BELATED REVIEW: ROH LIVE IN MISSISSAUGA

I had about half of a review typed up the day after the show, but never posted it. For whatever reason, I felt silly about going through each thing and critiquing it, mainly because I had an awesome time and that's what counts, I guess. Most people already know all the details, but I'll quickly hit you up with the results, followed by the highlights of the show. LET'S DO THIS ISH:

ROH IN MISSISSAUGA - 11/13/10

RESULTS + HIGHLIGHTS

Photo - SLAM! Wrestling - click here to view full gallery

QUICK RESULTS

Bobby Dempsey & Grizzly Redwood def. The House of Truth (Michael Elgin & Zach Gowen) with Truth Martini

Mark Briscoe def. Andy "Right Leg" Ridge

Sara Del Rey def. Jamilia Craft

The All Night Express (Kenny King & Rhett Titus) def. Colt Cabana & El Generico to receive a future shot at the World Tag Team Championships

Kyle O'Reilly & Adam Cole def. The Bravado Brothers

Homicide def. Jay Briscoe

The Kings of Wrestling (Chris Hero & Claudio Castagnoli) def. Kevin Steen & Steve Corino to retain the ROH World Tag Team Championships

Roderick Strong def. Christopher Daniels to retain the ROH World Championship

HIGHLIGHTS OF THE SHOW

- I got there late and missed the pre-show, but I was there in time to see Eddie Edwards kick off the show with his arm completely bandaged up from the previous night. He smashed his shoulder into obliteratitry in his match with Chris Hero, which he won, and then he still wrestled in the Survival of the Fittest match later in the night, which he also won. He came out in Mississauga to tell us that he wasn't medically cleared to wrestle, because wrestlers don't stop Eddie Edwards, only doctors do. Seriously though, Eddie Edwards' physical being seems to be completely comprised of PURE MAN. And when Eddie was announcing he was not allowed to wrestle, some drunken hipster beside me was yelling out "YOU PUUUSSSSSY!!!" and all I wanted was Eddie to hear him and beat this doucher's teeth inside out with one arm. Anyway, on with the highlights.

- All of the Zach Gowen one-legged jokes floating around in the crowd ("Figure Four!! durr!" which was soon followed by "Figure Two!!" which doesn't make sense, he's only missing one leg ya dope, followed by me wondering out loud if Zach Gowen and Andy "Right Leg" Ridge should form a tag team that would have two good legs (at least I thought that was funny)).

- Michael Elgin going for a samoan drop on the big slab of dude that is Bobby Dempsey... WHILE going for a fallaway slam on Grizzly Redwood! He, uh... just fell down though. But apparently Elgin nailed this same move on the Briscoes the night before, so one outta two ain't bad.

- Andy Ridge's long, deep, cat-like scratches down his back BEFORE his match started. Why, you ask? Because the night before, Homicide back raked him so hard that he FUCKING BLED. Mark Briscoe then balanced it out by drawing blood on the kid's chest from open hand chops on the outside. You could literally feel the thud in YOUR chest from across the room every time.

- The ovation Andy Ridge received for his match with Mark Briscoe. This was the surprise hit of the night, with Ridge doing more than holding his own against the younger Briscoe. I really like the idea of these "trial series" matches. It makes you go "hey let's see how he'll do against a guy he'll probably lose to" instead of looking at the lineup and going "PFF oh well OBVIOUSLY he's gonna lose boring DURR" which I'm sure a lot of people would do, had they not set up this series of matches.

- The Kings of Wrestling bowing to the Queen of Wrestling, Sara Del Rey, on her birthday.

- Jamilia Craft's ring attire, and how she appeared to be dressed in nothing but tassels.

- Colt Cabana snagging my hat (a lumberjack style winter toque) during his entrance.

- El Generico's new all black attire, complete with a new jacket that reminds me of some kind of stoic Japanese cartoon character that should be wielding an enormous sword. Even his mask is all black (maybe it's just an inside out Generico mask, I don't know), but he looks awesome. His demeanour for the whole match is another highlight of mine, denying Colt high fives and looking like he's filled with sorrow on the apron, until he gets tagged in and the ref has to pull him off Kenny King for beating on him so hard.

- The Steen/Generico story that was the focus for the entire night. Generico's dive onto an interfering Kevin Steen (who was being swallowed up by a hoard of local wrestlers trying to contain him) was awesome, as was Cabana's anger towards Generico for constantly losing focus. Later in the night, Generico came storming through the crowd to distract Kevin Steen long enough to allow the Kings of Wrestling to retain their titles. Then, in a moment of complete D'OH by me, I ran to go pee before the main event. Little did I know, Steen and Generico were having a scary brawl all over the place and I missed it ALL. Except for when Generico whiffed past me in a rage while I came out of the bathroom. Damnit.

