Ring Of Honor Releases Format & Rules For Pure Title Tournament
As noted, the ROH Pure Title tournament will be happening this month.
ROH has recently released the format and rules of the upcoming tournament.
The Pure Title tournament will begin airing on the "Ring of Honor Wrestling" television show the weekend of September 12 and will play out over eight weeks.
The participants are Matt Sydal, Delirious, Jay Lethal, Dalton Castle, Jonathan Gresham, Tracy Williams, Kenny King, Silas Young, David Finlay, Rocky Romero, PJ Black, Josh Woods, Fred Yehi, Tony Deppen, Wheeler Yuta, and Rust Taylor.
The bracket will be revealed on ROH's Youtube show, "ROH Week By Week" on September 7 at 1 p.m. ET.
Below is the following format and rules for the tournament:
* The competitors will be divided into two blocks, and it's single elimination.
* round 1 matches have a 15-minute time limit.
* Block semifinals have a 20-minute time limit.
* Block finals have a 30-minute time limit.
* The tournament final has a one-hour time limit.
* There will be three judges for each match, and time-limit draws will go to a judges' decision. ROH Director of Operations Gary Juster has been announced as one of the judges.
The rules for Pure matches are as follows:
* Every match begins and ends with the Code of Honor handshake.
* Each wrestler has three rope breaks to stop submission holds and pinfalls. After a wrestler exhausts his rope breaks, submission and pin attempts on or under the ropes by his opponent are legal.
* Closed-fist punches to the face are not permitted; only open-handed slaps or chops to the face are allowed. Punches to other parts of the body are permitted, excluding low blows. The first use of a closed fist will get a warning; the second will be a disqualification.
* As in standard ROH matches, there will be a 20-count when a wrestler is on the floor.
* Outside interference will result in automatic termination from the roster for the wrestler that interferes.
* Once a Pure Champion is crowned, the title can change hands via disqualification and count-out.
The Pure Title was created in 2004 with AJ Styles as the first champion.