ROH Final Battle 2014
ROH Final Battle 2014 (12/7/2014)- New York, NY
PRE-SHOW BONUS MATCH: Brutal Burgers vs. Mikey Webb & BJ Whitmer- 2.75/10
Whitmer says he was impressed with Webb at a recent ROH tryout camp so he is giving him an audition of sorts to be the Decade’s new young boy. Brutal Burgers win when Webb gets pinned, so Whitmer attacks him afterward.
YEAR IN REVIEW VIDEO PACKAGE- awesome!
FOUR CORNER SURVIVAL MATCH: Mark Briscoe vs. Caprice Coleman vs. Hanson vs. Jimmy Jacobs (w/BJ Whitmer)- 6.5/10
RODERICK STRONG vs. ADAM PAGE (w/the Decade)- 7/10
Before this match started we got a quick little segment in which Jimmy Jacobs set the stage for this match, and then we got the first little moment that eventually lead to the split between Jacobs and Whitmer. The match was great, and when all is said and done, this will be remember as exactly what Jimmy Jacobs said it could be: the beginning of the rise of Adam Page.
It’s very rare when the right finish for a match is for the heel to valiantly fight the pain but then pass out in a submission hold. Props to Delirious for recognizing a rare opportunity when it comes along.
TOMMASO CIAMPA vs. MICHAEL ELGIN- 7.5/10
Next up was Elgin vs. Ciampa. They did a spot where Ciampa prevented a delayed vertical suplex by grabbing Elgin’s testicles. He then held on and squeezed, even after Elgin had put him down. This was not a DQ. If you’ll recall, the angle is that Ciampa has to be on his best behavior or else he will be fired. Later in the match, they did a spot where Elgin ducked a lariat, causing Ciampa to nail a ref, and we were supposed to buy this as a big deal because Nigel stormed off in anger… but the fact that there was no DQ for a testicular claw completely killed the angle.
That aside, this was one hell of a slugfest which, believe it or not, came off a lot better on the DVD than it did live. I didn’t even hate the spot where Ciampa kicked out at one this time around. Also, the finish, which looked utterly sick from my vantage point three stories up, did not disappoint from the camera on the floor.
CEDRIC ALEXANDER & THE ADDICTION vs. ACH & THE YOUNG BUCKS- 7/10
This was your spotfest for the evening.
R.D. EVANS vs. MOOSE (w/Stokely Hathaway)- 3.75/10
The entrance graphic said Veda Scott was supposed to be out here with R.D. but she didn’t come out. She did come out later in order to turn on R.D. Also, Prince Nana showed up. The match was okay until R.D. did what appeared to be a comedy spot where he purposely botched one or two things and the crowd did not respond to it well at all.
Moose, Stokely, Veda, and Prince Nana all celebrated together after the match. Nana would never be seen with this stable again.
ROH TV TITLE MATCH: Jay Lethal(c) (w/Truth Martini & J. Diesel) vs. Matt Sydal- 7.25/10
A really cool finish, but I wish they would have done more before getting around to it.
ROH WORLD TAG TEAM TITLE MATCH: reDRagon(c) vs. Time Splitters- 8.75/10
Just what you’d expect from these two teams: crazy, fast-paced action with both teams working over some arms.
FIGHT WITHOUT HONOR FOR THE ROH WORLD TITLE: Jay Briscoe(c) vs. Adam Cole- 8.5/10
So… the blow-off fifteen months in the making. They’d already done a Ladder War and had to somehow one-up it. Well… I don’t know if this was a better match than their Ladder War was (both have their pros and cons), but this one was definitely more violent.
Something I’m really not a fan of is staple-guns in wrestling matches, but that just has to do with me being a little squeamish. I believe this was the only use of a staple-gun in ROH outside of the ROH vs. CZW feud, so the use of it here really did help sell the hate. What they did with it was have Adam Cole take a sign he had put on seats he reserved for the Briscoe’s parents and stapled the sign to Jay’s forehead. Jay proceeded to spend the next few minutes actually wrestling with the sign hanging from his face. It was quite disturbing… but once again I’m okay with that here because of the way it helped sell the hate.