- Kyle O'Reilly and Adam Cole. I'd never seen these guys live before and they delivered against a crowd that was vehemently against the Bravado Brothers (there's only room for one "B" brothers in ROH, you guys!). They threw suplexes and handed out submission holds like they were that dude on the sidewalk trying to get you to come to his club called "Li3uid" or something (the 3 is a q).

- Homicide's overness. He easily got the biggest pop of the night. And the only sign of the night... if you don't count the three guys in the front row who wore matching "We love Todd Sinclair" shirts.

- The awesome, tooth and nail brawling between Homicide and Briscoe. They can tear it up BIG TIME.

- Homicide's Eddie Guerrero tribute (and, I suppose, simultaneous ODB tribute as he was wearing a Wu-Tang shirt). Homicide hit the Three Amigos and pointing to the sky, did a ton of Eddie shoulder taunts, and even won the match with the old "loosen the boot" trick. Even if that didn't make sense (it was kinda strange... he just started loosening the boot out of nowhere, Jay grabbed it, it came off, and he finished him off), it was still cool to hear a room full of wrestling fans chanting for Eddie.

- Kevin Steen's pre-match promo. He is scary good on the mic. He can elicit boos, laughs and the kinds of "OHHHH's" that you only hear when wrestling fans think you've gone too far. Yeah. Wrestling fans.

- The entire tag title match. My personal favourite of the night. The Kings of Wrestling are just untouchable when it comes to tag team wrestling, and Steen and Corino are such fun heels to boo (Corino stuck his thumb up Hero's ass when he had him in an abdominal stretch... then SMELLED it. HOW CAN YOU NOT BOO THAT?!). Special mention to Claudio's UFO (which got it's own chant!) on Steve Corino, and Corino and Steen using the Sharpshooter/Crossface combo on Hero (drawing big heat from the crowd as they denounced their Canadian hertiage before the match, as Steen declared that him being from Quebec (always gets instant heat in Ontario) made him better than us).

- Roderick Strong slamming Christopher Daniels all over the apron. I'm pretty sure there were at least two apron bumps that made me cringe.

- Strong and Daniels' chemistry in the ring. These guys can really wrestle well together, even if a lot of the crowd didn't get fully invested in this match. I was definitely into it and thought that Daniels could take the belt in a shocker, but he ended up losing.

- Seeing Tatanka, Jimmy Korderas, Arda Ocal of Right After Wrestling all in attendance, and Mark Briscoe in the beer line.

It had been a while since I'd seen ROH live, and while they didn't have a bunch of key guys (Aries, Davey, Omega, Eddie), they still put on a hell of a show. They're back in Toronto on April 30th, which I'm almost positive I'll be in town for, so I'll be there drinking beers and shouting pure hate at Truth Martini's hair.

Also, this review ended up being way more long winded than I'd planned. The more I looked through photos, the more I remembered, and the more I remembered, the more I realized how much fun I had, and the more I realized how much fun I had, the more I wrote about how much fun I had, and the more I wrote about how much fun I had, the more I felt the need to explain why this was so long winded, and here we are.

That's enough.

2009 IN REVIEW: HOME STRETCH

As I mentioned in my last post, it's taking a coon's age (a COON'S!) to finish this 2009 review. I didn't have too much left to cover, but I didn't want to just leave these things behind.

So here is what remains of my 2009 review:

MOMENTS

2009

CM PUNK CASHES IN - AGAIN

I got nervous nerd sweats when Punk came out and cashed in his MITB contract on Jeff Hardy, in fear of him being the first guy to fail. But he didn't. And I nerd-rejoiced. Unlike this guy. Holy fuck is that hilarious to listen to.

SEEING KENTA AND NAKAJIMA LIVE IN THE SAME YEAR

I was super lucky this past year as I got to see both KENTA and Katsuhiko Nakajima wrestle live in front of my face, both for ROH events. The atmosphere was incredible for both of them.

ROH WORLD TITLE CHANGES

After 545 days of Nigel McGuinness holding the ROH World Title, two title changes in the same year was massive. The crowd reactions are always goose-pimply to watch.

SANTINO MARELLA

Santino is, full-stop, the funniest man to come through the WWE since Chris Jericho. No matter how bad RAW would get, if Santino showed up, I could laugh through the tears.

