniels for this match. This past friday, Kamaitachi helped The Addiction retain their tag titles. Daniels was trying everything he could to help Kamaitachi defeat Stuka. He got involved quite a bit in this one.

The story of this match was established early on in commentary when Kevin Kelly talked about Stuka's history of winning 7 mask vs mask matches in Mexico. How protective he is of his mask. That theme would play on and ultimately play into the finish. Kamaitachi spent the majority of the match trying to unmask Stuka. Stuka was impressive throughout and received an ovation from the crowd when the match ended.

The finishing sequence saw Kamaitachi pull the referee into the path of a charging Stuka Jr. The ref was laid out. Stuka gets revenge on Daniels for his constant interference by hitting a twisting plancha from the top rope onto him at ringside. He then hits the "El Torpedo" on Kamaitachi inside the ring but there is no ref to make the count. As the ref is coming to, Kamaitachi unmasks Stuka Jr, he then rolls him up for a pinning attempt. Stuka tries frantically to put his mask back on and while he is doing so, is pinned for the 3 count by Kamaitachi.

- The continuing cross promotion between New Japan and Ring Of Honor is great for both sides and now the addition of CMLL will only strengthen that. One can only hope that there may be future ppv events taking place in Mexico and Japan. It's good for all 3 promotions.

- A black and white video package airs of the on-going story between BJ Whitmer, Steve Corino and Kevin Sullivan. This nearly forgotten feud has definitely been on the back burner on the list of ROH priorities.

- Replay ad for Death Before Dishonor airs.

ROH TV MAIN EVENT

JAY BRISCOE AND JAY WHITE BATTLE TO A 20 MINUTE TV TIME LIMIT DRAW

The premise of this match was that ROH matchmaker, Nigel McGuinness booked this as a way to test the undefeated rookie Jay White. Mark Briscoe accompanied his brother Jay to ringside while The Motor City Machine Guns were in Jay White's corner. Rare occasion in wrestling where the talent in both corners are really only there for moral support and not to get involved in the action.

Solid match. It started off as technical struggle early on. Both men displaying their athleticism but then it eventually transitioned into a physical battle. Jay White got cut above his right eye. This almost felt like a initiation styled match with The ROH mainstay in Jay Briscoe roughing up the ROH rookie and Jay White.

Briscoe was getting the better of White in the late stages of this match. Story here was White refusing to back down and trying to survive the onslaught. White at one point, looked like he was legitimately concussed when Briscoe landed on him on the outside after a suicide dive. White's head snapped into the barricade during that collision.

Final sequence saw Jay Briscoe superplex Jay White from the top rope. Both men struggled to get back up after their crash landing. They begin exchanging multiple strikes as the bell rings and the match is announced as a tv time limit draw. The trainers rush in to check on both competitors as the crowd chants "That was wrestling".
The show closes with one last plug for the replay of Death Before Dishonor.

Closing Thoughts:

Part of what keeps promotions like Ring Of Honor and TNA to an extent still alive and breathing is the ability to control costs. ROH has always been the fiscally responsible promotion. By taping so far in advance and never doing live TV shows. Ring of Honor survives due to good budgeting and wise cost management. Their TV leading into Death Before Dishonor was as good as it gets. The Lethal-Cole saga played out on TV, harkened back to the great episodic style of wrestling in the territory days. Unfortunately because of the bulk tapings back in late July. The great climax of Cole-Lethal at the ppv wasn't followed up properly.It was on on their youtube page but not on their TV show. Missed opportunity. At the bare minimum, Some simple video recap or post match interviews from that main event should have been shown on this episode. Admittedly, This was a crazy and hectic few days in the industry where a tv show like this will be lost in the shuffle, barely noticed and buried under all the wrestling rubble. Just like this recap will probably be. Insert smiley face.