BRM Reviews the 2/20/2016 (boring and frustrating)

[Big Red Machine]

The new set looks cool.

ROH TV TITLE MATCH: Roderick Strong(c) vs. Johnathan Gresham- 6.5/10
Before the match, Veda Scott came out and offered Gresham an undisclosed large amount of money to let Cedric Alexander take this TV Title opportunity instead of him and also to leave ROH forever. Gresham told her to scram. Because this is crappy Delirious booking, I am now almost certain that this match will not have a clean finish.
Kevin Kelly referred to Veda Scott as “the caterwauling counselor.” Yes. He really said that. Well… at least now we know who has been responsible for all of those terrible alliterative nicknames that we saw in WWE.com articles for so many years.
The match itself only got about ten minutes of TV time, but they did a great job of convincing me there might have been an upset. Gresham working over (and trying to break) Roddy’s fingers to negate his chops would be an awesome story to kick off a feud between these two… but unfortunately that would require Roddy being the babyface, which he shouldn’t be right now because he just turned heel two months ago.

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- Bobby Fish came out and snatched the TV Title belt from Roddy so Roddy attacked him and they had a brawl that was quickly broken up by security.

BRISCOES PROMO- holy crap! It’s a backstage promo!
The promo itself wasn’t very good. Mark was bad and Jay was meh.

WAR MACHINE vs. TIM HUGHES & “BRUTAL” BOB EVANS- squash.
More stupid sh*t “comedy” from Hughes. Why the f*ck is ROH booking this guy?

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- ANX comes out with some weapons and cut what would have been a fine promo except for the part where Kenny King claimed that they were the “linear” ROH World Tag Team Champions. You’re not the linear champions if you get pinned, and ANX has gotten pinned multiple times since their return! F*cking stupid bullsh*t Delirious booking!

SILAS YOUNG PROMO- fine

KEVIN KELLY INTERVIEWS THE YOUNG BUCKS- they try to build up Kenny Omega. This felt like a promo that they would cut in Japan that somehow accidentally wound up in the US instead. The whole “cleaner” thing will not work in the US. ROH should ignore the nickname and just let him be Kenny Omega, leader of the Bullet Club and all around despicable person.

BJ WHITMER vs. “CAULIFLOWER” CHASE BROWN- squash.
Brown looks like a f*cking idiot with his hideous hairdo… and that’s not even the most offensive thing about him. His nickname “cauliflower” Chase Brown comes from the fact that he is obsessed with the vegetable, to the point where he brought a head of cauliflower down to the ring with him. Gabe, Pearce, and Cornette would never have let this sort of idiotic bullsh*t into ROH! I don’t care if Tim Hughes or this cauliflower ass-hat are just jobbers. This is ROH! You should be able to find some other jobbers that aren’t COMPLETE AND TOTAL EMBARASSMENTS TO PROFESSIONAL WRESTLING!
Also, why was no one at ringside with Whitmer? We know Kelly Kline was in the building, so why wasn’t she out here with him to show that he still has some followers?

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- sh*t.
Corino came onto the stage, but Whimter wouldn’t let him talk, demanding that Page come out instead, so Page came out from the crowd and attack Whitmer from behind like a coward, even though he’s supposed to be the babyface. Page was beating Whitmer up, so referees came out to break it up (so that’s two pull-aparts on this show, two squashes, and three post-match segments)

SILAS YOUNG PROMO ON BEHALF OF THE BOYS- bad.

WORLD TITLE MATCH HYPE SEGMENT- Adam Cole comes out and says that he is the best and will win the title. Then Jay Lethal comes out and says the same thing. Then, for some reason, he says he wants to fight Cole right now. They agree to fight, but as they are getting ready, Kyle O’Reilly comes out with a mic to talk… wait, no, he tosses the mic aside and throws some kicks and now we’re getting yet another brawl and I am SOOOOOO tired of this right now. Kyle beats up both Cole and Lethal and poses with the belt

We get a graphic informing us that Alex Shelley will face Christopher Daniels at the PPV, and apparently THAT is how we were all informed that Daniels’ suspension is over. Could they not have cut one of the many pointless matches we’ve had over the past few weeks to give us an in-ring segment where Shelley demands that Nigel reinstate Daniels so he can get revenge on him? That would have been so much better.
Oh. And apparently Daniels is on commentary right now, too, so I’m assuming we’re getting a f*ck finish to our main event.

