BRM Reviews ROH The Epic Encoutner

[Big Red Machine]

ROH The Epic Encounter (4/12/2003)- Philadelphia, PA

BACKSTAGE SEGMENT WITH AJ, RED, LONDON, & ALEXIS LAREE- GREAT!

THE BACKSEAT BOYZ vs. DA HIT SQUAD- 3/10. What was the point of having Da Hit Squad dominate the whole time. They were one of the biggest tag teams on the indies at this point. They could have done the same finish (because the finish is really what was important in this match) but had a competitive match, and this would have been much better.

TAG TEAM SCRAMBLE MATCH: The Carnage Crew vs. The Ring Crew Express vs. Special K (Dixie & Hydro) (w/Special K)- 4.5/10. Spotfest

AFTERMATH- okay

ROH TAG TEAM TITLE MATCH: AJ Styles & Amazing Red(c) (w/Alexis laree) vs. The Briscoe Brothers- 7.25/10

BJ WHITMER vs. CM PUNK- 6/10

HOMICIDE vs. CHRISTOPHER DANIELS (w/Allison Danger)- 7/10. Very good aftermath.

ALEXIS LAREE vs. ARIEL- Squash.

SAMOA JOE vs. HOTSUFF HERNANDEZ- 5/10. Excellent booking here by Gabe. Joe looked absolutely dominant beating a guy who is bigger than he is.

SAMOA JOE PROMO- good set up for the next match

FOUR CORNER SURVIVAL MATCH FOR THE ROH TITLE: Samoa Joe(c) vs. Colt Cabana vs. Matt Stryker vs. Tom Carter- 7.5/10. Great match, which once again made Joe look extremely strong while getting everyone else over again.

2 OUT OF 3 FALLS MATCH: Bryan Danielson vs. Paul London- 9/10. This was the “Epic Encounter” for which this show was named, and it definitely lived up to the hype.

I QUIT BUNKHOUSE RIOT: Team Homicide (Homicide, Iceberg, J-Train, “Lowlife” Louie Ramos, Dusty Rhodes & Becky Bayless) vs. The Group (Jack Victory, David Young, CW Anderson, & Guillotine Legrande, The Bar Room Brawlers, & “The Midnight Rider,” & Simply Luscious)- 3/10. Crap. Not even close to being acceptable for a main event. This was just too chaotic. You couldn’t follow any of the action, and having so many no-names in this match made it hard to keep track of who was on which team. There were no big spots, but there was a lot of blood. “The Midnight Rider” quickly disappeared after being revealed to not be Dusty Rhodes.

POST-MATCH PROMO BY DUSTY, HOMICIDE, & JULIUS SMOKES- good

SECOND CITY SAINTS PROMO- Great promo by Punk. Good character work by Cabana.

THE CARNAGE CREW BEAT UP THE RING CREW- okay.

THE PROPHECY & MONSTA MACK SEGMENT- Good promo by Daniels and a great interaction between Maff & Mack.

Gabe alluded to the scripted nature of wrestling on commentary multiple times, which annoyed me a lot.

Overall, a decent shot from ROH. It had some great stuff, and it had some total crap. The good generally outweighed the bad, though, so I would recommend it, the Epic Encounter makes it a must-buy for fans of Bryan Danielson and Paul London.

[yourcrapsweak]

Gabe on commentary is too much. It's not that he's pointing out the obvious, but he's just pointing things out too much. It's like every time I've heard him he is just there to get over his storylines and it gets annoying when that's all he talks about for the whole match. Sometimes the match is over before he finishes telling the story behind the match and it's like "I didn't even watch the freakin' thing because you were blabbing the whole damn time!"

[Big Red Machine]

Gabe on commentary is too much. It's not that he's pointing out the obvious, but he's just pointing things out too much. It's like every time I've heard him he is just there to get over his storylines and it gets annoying when that's all he talks about for the whole match. Sometimes the match is over before he finishes telling the story behind the match and it's like "I didn't even watch the freakin' thing because you were blabbing the whole damn time!"

Exactly. He is doing commentary like a booker, rather than like an announcer. The things he points out are almost all things that fans recognize on their own, but it takes the fun out of it if someone just points it out to you.

Image how unenjoyable the build to Taker vs. Triple H this year would be if one of the announcers kept saying "it's like a mirror image of last year! Last year Triple H interrupted Undertaker, and this year Undertaker interrupted Triple H. Last year they wanted to fight, and this year Triple H doesn't want to. It's like a mirror!" all the time.

[badnewzxl]

I agree; a lot of Gabe's ROH commentary comes off that way to me. I liked it better when Lenny Leonard and Dave Prazak did commentary and Gabe/Bower just popped in ("drunk") and said a thing or two.

On a side not (and, embracing the hate) when I first saw Gabe it was on Forever Hardcore and I thought he looked like the bug from Men In Black had gotten inside Tommy Dreamers body :))