Reported by Ben Hagen of WrestleView.com
On Saturday, May 27, 2006 at 2:28 PM EST

Celebrating a string of what will hope to be a great stretch of shows, Ring of Honor has separated out a group of seven shows now dubbed the “Milestone Series." The seven shows included are:

2006.02.25 Fourth Anniversary Show

2006.03.11 Arena Warfare (first appearance at the old ECW Arena)

2006.03.25 Best in the World (ROH return of KENTA and Marufuji)

2006.03.30 Dragon Gate Challenge (3 match series involving wrestlers from the Dragon Gate promotion in Japan)

2006.03.31 Supercard of Honor (2-disc show)

2006.04.01 Better Than Our Best (not yet released)

2006.04.22 100th Show (not yet released)


So, as one of the resident match critics of Wrestleview, I’ve taken it upon myself to take these shows and try to reach some sort of evaluation of their quality in relation to other products in the wrestling world. While my next six columns won’t necessarily be on these shows, eventually, you, my dear readers, will have seven nice reviews with which to approach what ROH totes as their greatest series of shows. Let’s take a look at the opening one, shall we?

ROH Fourth Anniversary Show 02.25.06 Edison, NJ

Match #1 – Three Way Dance: Jason Blade and Kid Mikaze vs. Sal Rinauro and Tony Mamaluke vs. Mark and Jay Briscoe

Originally scheduled as a normal tag match, the Briscoes make their big return and throw themselves into the mix. The returning former champs dominate for the first few moments with some pretty decent double teaming. While they attempt to isolate Mikaze, the other teams manage to tag in (there is a very awkward moment where scary Scramble rules are apparently instituted and then later revoked) and leave out the Briscoes for a big chunk of the short match. Although the action is okay (there is an annoying delayed vertical suplex from Rinauro at one point), the purpose of this match felt lost when the Briscoes were left on the apron for the majority of it. Nearly six minutes in, however, Mark gets tagged in and the Briscoes proceed to destroy everyone in less than a minute. Mark Briscoe pins Jason Blade after a cutthroat driver / top rope leg drop combo at 6:43.

Though short, I certainly didn’t want much more from this match. The Briscoes were the stars of it yet wrestled for very little of it. Perhaps they should have steam rolled over these two teams? Perhaps they should have save the fact that Rinauro and Mamaluke are former tag champs. Despite some flashy moves, there isn’t much here to care about. Don’t buy this DVD for this match. The awkward moment early on in combination with the swift domination made for very little to care about other than watching some sweet boots to faces. Fun I guess at times. Short. Inoffensive. But not good. Hopefully the Briscoes can adapt to 2006 ROH and stay away from their 2002 / 3 style of bigger-is-better offense: ½*.

Double Stomp Count: 1

Delayed Vertical Suplex Count: 1


Match #2 – Four Corner Survival: Azrieal vs. Claudio Castagnoli vs. Adam Pearce vs. Jay Fury

Match starts directly after a Chris Daniels promo backstage. No entrances on the DVD. Pearce and Azrieal begin the match playing up their size difference while some animosity begins immediately with Pearce mocking Claudio’s “Hey!" trademark. As the match continues more play between the match’s two big men continue yet they never tag in against each other until near the end of the match. Instead, they somehow manage to isolate Jay Fury and work together (all the while pissing each other off) before Fury is able to tag out to Azrieal. The action isn’t necessarily exciting (Castagnoli uses the second delayed vertical suplex of the night sadly) and gets even worse when Fury makes the “hot" tag to Azrieal. The action breaks down into awkward spots that finally see some offense between Claudio and Pearce (but not much). Azrieal throws some of the worst and passionless kicks I’ve ever seen; Jay Fury attempts an illegal pin; Claudio spills outside; Jay Fury dives onto him. Back in the ring, Pearce nails Azrieal with a top rope splash and wins the match with a possibly illegal pinfall (depending on whether or not we count his earlier punch to Claudio as a tag) at 11:05.

Despite some fun interaction between Claudio and Pearce, this isn’t a good match either. The work was sloppy, and the two big guys looked like they were working with two props rather than two other wrestlers. Azrieal looked horrible despite attempts to psyche up the crowd, and Jay Fury didn’t really add a whole lot either. Throw in awkward legal man issues (which ROH has been pretty good about for the past year or so) and we have a bit of a train wreck. It isn’t necessarily a DUD, but it isn’t any better than the opening match either: ½*.

