BRM Reviews the 4/3/2016 ROH

[Big Red Machine]

JAY LETHAL PROMO- great!
He's angry at Dijak for taking out Truth Martini.

reDRagon vs. CHAOS (Kazuchika Okada & Gedo)- 6.5/10
Okada got a monstrous pop. The match was a little disappointing considering that Okada was involved.

BRISCOES PROMO- great.
They pointed out that War Machine have never once beaten them. If I had to book this, I'd probably put the Briscoes over clean in a non-title match (maybe at one of the War of the Worlds shows and air it on TV later) to both set up the title match and to really dive things home, setting up for a big title match at Best in the World.

ADAM COLE vs. KUSHIDA- 7.5/10
The announcers point out that Cole is now wearing plain black gear instead of his Kingdom gear. I was definitely hoping for more from this match. That being said, I checked the time after the match ended and was amazed to discover that this only went twelve minutes, including commercials.

DALTON CASTLE PROMO- bad.
You're building up to a FIGHT WITHOUT HONOR! This is not the time for comedy.

THE ADDICTION vs. MOTOR CITY MACHINE GUNS- 7.25/10
The action was great and all but... that's it? They spend six months building up to this and then they just throw this match out here on free TV with no hype and the babyfaces go over clean? I know I've complained about the number of f*ck finishes lately but I think it would have been better to have the Addiction get themselves DQed here, especially if they were just going to jump the Guns after the match.
Speaking of which, there was a...

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- I REALLY liked it, but also kind of didn't.
Kaz and Daniels jump MCMG after the match. Then Sydal and KUSHIDA came out to make the save. I thought this was extremely random until Kevin Kelly pointed out that both guys are pals of Shelley's. This was good.
Then the Young Bucks came out and attack Sydal and KUSHIDA for no reason. The announcers tried to claim that it was them trying to get some sort of advantage by attacking other teams in the division, except that Sydal & KUSHIDA aren't even a team! If this was ACH this would have made a lot more sense.
Anyway, this devolved into a big brawl and the announcers tried to put it over as "wow! Look how wild the tag team division is with so many great teams and they all want to fight each other all the time" but it came across to me as brawling for the sake of brawling. This is also pretty much the same justification they used for the random Briscoes vs. ANX vs. Bucks brawl that led to the match at Final Battle, so it also came across to me as quite lazy.
Another reason I didn't like it (well... really more the inclusion of the Bucks than anything else) is because I think throwing the Bucks in there and turning this into some big four way pulls the focus away from where it should be, which was MCMG vs. Addiction. I thought that having KUSHIDA and Sydal make the save was very clever because it sets up matches like Addiction vs. Time Splitters or Addiction vs. Shelley & Sydal or singles matches between the Addiction and KUSHIDA or Shelley that can be used to draw out the main feud (MCMG vs. Addiction) without having to give the match away all the time and by setting up matches that you can have go to clean finishes without hurting that feud. Once you stick the Bucks in there, though, it makes KUSHIDA & Sydal feel like they're supposed to be a team that is part of this feud rather than just two guys who came out to save their friends, and also just muddies everything up. It also pretty much forces you to book MCMG vs. Bucks very soon (which they have already done both in Philly and TWICE this weekend) which is a huge waste because I think that could sure as hell draw on PPV.

Anyway, this was a hard episode of ROH to evaluate. There is no question that the matches were all pretty great, but the last two matches both should have felt a lot bigger than they did. As an overall whole, this show less than the sum of its parts.

