Ring of Honor on Destination America 11/11/15 Review

1. Cedric Alexander vs. ACH

Kevin Kelly puts over the unique concept of the wrestlers in Ring of Honor shaking hands before and after matches. God is that something they're still trying to promote? This match didn't do a whole lot for me, honor or no. It felt like a back handspring contest. I'm not sure who won, but there were a lot of handsprings. Also a lot of hiptosses with guys landing on the apron on their feet, a lot of "well-scouted signature offense". It all kinda runs together when there's no breathing room in a match. Veda Scott was really good in this, using herself as a human shield to block ACH's punt, allowing Cedric to hit a nice STO on the apron. She also held her ground when Cedric almost flip dove into her, with him having to hold the ropes to avoid hitting her "by mistake". I woulda got out of dodge and she stuck right in for the spot. There were a couple things I liked, ACH hit his cool rope run flip dive, Cedric throws a real nice running dropkick, and Cedric's blown springboard leading to the finish was really cool. I don't know if it was supposed to be blown, but he blew it spectacularly, catching a foot on the top and then bouncing chest first on the other side. It reminded me of all the great planned Hamrick blown spots. But the bulk of the match wasn't even move exchanging, it was reversal exchanging. At times it felt so far up its own ass, like actual moves weren't even being done because they were just focusing on reversing reversals of other reversals.

2. Will Ferrara vs. Caprice Coleman

This is maybe the quietest I've ever heard a ROH crowd. My were they silent during this. Coleman was real slow on offense. His standing leg drop and sliding leg drop to a seated Ferrara looked nice, but the set-up for all his stuff was slow, sluggish. Ferrara is blandish but Coleman didn't give him much to work with. For his part Will took two real nice "shoulder to the post" bumps in the corner, one on a missed charge and the other with Coleman tossing him. He's also good at putting over submissions. Last week against Strong he made me believe Strong was stretching him, and this week he made something Coleman did look deadly, so clearly this is just a great skill of his. Ooooooooo and after the match Nana gives him an envelope! It could possibly be coupons and newspaper clippings, like Rachel's mom cuts out and sends to her.

3. All Night Express vs. Briscoes

Hey, this was an All Night Express match that I liked! That isn't a thing that happens. But it happened right here! And it wasn't even all because I love the Briscoes, ANX also did some things I enjoyed! Titus hair flips a bunch but this might have been the best I've seen him. His share of the double team offense looked good, took Briscoes' stuff violently, flipped his hair some more, did some Martin Starr cosplay, hit a nice standing splash, more hair flips. I dug Mark starting things with some grappling. I want to see a character shift where he masters his redneck kung fu so moves on to a new challenge, and becomes a redneck RINGS worker. Mark's dives get crazier every week, dude really plays lunatic better than anybody else right now. I really liked the structure of this as ANX control Mark for awhile, Jay tags in and he and Mark go on a tear, King gets a run of kicks and suplexes, finishers get blocked, and then Jay hits a wicked Jay Driller and Mark hits a lung collapsing Froggy Bow. It's an easy way to fill 12 and both teams have the formula down. King took a weird bump off the apron and did a strange phantom knee injury for like 3 seconds. But yeah this was good. More stuff like this.