STARS

2009

Photo courtesy of Scott Finkelstein's Get Lost Photography

NIGEL MCGUINNESS

Even with the two title changes this year, some people forget that Nigel still held the ROH belt for the first four months of this year, and knocked out some great matches before becoming Desmond Wolfe - where he was elevated to the main event (for a sec) with matches against Kurt Angle.

HONOURABLE MENTION: MIZ AND MORRISON

Both of these guys managed to succeed without their bro by winning the US and Intercontinental titles, respectively. Once it's time for them to step up to the main event, it'll feel special, as they've been making that climb nice and slow.

HONOURABLE MENTION: KOFI KINGSTON

Hey, apparently Kofi has charisma! All it took was for him to speak like he normally does, instead of with an accent they made him speak with! It's GENIUS! His feud with Randy Orton had it's ups and downs, and we'll have to wait for 2010 to see where it took him for keeps.

FEUDS

2009

Photo courtesy of Scott Finkelstein's Get Lost Photography

AMERICAN WOLVES VS. KEVIN STEEN & EL GENERICO

The blood feud of the year managed to spark what should be the blood feud of this year. With Steen and Generico losing to the Wolves, then ultimately, the Bucks at Final Battle, Kevin Steen turned on his best bud in a brutal way. But before that, Steenerico fought tooth and nail with the Wolves throughout 2009 and put forward some incredible matches.

HONOURABLE MENTION: CHRISTIAN VS. JACK SWAGGER

Remember when ECW was great? Well, I actually don't know how it is now, since it's been AWOL in Canada, but there was a time at the start of this year when ECW was awesome. Christian and Jack Swagger put on some fantastic TV matches the built to PPV matches, and had a great feud that pitted Christian, a super believable babyface that's easy to get behind, against Jack Swagger, the easier to hate, lisp carrying heel.

FML

2009

GUEST HOST CIRCUS

Kofi Johnson. Evan Braun. SummerFest. "The Show" Triple H. "The Man" Mark Henry. There's gotta be more. Bottom line: RAW was a dice roll every week since Donald Trump came round. Sometimes you rolled a 6 and scored Bob Barker. Other (most) times you rolled a 1 and got Joey Kyle and Jeff Joey or whoever the fuck those Nascar dorks were. Sometimes the show was a trainwreck. Other times it was a hit because of how much of a hilarious trainwreck it was. The worst part is that RAW is being sold to us as a show that asks you to tune in for, not wrestling (sometimes not even storylines!), but to buy whatever some Z-list celebrity is selling.

I can't wait to look back on this in a couple years and be reminded of how this gimmick cheapened any potentially good storyline (ex: Hey, remember that sweet feud DX had? It all started when Verne Troyer got mad because last week Cedric the Entertainer made a match that... ah gad).

HORNSWOGGLE/DXCAPADES

I don't understand the kind of person that is old enough to remember DX but laughs at Hornswoggle. Makes me want to barf.

KID ROCK'S WRESTLEMANIA AIRTIME

Dude spent like twenty minutes rocking out, and got more airtime than JBL/Mysterio from this year (probably countless other guys from other years - like Lance Storm who's got a grand total of 0 WM minutes!). And using his performance to introduce the divas for the battle royale was completely retarded, considering that no one even knew the ones that were returning. God DAMN.

LETDOWNS

2009

JACK SWAGGER MOVED TO RAW

Seriously. Swagger was getting deadly heat on ECW as the top heel. His move to RAW seemed like it was going to be a big deal. It wasn't. He's getting played like the "goofy" heel who loses every week. I fear for his career sometimes. Godspeed, Jack Swagger.

MATT HARDY

Another ECW-to-main-roster letdown. Matt Hardy still gets a pretty big pop for a guy that's done nothing for the past who knows how long. Teaming with The Great Khali has to be a bummer.

TRANSFORMED

2009

Photo courtesy of Scott Finkelstein's Get Lost Photography

CHRIS HERO - TO - THAT YOUNG KNOCKOUT KID

Hero went from being a guy that wasn't featured on every ROH event, to a guy who his at the top of the main event scene. From Sweet 'N' Sour to concussing with his kicks and givin' KO's with his elbows. Hero is the real deal.

BIG SHOW - TO - ENTERTAINING?

Big Show started 2009 as a love interest for Vickie Guerrero. He then actually became entertaining when he found himself paired with Chris Jericho (can that man do ANY wrong?!), spending four months as an integral part of both RAW and Smackdown! But now he's back to being just same old angry Big Show. Eh.

"HEH HEH" BATISTA - TO - "UR SPOSEDA BE MY FRENNNN!!!" BATISTA

I, as much as anybody, was totally sick of that "I shrug off anything because wrestling is fake" Batista. Batista makes so much more sense as a heel to me. And he's killing it on Smackdown! right now.