Something that I’m REALLY not a fan of are these â€"oh no! The commission might stop this match!†spots. You can’t argue that this one wasn’t well done, but that doesn’t justify doing this spot which has the potential to kill a crowd’s atmosphere with worry that they are getting screwed out of their main event (and has no re-watch value, either) because when all is said and done, if the time they spent on this commission tease was spent on… you know… actually wrestling, the match would have been better. While they were at a slow-point when the doctors came out, it still felt like things had been â€"reset†when they got going again, causing some important momentum to be lost.
This was quite the violent match. Probably as close as we’ll see ROH get to a deathmatch (for which I am grateful). In addition to the staple-gun they also used thumbtacks as well the usual assortment of weapons to great effect. This definitely felt like a worthy blow-off for a feud that has been on-going for over a year. Major props are also due to Adam Cole, who wrestled the match with a major shoulder injury, but you would never have known it from his performance.
I’m not usually one to comment on (or even notice) these things, but the production values for this show were pretty bad. The camera set-up- especially their hard-cam shots with the ring on a slight tilt and not wide enough to fit the whole ring- was terrible. It was both disorienting and frustrating. The lighting of the ring was fine, but one side of the crowd was bathed in this blue light that both drew your eyes to it and also hurt them when you weren’t focusing on it. The crowd mic seemed to just completely die sometimes, especially during the main event, resulting in some big false finishes to seem like they had almost zero reaction when I can tell you for a fact that the crowd was quite loud. Getting their own JumboTron (Sinclair-o-Tron?) was a nice step up, though.
In the ring, though, it’s hard to argue that this wasn’t a pretty darn awesome show. 2014 was a fairly inconsistent year from ROH, but this was a great note to end it on, setting the tone for the great in-ring year that would be 2015.
PRE-SHOW BONUS MATCH: Brutal Burgers vs. Mikey Webb & BJ Whitmer- 2.75/10
Whitmer says he was impressed with Webb at a recent ROH tryout camp so he is giving him an audition of sorts to be the Decade’s new young boy. Brutal Burgers win when Webb gets pinned, so Whitmer attacks him afterward.
YEAR IN REVIEW VIDEO PACKAGE- awesome!
FOUR CORNER SURVIVAL MATCH: Mark Briscoe vs. Caprice Coleman vs. Hanson vs. Jimmy Jacobs (w/BJ Whitmer)- 6.5/10
RODERICK STRONG vs. ADAM PAGE (w/the Decade)- 7/10
Before this match started we got a quick little segment in which Jimmy Jacobs set the stage for this match, and then we got the first little moment that eventually lead to the split between Jacobs and Whitmer. The match was great, and when all is said and done, this will be remember as exactly what Jimmy Jacobs said it could be: the beginning of the rise of Adam Page.
It’s very rare when the right finish for a match is for the heel to valiantly fight the pain but then pass out in a submission hold. Props to Delirious for recognizing a rare opportunity when it comes along.
TOMMASO CIAMPA vs. MICHAEL ELGIN- 7.5/10
Next up was Elgin vs. Ciampa. They did a spot where Ciampa prevented a delayed vertical suplex by grabbing Elgin’s testicles. He then held on and squeezed, even after Elgin had put him down. This was not a DQ. If you’ll recall, the angle is that Ciampa has to be on his best behavior or else he will be fired. Later in the match, they did a spot where Elgin ducked a lariat, causing Ciampa to nail a ref, and we were supposed to buy this as a big deal because Nigel stormed off in anger… but the fact that there was no DQ for a testicular claw completely killed the angle.
