BRM Reviews the 1/22/2021 ROH (I'm starting to believe in Shane Taylor)

[Big Red Machine]

QUINN MCKAY’S INTERVIEW WITH DRAGON LEE AFTER LAST WEEK’S MATCH IS INTERRUPTED BY BRODY KING- fine
Brody tells Dragon Lee to tell his family that “this is just the beginning” and he will be seeking revenge on them for screwing him out of the ROH World Title at Final Battle.

JOSH WOODS VIDEO PACKAGE/PROMO- fine
Woods is seeking ROH gold in 2021. He also pushed the idea that he has already beaten one former ROH World Champion in Jay Lethal

DALTON CASTLE VIDEO PACKAGE/PROMO- fine
They got across the idea that he has been struggling lately. He has he has been distracted by things outside of wrestling, but insists that that’s not an excuse. In one of those tremendous Dalton Castle metaphors, he referred to himself as “a box fully of bees,” just read to explode and create all manner of havoc if prodded.

PURE RULES MATCH: Josh Woods vs. Dalton Castle- 6.75/10
While framing this match during the opening of the show, Quinn McKay got across the message that if Dalton wins, he will surely earn a place in the top five rankings in the division (you need to be in the top three to be, eligible for a title shot). They had a good, solid, clean, professional wrestling match. It felt bound by the Pure Rules without relying on them for a story. Woods beat Dalton, so his ascent continues and Dalton’s slide continues.
They did a spot where Woods and referee got into an argument over what counted as a rope break. Props to them for coming up with a spot to set this up where it felt believable that there could be a disagreement.

QUINN MCKAY INTERVIEWS JOSH WOODS- odd
Woods was disappointed because there was too much brawling in his win, and he thinks that’s not in line with the Pure Division. If the rules allow it, I don’t see why Woods should be upset with it. It’s a not “grappling only” division. It allows for certain strikes.
Quinn did a great job of getting across to the audience how their supposed to be feeling/being a viewpoint character for the audience. That being said, they should have re-shot this once she started hesitating in trying to figure out how many weeks it had been since Woods beat Lethal. It’s not a good look for the promotion.

THE FOUNDATION PROMO FROM SOMETIME IN THE PAST, SETTING UP TONIGHT’S MAIN EVENT- okay
OH MY G-D, HOLD THE F*CKING CAMERA STILL!
They want more proof than just turning down titles via forfeit that Shane Taylor Promotions are truly honorable (as Tracy Williams, reminded us, their first interaction with him was jumping him from behind).
I like Tracy Williams a lot, but he came off kind of boring here. Some people are not meant to give long speeches.

SHANE TAYLOR (& SOLDIERS OF SAVAGERY) PROMO- TREMENDOUS!
I’m not sold on Taylor as an ROH main event-level worker quite yet (though more because of a lack of sample size than doubting his abilities), but after listening to this promo, I would love to see them give Taylor the ROH World Title, let Gresham run with the Pure Title and just have them trade verbal jabs (and if Taylor isn’t quite the level of worker that the ROH World Champion ought to be, you can make up for that by using Gresham as the main event more often… and then work that fact into the storyline by having Taylor complain about it).

SHANE TAYLOR PROMOTIONS vs. THE FOUNDATION (Tracy Williams, Jay Lethal, & Jonathan Gresham)- 6.75/10
This match did a TREMENDOUS job of portraying Shane Taylor Promotions (though it was really just the Soldiers of Savagery who needed the boost) as being equal to top guys like Gresham and Lethal. Lethal especially bumped his butt off for them, but the match was designed to get them over on the Foundation while still letting the Foundation feel like the top stars that they are.
I absolutely adored the spot they did early on when the Foundation went to the outside to collect themselves and seemed to be angry that STS were doing more brawling than wrestling (Tracy argued that they should fight fire with fire but Lethal was adamant about sticking to their game-plan) because it did a great job of showing us the sort of snootiness that Taylor had told us that he saw from them. And I especially loved Caprice Coleman calling the Foundation out for this. The Foundation followed the Code of Honor without complaint after the match, so they seem to have accepted that STS are honorable, even if they don’t like how they wrestle.
Taylor pinning Lethal felt like a big deal, but it definitely feels a little watered down by the fact that both he and Woods are doing the thing where they are beating former world champions (Dalton and Lethal for Woods, Briscoe and Lethal for Taylor).



This was another great episode of ROH… other than this one thing:
They announced that next week, Jonathan Gresham would defend the ROH Pure Title against someone named Joe Keys. It hasn’t even been ONE WEEK since they told me that only the top three in a division could challenge for a title, and now they’re giving this random person a title shot?! COME ON! Not even RUSSO forgot his own rules that quickly!