By Mark Worrall@hoohoowozza
This will be the start a weekly round-up of both Ring of Honor TV and MLW Fushion as a combined review/summary for Pro Wrestling Journal as I look back each week at the weekly television tapings.
ROH
Ring of Honor aired ROH TV episode 406 which emanated from Kent, Washington as the ROH roster headed to the west coast for a series of tapings. This episode was headlined by Mark Haskins and Jeff Cobb who would be the main event for the show.
Show opens with Jay Briscoe up against PCO who continues to be a pushed commodity, dripping in gold proudly holding one of the ROH six-man tag belts alongside his NWA tag team title and looked really good throughout the match which really continues to be to his credit considering his age of 51 years. Briscoe was always found looking to control the big Montreal native who just would not relent, no selling some terrific Briscoe moves as the crowd rallied behind PCO who as always pulled out the big moves. Decent start to the show with Briscoe keeping his own, however could not find a way to win legitimately so with PCO setting up a top turnbuckle moonsault, Jay nailed him with a chair that saw him disqualified. Brother Mark made his way to the ring and together they beat the big Canadian down postmatch with Mark sending PCO through a table with Froggy Bow!
Hype for the upcoming Top Prospects tournament coming up in August with Bryan Johnson declaring himself the number one entrant!
Next up we have Coast to Coast, namely Shaheem Ali and LSG facing Bully Ray and TV champion Shane Taylor in tag team action. Usual Bully Ray stick proceeded the match, he didn’t enjoy being on the west coast and I guess the fans felt the same. This was not a good match, Coast to Coast worked fairly well as a team but with Bully Ray being vocal throughout and needing to be centre of attention this match seemed all about him! Ali and LSG hit the Coast to Coast splash but could not finish the Coast to Coast turnpad drop kicks as Taylor, who is so good finished off LSG to give the Bully Ray/Taylor team the win. Considering commentary hyped up Coast to Coast being on a six month winning spree, this was a setback and certainly did not make them look anything special.
Main event featured Mark Haskins v Jeff Cobb which was a really good match to finish the show. Haskins was no match for Cobb regarding power so he utilised his kicks to wear the Hawaiian down, working the arm was also an option as well as using his pace in a match that went back and forth for a majority of the time with Cobb always looking for the big power moves that Haskins to be fair finding counters for. Crowd singing ‘This is awesome’ chants that saw them really into their main event which was won by Jeff Cobb who finally sent Haskins for a ‘tour of the Islands’!
Decent show, opener and Main event good matches, just needs a Little less Bully RAY!
MLW Fusion
MLW Fushion once again emanated from Milwaukee and was the last of the current TV tapings from Wisconsin before heading to Chicago for next week’s ‘Kings of Colosseum’ show airing live in the US. There was plenty of hype throughout the show for the live show and the actual main event that will see ‘Filthy’ Tom Lawlor defend his MLW heavyweight title against the much pushed Jacob Fatu.
Austin Aries made his return to MLW as he opened up the show against Australian native Adam Brooks. This was an excellent showing for Brooks making his MLW debut as he went toe to toe with the self proclaimed greatest man that ever lived Austin Aries who got a little control but not much as both countered each other on every occasion. Aries, with the full backing of his hometown crowd botched a Death Valley driver on the apron which led to the finishing stretch of the match that had Aries nailing a brainbuster on Brooks, who had offered a little more offence prior, however this saw Aries pick up the win. Aries on the mic post match thanked the hometown crowd, put over MLW for having a true weight division stating that he had previously held heavyweight titles when he had never been a heavyweight in his life! Then set his sights on Teddy Hart’s Middleweight title.
One Dynasty video later, was followed by the news of Puerto Rican legend Savio Vega coming soon to MLW and a recap of last week’s six-man tag match between the Contra Unit and Tom Lawlor/Von Erich brothers.
Pushed commodity Jacob Fatu was up next in a two on one handicap match against a couple of jobbers. Easy squash for the heavyweight title challenger which was followed by the rest of ‘Contra’ namely Josef Samael and Simon Gotch beating down the jobbers! Good way to keep Fatu a formidable challenger going into the title match.
Salina De La Renta claimed guys do not like her because they hate a twenty-two year old being in charge! That was followed for more hype for Kings of Colosseum which will include a ‘Live’ Jim Cornette experience with De La Renta, interesting!
A Mance Warner segment and we come to the main event featuring ‘Filthy’ Tom Lawlor up against Josef Samael from the Contra Unit. Both traded blows in what seemed forever as
Lawlor tried to get something from Samael who was slow and weak in his offence. This was a nothing match, not a main event wrestling wise but a way of promoting next week’s title match as the end of the match saw Samael reach for a spike from his boot which Lawlor saw and helped Samael into putting the spike in the turnpad, releasing that spike for himself which got him a disqualification and somehow Samael walks away the winner. Backstage clips of Fatu and Gotch scrapping with the Von Erich brothers as Lawlor and Samael continue to fight ringside and the show fades out.
MLW kills it as a weekly TV show. Great consistent booking, good matches and rivalries, everything makes sense