ALEX SHELLEY & ACH vs. THE BRISCOES (w/ODB)- 6.75/10
Oh come on! I’ve already had to sit through this boring show, and now I have to deal with ODB, too!
Daniels distracts Shelley, which allows the Briscoes to hit the Doomsday Device on ACH and pin him while Daniels holds Shelley back while Nigel sits there, two feet away, doing jack-sh*t. Because G-d forbid that the freakin’ BRISCOES get a clean win over a team that hasn’t even been teaming together for three months. It would have been a million times better (and a LOT more Ring of Honor-ish) to do a clean finish ad just not have Daniels out there on commentary and say that his suspension ends at the f*cking PPV, so you’ll have to pay money to see him.

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- déjà vu.
Kaz and Sabin come out from backstage and Kaz and Daniels start to beat on Shelley. We are told the Briscoes have “left,” apparently by disapparating because they were in the ring about ten seconds ago but are now apparently too far away to realize what is going on. Sabin stands there, looking conflicted. He doesn’t join in the beat down of his former partner, but he’s not doing anything to try to get The Addiction to stop, either.
For some reason Kaz and Daniels decide that they must INSIST that Sabin be part of the beat down, so they hold Shelley up for him to hit. Sabin stands there, looking conflicted and we can’t tell if he is going to do it or not, and we never find out because ACH pulls him out of the ring to make the save. I feel like I’ve seen this segment a million times already.

I get that this was supposed to be the go-home show for the PPV and they did hit on almost all of the big matches (I think Moose vs. Okada was the only important match that wasn’t mentioned), but they did so in ways that just felt so painfully repetitive, both within the individual feuds and within the context of this single show, that I was ready for the show to end by the time Adam Cole got into the ring. It might have accomplished its goal, but aside from Roddy vs. Cedric, this was nowhere close to being an enjoyable show.

[Bulletclubfan2014]

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- ANX comes out with some weapons and cut what would have been a fine promo except for the part where Kenny King claimed that they were the “linear” ROH World Tag Team Champions. You’re not the linear champions if you get pinned, and ANX has gotten pinned multiple times since their return! F*cking stupid bullsh*t Delirious booking!

I'm going to defend this by arguing they are heels and the thing about heels is that they lie, make excuses and try to claim that anything that can make them look bad didn't happen even though it did so I'm fine with them claiming to be the linear champions

[Big Red Machine]

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- ANX comes out with some weapons and cut what would have been a fine promo except for the part where Kenny King claimed that they were the “linear” ROH World Tag Team Champions. You’re not the linear champions if you get pinned, and ANX has gotten pinned multiple times since their return! F*cking stupid bullsh*t Delirious booking!

I'm going to defend this by arguing they are heels and the thing about heels is that they lie, make excuses and try to claim that anything that can make them look bad didn't happen even though it did so I'm fine with them claiming to be the linear champions

I was certain ANX are babyfaces. The last angle they were in had them upset that the clearly heel Young Bucks got a cheap win against them after they got a visual pinfall on the Bucks.

[Bulletclubfan2014]

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- ANX comes out with some weapons and cut what would have been a fine promo except for the part where Kenny King claimed that they were the “linear” ROH World Tag Team Champions. You’re not the linear champions if you get pinned, and ANX has gotten pinned multiple times since their return! F*cking stupid bullsh*t Delirious booking!

I'm going to defend this by arguing they are heels and the thing about heels is that they lie, make excuses and try to claim that anything that can make them look bad didn't happen even though it did so I'm fine with them claiming to be the linear champions

I was certain ANX are babyfaces. The last angle they were in had them upset that the clearly heel Young Bucks got a cheap win against them after they got a visual pinfall on the Bucks.

Apparently at Final Battle when the fans turned on ANX in the 3 way ROH decided "well the fans hate them and we won't have to change there personas at all because there characters are already giant douchebags so lets skip the Heel turn and just have them be Heels now"

[Big Red Machine]

I'm going to defend this by arguing they are heels and the thing about heels is that they lie, make excuses and try to claim that anything that can make them look bad didn't happen even though it did so I'm fine with them claiming to be the linear champions

I was certain ANX are babyfaces. The last angle they were in had them upset that the clearly heel Young Bucks got a cheap win against them after they got a visual pinfall on the Bucks.

Apparently at Final Battle when the fans turned on ANX in the 3 way ROH decided "well the fans hate them and we won't have to change there personas at all because there characters are already giant douchebags so lets skip the Heel turn and just have them be Heels now"

ANX turning heel sounds vaguely familiar, but I still don't like it because they've been saying this since they were babyface but after they suffered losses.