LIVE

2009

ROH IN NOVI - "ARIES VS. RICHARDS"

Austin Aries vs. Davey Richards was the best match I've ever seen live. The rest of the show, wasn't as great, because that would be impossible, but it was still totally awesome. Steenerico vs. The Young Bucks ruled, as did Hero/Strong. The other highlight would have to be Omega facing Nakajima, which, if I remember correctly, had kind of a fucked up finish, but only because Omega was dropped on his head earlier in the match with a super high angle German Suplex.

ROH IN MISSISSAUGA - "THE OMEGA EFFECT"

Omega vs. Aries was a fantastic match, but maybe not quite as good as Aries' match the night before with Davey. The show was, again, awesome, with Generico/Nakajima maybe topping Omega/Nakajima. I got to see some sweet live wrestling this year.

And that's all. Stay tuned for my final wrap-up that will separate all categories for easy navigation. NEAT!

LIVE 2009: ROH: DBDH VII - 07/24/09, 07/25/09

After seeing Violent Tendencies in Detroit, one month later I had tickets to both nights of the Death Before Dishonor VII Weekend in Toronto. And holy nuts was I excited.

Then a problem struck.

Toronto had been going through a near six-week garbage strike that was stanking up the streets in the middle of a nasty summer. And what was worse? Ted Reeve Arena, home of DBDH VII, was a collection site.

Leading up to the show, we were all just praying that the strike would end, and we wouldn't have to sit and watch a night of wrestling with gas masks strapped to our faces.

Welp, the strike wasn't resolved... but somehow, someway... there was no smell. And I mean no smell. It's as if everybody had been throwing out unused paper towels or something, because it didn't even stink a little (er... in comparison to a normal wrestling show).

Lucky us! Not only that, but I got my belt signed by Bret Hart and Ric Flair. It was an awesome weekend, to say the least.

MATCH OF THE WEEKEND

CHRIS HERO VS. LANCE STORM

There was some amazing wrestling over those two days, but this one without a doubt had the most emotion. Hero going over clean with a devastating elbow was perfect, and everyone was so pissed that they started throwing garbage in the ring. (er, like beer cups, not garbage strike garbage (although that garbage did get involved in the Cabana/Ryan match)). That kind of heat is rare these days, especially for a guy like Hero who is pretty over with the ROH fans. This is also a testament to how popular Lance Storm is with the Canadian fans, and how well he performed.

Then, after the match, Storm made us all cry with a farewell speech.

A fantastic ending to an exhaustingly exciting weekend of shows.

HIGHLIGHTS

NIGHT ONE

- The dueling "OLE!" and "SONJAY!" chants for Generico/Dutt, which went to a crisp, very exciting 15-minute draw.

- How surprisingly over D-Lo was, and how absolutely hated Frankie the Mobster was.

- Grizzly Redwood getting beat to all hell and bloodied by Bison Smith (not to mention the rest of a sprawling 8-Man Eliminaton Brawl).

- Storm/Steen vs. Hero/Davey had us in the palm of their hands at times.

- Nigel with a Tower of London to Jerry Lynn, to the outside, through a table.

- Tyler has us all believing he's closing in on the title, with moments like this.

- Nigel is knocked silly with a Cradle Piledriver, and then Aries slips on the turnbuckle and turns his 450 into about a 370 or so (my math ain't so good, h'yuk)

NIGHT TWO

- Smash Bros going over Steenerico in a fun upset.

- Bison Smith doing his superman-crowd-barrier dive, crushing Frankie the Mobster.

- Toronto Gauntlet was really well done, thought the booking was perfect (such a dink thing to say, but it was really great).

- Necro Butcher absolutely CLOBBERING time keeper Giuseppe di Lorento with a sick chairshot, bending it over his effing head.

- People hating the fuck out of the European Rules match (felt bad for those guys, but... the match was silly).

- Bobby Cruise making fun of these guys.

- Joey Ryan vs. Colt Cabana in the best comedy match I've seen live, which included the first-ever Todd Sinclair chant, as far as I can remember.

- Omega pinning Aries in a great six man.

- Storm/Hero closing the weekend right.

