Pro Wrestling Chronicle

John Philapavage is at the Manhattan Center and is texting in results. I’ll be continuously updating and filling in details at intermission and after the show, so check back throughout the night.

The building is packed. Tammy Sytch did an autograph session before the show. The next NYC show was confirmed for the Hammerstein Ballroom on May 10.

1) Delirious vs. Human Tornado ends in a no contest after 2 minutes of comedy and dancing when Age of the Fall (w/ Zach Gowen) attack, setting up…

2) Jimmy Jacobs & Tyler Black defeat Delirious & Human Tornado. Good slow-building match with a beat-down on Delirious building to a hot tag to Tornado. Jacobs scores the win with the guillotine choke.

Ring of Honor World Champion Nigel McGuinness comes out to a hot mixed reaction. The boos eventually take over, including a “You’re a pussy” chant. McGuinness cuts a promo in street clothes and subtly teasing a heel turn, which the fans want badly. He considers pulling out of his match tonight to save himself for the PPV next month. “He’s Mick Foley in ECW.” The negative reaction is callous, but exactly what they’re going for. Bryan Danielson then comes out and cuts an awesome promo putting over the title and past champions and teasing Nigel for threatening to not defend it. This is also a bit heavy-handed, but well done. He promises to beat him in a technical wrestling match rather than working strong style, so Nigel agrees.

3) Brent Albright defeats El Generico. Albright is accompanied by Shane Hagadorn. Very good start, and it remains solid as Albright works the back to build heat, which was greeted with “Jim Belushi” and “Toga!” chants at him, at least partially due to Albright’s inability to draw real heat. Generico sold well and the crowd kept shouting “Ole!” to spur him on. Albright wins with knee strikes.

During the match, John wrote, “So far, the show is smartly built. It should be called ‘ROH Puppet Master’ as Sapolsky and the workers have the crowd reacting exactly as they direct. It’s like a Heyman-booked show at the ECW Arena in 1995-97. Pavlov’s dog booking.”

Larry Sweeney comes out for a promo with Bobby Dempsey to “steal any face heat.” Allison Danger then makes her return and cuts a babyface promo. Sweeney essentially calls her a slut and knocks her out with the mic when she talks back. He then implies that Dempsey should be a man feel her up, and knocks him down onto her. John says that the angle was funny to start, but got a bit uncomfortable as it went on. The crowd eats it up and chants “Man up!” Sweeney says that Sweet & Sour Inc. will begin a hostile takeover of ROH.

4) Kevin Steen defeats Joey Matthews. Steen is over huge. John says each match has been better than the previous, with this being the best. However, some “total jerk-offs” in the crowd are putting a damper on things, but both guys have enough star presence to overcome the lack of heat. At one point, they teased a Package Piledriver off the top rope. The crowd is out for blood, and it seems like more of a WWE crowd near John. After a slower-paced but well-worked match, Steen wins with the Sharpshooter.

They announced the Hammerstein show to the crowd to a big pop.

5) Austin Aries defeats Go Shiozaki. Both guys are very over. Go is a lot bigger than “non-’roid Aries” and his strong style work was over with the crowd. The match starts out great, then settles in to be slow at times, but still good despite some “boring” chants. Many of the fans are expecting “car crash spots”, or may just be quiet due to the face-face match-up. Aries hits a suplex off the apron and a suicide dive. Go makes a comeback to get the crowd going again. Go is “made in New York” here and looks like a young Kobashi minus some athleticism and fire. After an awesome last five minutes with the crowd on fire, Aries wins with a 450 splash. No handshake after the match.

After the match, the lights go out and a spotlight shows Age of the Fall in the balcony, and they ask Aries to join them again. Tammy Sytch comes out to the ring and offers to manage Aries. He says he’ll think about both offers. Lacey and Tammy talk shit back and forth.

Intermission. John has more opinions about the crowd, but I’ll leave it to him to describe as he wants.

6) Sara Del Rey defeats Daizee Haze to retain the Shimmer Championship. This may be the most focused hold/move exchange so far, with “Death Rey” getting the win with her Royal Butterfly suplex. Good match with the crowd digging the finish.

7) Davey Richards & Rocky Romero defeat Jigsaw & Ruckus to retain the ROH World Tag Team Championships John predicts that this match will go over big due to the strong style of NRC and the high spots of the Vulture Squad. And this is confirmed. Best match so far along with Aries-Shiozaki, but with better crowd heat throughout the bulk of the match. Richards & Romero are “GOOD together”. I think a message may have been lost because he didn’t say who won or what the finish was, but it’s clear from the post-match stuff that NRC retains. Jigsaw amd Ruckus tease dissention, and Steen & Generico come out to the stage to challenge for the titles. The crowd wants it, and they charge the ring, but the NRC bails.

8 ) Roderick Strong defeats Erick Stevens and Necro Butcher to retain the FIP Championship Big chant for Necro before the match, and he’s the most over of the three. Lacey is with him. The match is no DQ, count-out, or time limit. Stevens has a bandage on the left side of his head and gets no crowd reaction either way. He attacks Strong on the ramp to start the action. Great hardcore match to start. Necro plays the wild man and the other two want to kill each other. Necro is super over and takes a scary unprotected chair shot. They do a lot of other decent to very good chair spots that are safer. Three-way chop-fest followed by another dangerous chair shot on Necro. Strong hits a dive on both guys. The match is very well-received. Stevens is bloody. Necro gives him a Death Valley Driver into a chair. Strong gives Ncero a Tiger Driver ‘91 through a table and rolls him into the ring for the win. “Thank you Necro” chant and a semi-standing ovation when he finally gets up.

9) Nigel McGuinness defeats Bryan Danielson to retain the ROH World Championship The main event starts at 11:00. Dragon has a Ring of Honor t-shirt on and is playing “over-the-top Captain ROH” and gets a huge face pop. Nigel is already playing heel. John thinks something is up and suspects a swerve since the “double turn” he predicted for the end has already happened. Chain wrestling exchange is won by Danielson. The same goes for submission and mat holds. Nigel gets frustrated and punches the ref to get DQed, which the fans totally buy into. He says he’s leaving, but Aries and Steen stop him and demand he continue. At this point, John predicts that both will tun heel with him, or maybe with Dragon. Cary Silken demands a re-start. Danielson hurts his shoulder and Nigel works over it. It’s a “storyline style match,” which is awesome but not being worked as a potential Match of the Year. Nigel is bleeding. He steals Cattle Mutilation. The match has good heat, but isn’t quite epic yet. Danielson had a few chances to hit his elbow strikes, and the crowd wanted it, but he held up his promise from earlier and didn’t use big strikes. Nigel broke the agreement by hitting a few battering ram head butts a la the Driven match. Danielson went down and Nigel hit elbow strikes, then locked in a Boston Crab-like move on his shoulder for either a verbal submission or a pass-out. Looks as if Nigel will be playing full-on heel and Danielson in an over-the-top “Duggan style” babyface.