Ring of Honor on Destination America 6/10/15 Review

Actually liked the Kazarian/Daniels promo to start this, and "Hey I liked that Christopher Daniels promo!" doesn't feel like something I've said a whole bunch in my adult life.

1. The Addiction (Christopher Daniels & Frankie Kazarian) vs. Kyle O'Reilly

This was supposed to be reDRagon (also, I don't understand the name. Pointless capitalization? Meaning I'm missing? Accidentally misspelled when it got back from the printers, so they just ran with it?) but Bobby Fish is on injured reserve, so O'Reilly takes them on solo. Match only goes about 4 minutes and is actually pretty fun, almost entirely because of Kazarian/Daniels. O'Reilly looked awful and nothing about his flimsy offense looked like it would keep two guys at bay. But Kazarian and Daniels bump and do pratfalls like crazy for him and somehow make a lot of it look plausible. O'Reilly throws these embarrassing hockey punches on Daniels (at least I think that's what those were supposed to be...whatever they were they were hilarious) and throws really bad regular punches where he kind of aims somewhere over his opponent's head. But Kazarian/Daniels bump for his stuff, fly into guardrails really tough, even set up for a wild O'Reilly dropkick off the apron into both of them, who had been placed improbably in a chair. Eventually Daniels hits him with the belt and the match is thrown out, but this was probably better than it should have been when you factor in the participants, and that it was a handicap match.

2. Dalton Castle vs. Jushin Liger

Well this was fun! I have never seen Castle before, and he's like a cross between Michael York, Cassandro, John Tatum and Blake from Workaholics. He has a couple of eunuchs with him who fan him with peacock feathers, even has sparkly tights (under his awesome glittery Bowie jumper/cape) with a glittery peacock feather on them. The dude has got the look. His work was good too as he bumped all over for Liger (loved his big bump off the apron from a Liger chop, and the way he took the finishing brainbuster and sold it after was great). Liger dogged it a little bit, had some lazy little palm strikes a couple times that looked like a kitten batting at yarn, but he flew into Castle's knees off a splash, threw some nice suplexes and jeez the guy is 50 and certainly works more athletically than most other guys who are 50. My dad already hated going on walks when he was 50. Castle knew how to stooge for him, this was plenty enjoyable.

3. Brutal Bob Evans vs. Cheeseburger

Bob Evans looks like a David Koechner character; or, a line cook at an actual Bob Evans. He does not look like somebody who should be wrestling on a nationally broadcast wrestling program. Yet he comes off as more of a wrestler than Cheeseburger, who seems like a guy who used to populate opening matches of IWA-MS shows because he sold enough tickets to earn a spot on the card. Nothing he does looks very good. He tries a springboard knee that whiffs by a couple feet, looks scared to go fullspeed into a turnbuckle or even the ring ropes (noticeably slowing way down before hitting the ropes or the turnbuckle), throwing lousy strikes, just looking like a guy who is only given a job because he was promised one after completing training. Bob throws some light punches himself although they are close to being salvageable. Something tells me at the age of 42 he won't be working too hard to improve them. He hits a nice enough shoulderblock and I did really like the sideslam off the apron through a table. I didn't see that coming so the surprise was nice. But man these are two guys who should not be featured on TV.

4. The Kingdom (Michael Bennett & Matt Taven) vs. Doc Gallows & Karl Anderson

Oh, god I have to watch Red Shoes on the program too? Cahmannnn. I was hoping I'd get to see him working his Billy Crystal routine with multiple televised feds. Bullet Club seems to be all the rage amongst live wrestling crowds these days. Lots of BC shirts and whatnot. I don't get it myself. Bullet Club matches usually just mean a bunch of poorly executed interference and matches that would have been better if there wasn't interference. Maybe it's just a cool logo that white guys like to wear? I had not seen Taven before this. I do not want to see Taven after this. Man he looked bad. Taven, Cheeseburger, Will Ferrara...are these the kind of guys the ROH school is churning out?? Good lord. Taven undershot every moved he tried by a few feet, peaking with him going for a moonsault to the floor and landing about 6 feet short, so that Gallows had to sprint several steps just to get grazed. Earlier he got caught with a Gun Stun leaping off the top to the floor, but to make it work required him to land - again - about 6 feet short of his target. Dumb spot. Bennett and Anderson throw some unconvincing Frye/Takayama stuff, shove Red Shoes a bunch, Red Shoes works his schtick where he doesn't actually do anything worthwhile as a kayfabe ref, and instead focuses far more on mugging. Gallows looked fine, Anderson tends to look better in a NJPW setting, Bennett looked good enough, Taven dragged the rest down. Match couldn't have gone more than 5 minutes before the non-finish.

Well, I really liked Castle/Liger, and the rest of the show was...well, not as bad as last week. So that's some progress. They still threw us a couple Brisco promos which are always a great thing. The promos from everybody are actually a far stronger part of the show than the wrestling has been. Eh, where do I have to go on Wednesdays? I'll keep checking it out.