[Bulletclubfan2014]

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- I REALLY liked it, but also kind of didn't.
Kaz and Daniels jump MCMG after the match. Then Sydal and KUSHIDA came out to make the save. I thought this was extremely random until Kevin Kelly pointed out that both guys are pals of Shelley's. This was good.
Then the Young Bucks came out and attack Sydal and KUSHIDA for no reason. The announcers tried to claim that it was them trying to get some sort of advantage by attacking other teams in the division, except that Sydal & KUSHIDA aren't even a team! If this was ACH this would have made a lot more sense.
Anyway, this devolved into a big brawl and the announcers tried to put it over as "wow! Look how wild the tag team division is with so many great teams and they all want to fight each other all the time" but it came across to me as brawling for the sake of brawling. This is also pretty much the same justification they used for the random Briscoes vs. ANX vs. Bucks brawl that led to the match at Final Battle, so it also came across to me as quite lazy.
Another reason I didn't like it (well... really more the inclusion of the Bucks than anything else) is because I think throwing the Bucks in there and turning this into some big four way pulls the focus away from where it should be, which was MCMG vs. Addiction. I thought that having KUSHIDA and Sydal make the save was very clever because it sets up matches like Addiction vs. Time Splitters or Addiction vs. Shelley & Sydal or singles matches between the Addiction and KUSHIDA or Shelley that can be used to draw out the main feud (MCMG vs. Addiction) without having to give the match away all the time and by setting up matches that you can have go to clean finishes without hurting that feud. Once you stick the Bucks in there, though, it makes KUSHIDA & Sydal feel like they're supposed to be a team that is part of this feud rather than just two guys who came out to save their friends, and also just muddies everything up. It also pretty much forces you to book MCMG vs. Bucks very soon (which they have already done both in Philly and TWICE this weekend) which is a huge waste because I think that could sure as hell draw on PPV.

Actually The Young Bucks ever since they joined the Bullet Club there gimmick has been they hate when any team other than them has spotlight on them and they're not involved so they have to come out and get involved for no reason every time also Kushida is the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Champion which I'd assume one of them might like to challenge for and Sydal is 1 half of the IWGP Junior Tag Champions which they want back so it actually does make sense for them to attack Kushida and Sydal to "gain an advantage on them"

[Big Red Machine]

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- I REALLY liked it, but also kind of didn't.
Kaz and Daniels jump MCMG after the match. Then Sydal and KUSHIDA came out to make the save. I thought this was extremely random until Kevin Kelly pointed out that both guys are pals of Shelley's. This was good.
Then the Young Bucks came out and attack Sydal and KUSHIDA for no reason. The announcers tried to claim that it was them trying to get some sort of advantage by attacking other teams in the division, except that Sydal & KUSHIDA aren't even a team! If this was ACH this would have made a lot more sense.
Anyway, this devolved into a big brawl and the announcers tried to put it over as "wow! Look how wild the tag team division is with so many great teams and they all want to fight each other all the time" but it came across to me as brawling for the sake of brawling. This is also pretty much the same justification they used for the random Briscoes vs. ANX vs. Bucks brawl that led to the match at Final Battle, so it also came across to me as quite lazy.
Another reason I didn't like it (well... really more the inclusion of the Bucks than anything else) is because I think throwing the Bucks in there and turning this into some big four way pulls the focus away from where it should be, which was MCMG vs. Addiction. I thought that having KUSHIDA and Sydal make the save was very clever because it sets up matches like Addiction vs. Time Splitters or Addiction vs. Shelley & Sydal or singles matches between the Addiction and KUSHIDA or Shelley that can be used to draw out the main feud (MCMG vs. Addiction) without having to give the match away all the time and by setting up matches that you can have go to clean finishes without hurting that feud. Once you stick the Bucks in there, though, it makes KUSHIDA & Sydal feel like they're supposed to be a team that is part of this feud rather than just two guys who came out to save their friends, and also just muddies everything up. It also pretty much forces you to book MCMG vs. Bucks very soon (which they have already done both in Philly and TWICE this weekend) which is a huge waste because I think that could sure as hell draw on PPV.

Actually The Young Bucks ever since they joined the Bullet Club there gimmick has been they hate when any team other than them has spotlight on them and they're not involved so they have to come out and get involved for no reason every time also Kushida is the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Champion which I'd assume one of them might like to challenge for and Sydal is 1 half of the IWGP Junior Tag Champions which they want back so it actually does make sense for them to attack Kushida and Sydal to "gain an advantage on them"

That might be their gimmick, but it's bad booking to do it here so it shouldn't have been done (and if that is there gimmick, then they should be cutting promos saying as much or complaining that they aren't getting promo time or whatever).