BRM Reviews ROH Supercard of Honor VII

[Big Red Machine]

ROH Supercard of Honor VII (4/5/2013)- New York, NY

ACH & TADARIUS THOMAS vs. Q.T. MARSHALL & R.D. EVANS- 4.5/10
R.D. Evans was fun and ACH looked good. Marshall remains unimpressive and Thomas didn’t get the chance to do much.

Next Shelton Benjamin came out and put over Cheeseburger for standing up to Charlie Haas, but this was interrupted by the return of Mike Bennett (and Maria Kanellis and Brutal Bob). Bennett starts to talk himself up and teases a big announcement about his future when Cheeseburger grabs the mic and tells Bennett, Brutal Bob (“your father”) and Maria (“your cum-burping gutter-slut”) to go back to Boston, which gets a pop from the crowd. Bennett punches Cheeseburger out and Kevin Kelly has the audacity to criticize Mike Bennett for this! The kid just called Bennett’s fiancée a “cum-burping gutter-slut!” What the hell was Bennett supposed to do?
Shelton then says “well… I guess I found my match” and sucker-punches Bennett. While I normally would criticize this as horrible behavior for a babyface, Shelton hasn’t actually done anything to become a babyface. He got turned on by another heel then put over someone who was feuding with said heel. He might well still be the same jerk we saw in ROH throughout all of 2012, so this is still in character for him.

SHELTON BENJAMIN vs. “THE PRODIGY” MIKE BENNETT (w/Maria Kanellis & “Brutal” Bob Evans)- 6.25/10
Good match. Bennett’s dog and pony show stuff manages to both be fun and get good heat, and the wrestling was good, too.

WINNER GETS A FUTURE ROH WORLD TITLE SHOT: Michael Elgin vs. Jay Lethal- 8.5/10
Twenty minutes of awesome! These guys did an outstanding job putting this match together. They started off with some great sequence and then tt just build and build and build until the big finish.

After the match both men are attacked by SCUM and Corino cutting a promo calling out ROH’s team, leading to…

B.J. WHITMER, CAPRICE COLEMAN, CEDRIC ALEXANDER, MARK BRISCOE, & “NO FEAR” MIKE MONDO vs. SCUM (Rhino, Cliff Compton, Jimmy Jacobs, Jimmy Rave & Rhett Titus)- 6.25/10
Good for what it was, which was a big brawl and a flurry of finishers. The heels used some foreign objects, handcuffed Whitmer to the ropes, and Steve Corino attacked Caleb Seltzer.

RODERICK STRONG vs. KARL “MACHINE GUN” ANDERSON- 6.75/10
A good match, but I was expecting more out of them.

TRIPLE THREAT ELIMINATION MATCH FOR THE ROH TV TITLE: Matt Taven(c) (w/Truth Martini & and Scarlet) vs. Adam Cole vs. Matt Hardy- 5.25/10
Scarlett Bordeaux is once again appearing as a Hoopla Hottie. This is the fourth time ROH has used Scarlett in this role, so this seems to be a regular thing (which makes my thing extremely happy). Not only did Scarlett get officially named tonight, but she also took her shirt off and gave Nigel a lap-dance in the middle of the match (lucky British bastard!). Unfortunately this really did distract from the match a lot, as rather than cheering for the action, the fans chanted “SHOW YOUR TITS!” I know that you can’t control the fans, but for the love of G-d the damn cameraman should have been paying attention to the match rather than to Scarlett.
The match itself didn’t go particularly long. They did a few nice spots and then went right into their finishes. Cole pays Hardy back for Final Battle, eliminating him with a low blow and a small package, then goes after Corino and winds up getting hit with Taven’s finisher for pin. The match did have great atmosphere, though, as the fans were all over Hardy with chants of “F*ck you, Hardy!” and “you fat f*ck!” and popped huge whenever Cole went after him.

ROH WORLD TAG TEAM TITLE MATCH: reDRagon(c) vs. the American Wolves- 8.5/10
A fantastic display of wrestling, athleticism, and striking with a few nice submissions thrown in there, too. It’s a shame Kyle had to ruin it by cheating!

ROH WORLD TITLE MATCH: Kevin Steen(c) vs. Jay Briscoe- 7/10
Maybe I would have enjoyed this a bit more if the problems with the stream hadn’t spoiled the result for me, but I was quite disappointed in this match. Steen losing the belt needed be an epic match with great nearfalls. This really didn’t have many, which was disappointing, especially aftr they did such a great job setting up Steen working over Jay’s arm and Jay working over Steen’s neck. Steen spent the whole match concentrating his offense on Jay’s arm but they only used the crossface for one false finish? Come on!
I was fine with most of the overbooking, aside from the Matt Hardy part. Steen turning on SCUM needed to feel big, and just kicking Matt Hardy didn’t feel as big as this needed to be. Steen’s turn needed to be a big moment where Steen stands up for ROH as a whole (something like Gabe’s plans to have Tyler Black turn babyface on the Age of the Fall). Have all of SCUM in the ring and have Corino tell Steen to throw the ROH World Title in the trash but have Steen say that he doesn’t want to kill ROH. That without Cornette ROH has reverted to being the company that he loved and was heartbroken when he had to leave, and have SCUM beat him down. Just having Steen attack one member of SCUM for interfering in his match wasn’t anywhere near big enough, and doing it two minutes before the huge moment of Jay Briscoe finally capturing the ROH World Title made it feel even smaller.

While I won’t deny that Jay’s win was a huge moment and that the usually pro-Steen NYC crowd popped huge for it, I, for one, am not a fan of it. Jay is a great wrestler, but I really don’t think he can carry the company as a singles wrestler. Most of the upcoming title matches (Cole, Whitmer, Elgin) are much more appealing to me with Steen as champion than with Jay, and with the Wolves as the only other main event level tag team aside from the champions, I think the tag division really needs the Briscoes right now. This will likely be a short reign (something else I’m not a fan of). Maybe I’ll be eating my words next month, but I don’t see Jay walking out of Border Wars 2013 as ROH World Champion.

Overall, a great show from ROH, despite my issues with the main event. Lethal vs. Elgin and the tag title match are both certainly worth going out of your way to see. I would definitely recommend picking this up when it comes out on DVD (don’t order the iPPV replay, though, as the stream is still flawed. It took me hours of trying to see the final five minutes of the main event, and I still had to watch it in about twenty-second chunks… and this was on SUNDAY).

STUPID ANNOUNCER QUOTES:
1. Caleb Seltzer says that Mike Mondo’s injury kept him out for almost a year. Those of us who can do math will tell you it hasn’t even been half that. To make things worse, for the past three months, Mondo has been going around proudly telling everyone how much earlier than the original one year prognosis he would be returning.