That aside, this was one hell of a slugfest which, believe it or not, came off a lot better on the DVD than it did live. I didn’t even hate the spot where Ciampa kicked out at one this time around. Also, the finish, which looked utterly sick from my vantage point three stories up, did not disappoint from the camera on the floor.
CEDRIC ALEXANDER & THE ADDICTION vs. ACH & THE YOUNG BUCKS- 7/10
This was your spotfest for the evening.
R.D. EVANS vs. MOOSE (w/Stokely Hathaway)- 3.75/10
The entrance graphic said Veda Scott was supposed to be out here with R.D. but she didn’t come out. She did come out later in order to turn on R.D. Also, Prince Nana showed up. The match was okay until R.D. did what appeared to be a comedy spot where he purposely botched one or two things and the crowd did not respond to it well at all.
Moose, Stokely, Veda, and Prince Nana all celebrated together after the match. Nana would never be seen with this stable again.
ROH TV TITLE MATCH: Jay Lethal(c) (w/Truth Martini & J. Diesel) vs. Matt Sydal- 7.25/10
A really cool finish, but I wish they would have done more before getting around to it.
ROH WORLD TAG TEAM TITLE MATCH: reDRagon(c) vs. Time Splitters- 8.75/10
Just what you’d expect from these two teams: crazy, fast-paced action with both teams working over some arms.
FIGHT WITHOUT HONOR FOR THE ROH WORLD TITLE: Jay Briscoe(c) vs. Adam Cole- 8.5/10
So… the blow-off fifteen months in the making. They’d already done a Ladder War and had to somehow one-up it. Well… I don’t know if this was a better match than their Ladder War was (both have their pros and cons), but this one was definitely more violent.
Something I’m really not a fan of is staple-guns in wrestling matches, but that just has to do with me being a little squeamish. I believe this was the only use of a staple-gun in ROH outside of the ROH vs. CZW feud, so the use of it here really did help sell the hate. What they did with it was have Adam Cole take a sign he had put on seats he reserved for the Briscoe’s parents and stapled the sign to Jay’s forehead. Jay proceeded to spend the next few minutes actually wrestling with the sign hanging from his face. It was quite disturbing… but once again I’m okay with that here because of the way it helped sell the hate.
Something that I’m REALLY not a fan of are these â€"oh no! The commission might stop this match!†spots. You can’t argue that this one wasn’t well done, but that doesn’t justify doing this spot which has the potential to kill a crowd’s atmosphere with worry that they are getting screwed out of their main event (and has no re-watch value, either) because when all is said and done, if the time they spent on this commission tease was spent on… you know… actually wrestling, the match would have been better. While they were at a slow-point when the doctors came out, it still felt like things had been â€"reset†when they got going again, causing some important momentum to be lost.
This was quite the violent match. Probably as close as we’ll see ROH get to a deathmatch (for which I am grateful). In addition to the staple-gun they also used thumbtacks as well the usual assortment of weapons to great effect. This definitely felt like a worthy blow-off for a feud that has been on-going for over a year. Major props are also due to Adam Cole, who wrestled the match with a major shoulder injury, but you would never have known it from his performance.
I’m not usually one to comment on (or even notice) these things, but the production values for this show were pretty bad. The camera set-up- especially their hard-cam shots with the ring on a slight tilt and not wide enough to fit the whole ring- was terrible. It was both disorienting and frustrating. The lighting of the ring was fine, but one side of the crowd was bathed in this blue light that both drew your eyes to it and also hurt them when you weren’t focusing on it. The crowd mic seemed to just completely die sometimes, especially during the main event, resulting in some big false finishes to seem like they had almost zero reaction when I can tell you for a fact that the crowd was quite loud. Getting their own JumboTron (Sinclair-o-Tron?) was a nice step up, though.
In the ring, though, it’s hard to argue that this wasn’t a pretty darn awesome show. 2014 was a fairly inconsistent year from ROH, but this was a great note to end it on, setting the tone for the great in-ring year that would be 2015.