Double Stomp Count: 2

Delayed Vertical Suplex Count: 2



Match #3 -- Samoa Joe vs. Jay Lethal

This match certainly begins with some great Joe flurries, but it dies down a bit when Lethal takes over on offense. About five minutes in, Joe inserts some fire by escaping a head scissors and just throwing some lethal (*wink*) kicks. A few moments later, Samoa Joe drags Lethal around the ring by his afro (the coolest part of the match) before continuing his calm onslaught. Though Lethal manages to get in some offense, Joe keeps control for the most part until late in the match where Lethal slips out of a Muscle Buster, nails a running vertical suplex, and diving head butt for a nice near fall. He goes for a second running suplex, but the former world champ reverses, sets him on the turnbuckle, hoists him in the air, and nails a Muscle Buster for the victory at 14:21.

While a decent encounter, it is still a disappointing one. After their really good match at Manhattan Mayhem and another match in December that, while overrated by some reviewers, really seemed to point toward a major feud after Steel Cage Warfare, this felt like a flash in the pan (if I may be allowed such a horrible cliché). It isn’t that the offense or pacing in the match is necessarily poor, it’s just that the match lacks the fire a feud-ending match should really have. The crowd could certainly tell and seems a little bored at times as Lethal calmly targets Joe with precise strikes and holds and Joe only shows intensity at rare points. Lethal comes off looking like an annoying fly on the wall rather than a real threat (which is sort of the point I imagine). A decent match for both men, but it certainly was not meant to (though perhaps it should have been) one of the major matches on this show: **½.

Delayed Vertical Suplex Count: 3


Match #4 – Christopher Daniels vs. BJ Whitmer

Match starts with some shoves. There is some history between these two (Whitmer was recruited by Daniels’ Prophecy at Final Battle 2003 . . . yet the next show was Daniels’ last ROH match until later 2005), but it sadly feels forced. Even so, I give them credit, it comes across pretty well. Whitmer dominates for the first few moments with some strikes, but Daniels fights his way back with some of his own. About three minutes in, Whitmer gets in a kick to Daniels’ “hurt" leg, and we get a spot where the Fallen Angel rolls around for a bit while Allison Danger attends to him with her cute halo. The injury just fires up Daniels, however, and the two fight outside the ring and into the crowd . . .

Enter CZW. Now this is where things get good. Whitmer heads back to the ring, and Daniels just leaves I guess leading to the match getting thrown out at around 6:21 or so (a bell rings when Pearce tackles Chris Hero . . . don’t know if that was a bell trying to call order or if it was the final bell for the Daniels / Whitmer match). Either way, it was over before it really got started. Decent action from the former prophecy members, but certainly nothing memorable. Still, as it was, it wasn’t any worse than the opening matches: ½*.

At least there weren’t any delayed vertical suplexes or double stomps.

Oh yeah, I’m not going to spoil much, but the CZW / ROH stuff here is really great. The most interesting stuff on the show thus far. Afterwards, Homicide and Cabana come out brawling . . . and their match begins.


Match #5 – Ghetto Fight: Homicide vs. Colt Cabana

Cabana just unloads on Homicide early on, throwing him into guardrails and just punching away. The Notorious 187, however, takes over back in the ring after a few minutes and just pretty much stays on offense for the rest of the match. He throws him to the ring post, to the guardrails, rips at his face, tosses chairs at his unprotected head, etc. Six minutes in, Homicide tosses a bleeding Cabana in the ring and continues his onslaught with punches and a uses a freaking STRAIGHT RAZOR . . . erm, straight razor on Colt’s forehead! This is ugly.

Cabana tries fighting back eight minutes in, but an eye poke stops him right away and a vicious knee shot keeps Homicide on the advantage. Eleven minutes in, Cabana nails a lariat and applies an unsuccessful arm lock before missing a big moonsault. Homicide nails a lariat of his own and applies a camel clutch before wrapping a coat hanger around Cabana’s throat. The referee stops it at 12:40. But it isn’t over. Cabana calls Homicide back. They brawl for a bit before Cabana begins going after Homicide’s shoulder (hurt since the Steel Cage Warfare match against Corino). Smokes interferes allowing Homicide to nail him with a chair. They tape him to the corner and the referee stops the match 4:09 into the second fall. Are we done yet? Hell no. Cabana calls Homicide back a third time. Though he does well for a while, Homicide eventually retakes control and piledrives him onto the table outside. The table rather than breaking slips from underneath them and they go crashing to the floor! Finally, it is over as the referee stops it with no intention of restarting 1:08 into the third fall.