And lastly, the full card:

NIGHT ONE

OPENING MATCH

El Generico vs. Sonjay Dutt

TAG TEAM MATCH

The Briscoes vs. The Super Smash Brothers

SINGLES MATCH

D-Lo Brown vs. Frankie The Mobster

8-MAN ELIMINATION MATCH

Necro Butcher, Brent Albright, Colt Cabana & Grizzly Redwoow vs. Jimmy Rave, Joey Ryan, Claudio Castagnoli & Bison Smith

GRUDGE MATCH

Kenny King vs. Kenny Omega

TAG TEAM MATCH

Lance Storm & Kevin Steen vs. Chris Hero & Davey Richards

MAIN EVENT ROH TITLE FOUR CORNER SURVIVAL

Austin Aries vs. Tyler Black vs. Jerry Lynn vs. Nigel McGuinness

NIGHT TWO

OPENING MATCH

Kevin Steen & El Generico vs. The Super Smash Brothers

SINGLES MATCH

Bison Smith vs. Frankie The Mobster

TORONTO GAUNTLET

D-Lo Brown vs. Jerry Lynn vs. Sonjay Dutt vs. Jimmy Rave vs. Necro Butcher vs. Davey Richards

EUROPEAN RULES MATCH

Claudio Castagnoli vs. Brent Albright

SINGLES MATCH

Tyler Black vs. Tyson Dux (Replacing the injured Nigel McGuinness)

NO DISQUALIFICATION MATCH

Joey Ryan vs. Colt Cabana

SIX MAN TAG TEAM MATCH

Kenny Omega & The Briscoes vs. Austin Aries, Rhett Titus & Kenny King

MAIN EVENT

Chris Hero vs. Lance Storm

LIVE 2009: ROH: VIOLENT TENDENCIES - 06/26/09

I was lucky enough to see about six nights worth of live wrestling this year (5 ROH, 1 WWE), which is about double of what I saw last year. Here's what I saw, starting in chronological order, in Detroit...

This was the first ever ROH (or wrestling in general) show that I'd ever gone to outside of Canada. It was the first cage match I'd ever seen live. And it was the first time ever seeing KENTA live, and the show opened with him and Cary Silkin, as well as the rest of the roster, coming out for a Misawa tribute, as it was the first show since his death.

MATCH OF THE NIGHT

AMERICAN WOLVES VS. STRONG & KENTA

AMAZING match. If I hadn't lost my voice already by this point of the show, it was done for after this match. So much fun, and just full-tilt from bell to bell.

What truly made this match even more exciting was that it was originally supposed to be KENTA and Danielson against the wolves, but just a week or two before the match, Danielson suffered a staff infection, and was swapped out for Roddy. So, everyone was officially like "PFFT, they're not winning. F THIS." But this match was done so well and just so damn exciting that there were several points where the entire crowd was on their feet, thinking that the Wolves were going to lose.

It was awesome to see KENTA live. You can feel his kicks in your chest like a bass drum at a concert.

HIGHLIGHTS

- The preshow card featured a guy named "Samson" who I haven't seen since, who was amazing. He's a huge Ezekiel Jackon size dude (maybe not that big), with the nickname "The Gangsta". He stepped into the ring looking like a fucking psycho badass... but when his opponent took a swing at him, he screamed and cowered like a little girl. And he would tell the guy he was going to shit on him. It was amazing.

- Albright busts the back of his head open at some point in his match, but finishes the thing.

- Nigel wrestled essentially his only match as a face.

- Steenerico/HoT has a super exciting last few minutes of a match-ending sequence.

- Austin Aries hires Joey "The Hired Magnum" Ryan to ensure that he wins the Six Man Mayhem match, and cuts a hilarious pre-match promo, calling Detroit "Detroilet," and telling Joey "you wax my moustache, I'll wax yours."

- Colt Cabana's "welcome back" chant.

- Cage match ending in complete chaos with an Age of the Fall invasion from all entrances of the arena, after Tyler lands a splash from the top of the cage through a table.

Overall, it was a super fun night, with a pretty ridiculous cast of characters sitting in front of us in the first row, cracking wise (not actually wise). Also got to see Ric Flair for the first time. Woo.

Here's the full card:

OPENER

Silas Young vs. Grizzly Redwood

TAG TEAM MATCH

Erick Stevens & Brent Albright vs. Kenny King & Rhett Titus

GRUDGE MATCH

Claudio Castagnoli vs. Nigel McGuinness

TAG TEAM MATCH

Kevin Steen & El Generico vs. The House of Truth

SIX MAN MAYHEM

Austin Aries vs. Joey Ryan vs. Petey Williams vs. Delirious vs. Sami Callihan vs. Rasche Brown

GRUDGE MATCH

D-Lo Brown vs. Colt Cabana

ROH WORLD TAG TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP MATCH

The American Wolves vs. Roderick Strong & KENTA

MAIN EVENT STEEL CAGE MATCH

Tyler Black vs. Jimmy Jacobs