That was exhausting. The quality in this situation is not based on some sort of “work rate" or technical prowess or insane high spot. No, the quality in a match like this is how realistically Cabana and Homicide come across as hating each other. In the end, though some strikes looked weak and Cabana calling back Homicide twice might be a bit too much (I don’t think it is), Cabana’s mic work and Homicide’s nastiness and facial expressions are just scary-real throughout this whole affair (which en total lasts nearly twenty-three minutes). The crowd plays in perfectly as they call for tables in the first fall but don’t get it until the ending of the third. The violence just escalates, and by the end of things, Cabana is practically dead. In short, I dug this: ***.

Awesome promo from Cornette afterwards. Watch it.


Match #6 – ROH World Title Match: Bryan Danielson (ROH World Champ) vs. Jimmy Rave

While Danielson is usually more heelish than not, against an uber-heel like Jimmy Rave he’s pretty much Hulk Hogan. You know you’re a heel when an ROH crowd will not do dueling chants for you. The match opens with some really solid mat work with Rave escaping Danielson’s grasp before pie facing him several times. The champ returns the favor three minutes later before a snap mare and vicious kick to the back. He dominates at his pace for a few minutes. The American Dragon is just fabulous at looking like he’s the best in the world. The way he controls his opponent’s body is scary-good considering how young he is. The challenger tries a surfboard about ten minutes in, but the champion fights out and retakes control of the match. Nearly fourteen minutes in, Danielson nails a second-rope European uppercut followed by a running forearm and slingshot suplex for a near fall. Shortly thereafter, however, Rave nails a good spear and a spinning neckbreaker for a near fall of his own. He isn’t able to maintain an advantage, however, until several minutes later when Rave knocks Danielson off the top avoiding a superplex. He continues an attack outside the ring just pounds away at the champion before sending him into the ring side barricade. Nearly twenty minutes in, Rave switches a camel clutch attempt into his own version of Cattle Mutilation. After another Cattle Mutilation attempt minutes later, Danielson fights back with punches, chops, and a nice enziguiri. The challenger battles back, however, escaping the cross face chicken wing, nailing a big suplex, escaping Danielson’s half crab, and locking in a sleeper hold after eating a drop kick to the face. Near the end of the match, Nana pulls out the referee when counting a Tiger suplex pinfall, and Danielson nails a crazy flailing tope onto the Prince before returning to the ring and eating another spear. Rave hits Gonorrhea, the best running knee he’s ever hit for a fabulous near fall, and locks in a butterfly lock for an attempted submission. The champion ducks a clothesline in the closing sequence, nails a roaring elbow, a Regal-plex, and locks in his Crucifix-o-elbows before the referee stops the match at 31:58.

While I would have preferred Danielson to turn up the heel knob a bit, I understand that that would have possibly taken heat away from the ultra-heel Rave (who they do NOT want getting cheers). As a tweener with heel tendencies, Danielson’s work here was still superb and this, thus far, is a career singles match for Jimmy Rave. In 2003, would we have ever thought he’d be able to pull something like this off? I doubt it. He’s a great talent to have around and has consistently (along with Shelley) produced the better matches on all of ROH’s shows. Great match that is a treat to watch. Almost like eating candy. The ending sequence felt a little forced. Danielson’s elbow-trick worked well against Roderick since it came out of a crucifix pin attempt. Here, he just ties up Rave and begins elbowing him in the chops to not much of a crowd reaction. I wouldn’t necessarily call that a bad thing, but I can’t say I liked how the match ended. With all that, Rave’s performance of stealing Danielson’s moves after being so cocky early on was just beautiful and the fact that he actually had some nice near falls near the end really boosted the match’s quality. The champion’s pace is interesting. He’s a patient wrestler that wrestles thirty minute matches that feel like they’re twenty. Strange, but great: ***1/2.


Match #7 – Ricky Reyes vs. Jack Evans

Jack Evans apparently just got off a plane from Japan. So mix jet lag and a long flight with being in the ring with Reyes AND being a guy usually known for taking a beating and we have a rather nasty looking match on our hands. In short, Reyes kills Evans for a while, but Jack is able to take out Ricky and Smokes with a springboard 450 plancha! Regardless, he isn’t able to keep this up for very long. Nearly four minutes in we see a pretty nasty mess-up before Reyes gets a near fall with a sit-out powerbomb. Flippenstein puts together some nice looking stuff (sort of) before . . . okay . . . most of you should see this: Evans attempts a springboard moonsault out onto Reyes, over-rotates and practically drills his skull on the floor. The rest of the match is academic though they tease that Evans might still pull it out. Reyes shows little concern for Evans, nails three hard powerbombs, and – with Evans’ pants practically falling off – kills him with his Dragon Sleeper after avoiding a 630 at 7:57.

I hate to say it, but Jack is mostly good for getting killed. Though the botched dive should have really ended the match, I guess I respect them for trying to continue it. Reyes looked like a major dick (which is good I guess considering the character), and Evans looked super-humanly resilient. With that, Evans still needs a lot of work on his offense. His kicks have been looking better (and I certainly understand that he was coming in on total jetlag and was probably exhausted already), but his offense still needs to be toned down a bit to focus on solidifying his fundamentals. Surprisingly watchable considering the conditions, but not good: ¾*.

Match #8 – ROH Tag Title Match: Austin Aries & Roderick Strong (Tag Champs) vs. AJ Styles & Matt Sydal

This should be butter (which is a good thing unless you have high cholesterol). The story here is that Sydal is a member of Generation Next and yet still chose to go after the tag titles against the wishes of Aries and Strong. Strong and Sydal start off and one can immediately tell that they aren’t out there trying to just pull off a bunch of spots. Strong taunts Sydal early on and eats a boot for his trouble. The opening minutes of the match entertains its viewers with some nifty work (tons of potential talent in this match). They keep it simple early on with simple pairings (Sydal / Strong and Styles / Aries) before we get some mini-isolations: the challengers isolate Aries for a short time before the champions turn the tables on Styles. A few minutes into the segment, Styles catches Aries with a nip-up hurricanrana before knocking Strong to the outside with a beautiful dropkick. Rather than tagging Sydal he gets greedy, however, and goes for a dive allowing Aries to cut him off with a great clothesline.

The champions continue to isolate Styles with quick tags for a couple more minutes before Styles manages to pull out his back flip enziguiri on Aries. Both men tag and Sydal comes in against Strong. He keeps off both champions long enough for Styles to recover before nailing Strong with a standing moonsault for a near fall. The challengers isolate Roderick after a series of three beautiful dives. Sydal manages to outmaneuver Strong while Styles brings the heavy strikes and offense. There is an awkward moment where Sydal looks lost just stomping Strong, but he tags out shortly thereafter. Styles nails a sick DDT which prompts Aries to break up the pin attempt, but the challengers continue the advantage about a minute more before Aries is finally able to make the tag and enter the match with a beautiful top rope drop kick. And we’re in the closing stretch ladies and gentlemen. The four men manage to maintain the legal man rules through a series of exciting sequences leading up to a Shooting Star Press from Sydal to Aries. The champ reaches the ropes and Styles sets him up for the Styles Clash. Before he can hit it, however, Strong rushes in with a SICK boot, fixes up Sydal with his half-nelson backbreaker for Aries’ 450 splash which leads to a successful defense at 23:10.

This is one of the best tag matches I’ve seen in a long time. It blows away almost every tag match to date in ROH (I might still put the Liger and Kobashi tags above this), but this has it all: a semblance of a story, perfect tag rules, good in-peril segments, hot tags, hot near falls, hot ending, and a kick that almost makes the referee fall over in shock. Great match. There are certainly problems with it. It is arguable that Sydal should have looked a bit more of a weak link than he did, but it still came across well that Styles was a much more seasoned wrestler. The structure of the match is simple, the control segments aren’t fancy, but there is a passion there that seemed lacking in the first few matches of the show. I think what really matters in this match isn’t necessarily the explosive nature of these four guys and how it all came together well one night. No, what really matters is how much better these four have gotten. Despite Styles tendency toward goofiness and overdone flamboyancy at times, despite the same sort of deal from Aries, despite Sydal’s greenness, despite Strong’s rising ability which is still developing, they all went out and delivered a match worthy of being the main event after one hell of a World Title match: ***1/2.

Oh . . . and Delayed Vertical Suplex Count: 6


Final Comments

While the show certainly isn’t chalk-full of great stuff, the majority of stuff here is totally worth watching. The segment beginning with Daniels / Whitmer (though that match never really got going) turned into the CZW / ROH brawl turned into the really intense Homicide / Cabana war. That whole thing (totally worth watching in one sitting) really makes for a good portion of the DVD. Tack on the fact that the two longest matches (the title matches) are VERY worth seeing (they’re great matches), then you have a show that is great a good majority of the time (and certainly in the second half). Don’t let the low ratings of the first two matches deter you. This show is intense and certainly has enough quality stuff to make it worth the sticker price. Good start for their Milestone Series. It certainly isn’t their most solid show from start to finish. It doesn’t have a must-see match on it. But it is certainly worth going out of your way to see. If TNA put on a show this good on PPV, reviewers would be drooling over it. And ROH did it without delivering a must-see Samoa Joe match.