ROH: SCRAMBLE MADNESS
American Civic Center
Wakefield, MA
November 16th, 2002
ROH Champion: Xavier (Since 9/21/2002 - 1 Defenses)
ROH Tag Team Champions: The Prophecy (Since 9/21/2002 - 1 Defenses)
ROH #1 Contd’rs Trophy: AJ Styles (Since 11/9/2002 - 0 Defenses)
Even though the card didn’t look awful, this is a pretty low rated show (by ROH standards) on Cagematch so I’m not hopeful.
The Prophecy cut a promo backstage. Daniels applauds Massachusetts for coming out to see the Prophecy, but they’re not going to see any of ROH’s titles on the line because they control the belts. Xavier cuts an AWFULLY bland promo on his opponent tonight, Jeremy Lopez. Luscious again gives Xavier shit and Daniels finally yells at her. Daniels then says he’s going to beat AJ Styles for the #1 contenders trophy tonight and when he does, Xavier will never have to defend that belt again. He turns towards Joe but Joe cuts him off and repeats his points about how essentially he’s not in the Prophecy nor does he follow their rules. Daniels pays him to do specific jobs and he does them. Tonight though he’s gunning for Homicide because of what he did to his good friend Steve Corino at the last show. Daniels quickly moves on from talking about Corino. Luscious gives Joe shit about shaking hands. Dunn & Marcos walk on and do their schtick and want to know when they’re going to get their tag team title shot, and the Prophecy just laugh at them and walk off.
Jay Briscoe is out in the ring and says last time he was here he got beat by his brother but he’s going to right that wrong tonight since Mark can legally wrestle in Boston. They’re having a Dream Partners tag match and Jay has Amazing Red as his partner. Mark Briscoe comes out and tells the sound guy to hit his partners music…AND MY GOD ITS THE FALLEN ANGEL CHRISTOPHER DANIELS! Daniels grabs a mic and says he is NOT Mark’s dream partner…he’s his NEW MASTER BECAUSE MARK BRISCOE HAS JOINED THE PROPHECY! AND MARK TAKES A KNEE TO HONOR DANIELS! Jay loses it and goes after Mark to talk sense into him but Mark attacks him and the match begins!
Match #1: The Prophecy [Daniels & M. Briscoe] vs. Jay Briscoe & Amazing Red [Dream Partners Tag Team Match]
It’s noted that the Briscoe parents are in attendance. Gabe’s commentary partner says Mark is something of a wayward youth and I really hope this feud has a hype video set to “Runaway Train” by Soul Asylum. I liked the story here. Jay was trying to beat some sense into Mark and every time he got close Daniels was there to protect Mark. Red kept trying to get involved more since Jay’s emotions were getting the best of him and ironically that led to the Briscoes battling to the floor and Red attempting to act quick with a spinning ganmengiri and a hurricanrana but Daniels holds on and hits the Last Rites on Red to win. More story than match but it was quite good for what it was.
**3/4
Post-match, Mark & Daniels celebrate up the aisleway. They pass Papa & Mama Briscoe. They try to reason with Mark and Daniels says he doesn’t listen to them ANYMORE. He looks at Mark and says HE is his father now and they leave. Mama Briscoe starts to cry. Incredible angle!
Backstage, Joey Matthews is with Special K and they’re going through the pills they have and worried they don’t have enough to get through the show after what happened in Philly. Alexis Laree walks up, and WHOA I had never heard young Mickie speak in her full West Virginia accent. Nothing wrong with it just threw me for a loop. Anyway, she asks why Joey didn’t help her at the last show. Joey just laughs at her like a dope and she calls him a douchebag and leaves. Then more (seemingly new) Special K members come over and they all start taking drugs. Hell yeah.
Match #2: Alexis Laree vs. Mace w/ Allison Danger
This stems from Mace’s assault on Laree at the last show. Gabe confirms that Buff-E is GONE from the company. This sucked by the way. My working theory that CSC were secretly good wrestlers forced to do an incredibly offensive gimmick was not true. Alexis wins with a Tornado DDT.
1/2*
Post-match, Allison grabs Mickie from behind and plants a big kiss on her so Mickie lays her out.
In a pre-tape, we see Steve Corino from after getting stabbed in the eye by Homicide last show. He says he’s tried for years to get over with these Philly fans and he’s gone over backwards to try and get Ring of Honor over and this is the thanks he gets? He says he’s a big star over in Japan now and he doesn’t need this shit. It’ll be a long time before you see Steve Corino again but Homicide will have to answer for what he’s done to him one day.
Match #3: Xavier vs. Jeremy Lopez
Oh who gives a shit. I am so over Xavier man and I’m nowhere near having to be done with him. They try to get the Lopez kid over with some near falls and kick outs. But I don’t care. Nobody cares. We have zero reason to care about this. None of it matters. Xavier wins.
*
Match #4: Da Hit Squad vs. Tony Mamaluke & Matt Thompson
Seeing a Xavier match back to back with a Tony Mamaluke match should be considered an act of global terrorism. Fuck, man. Gabe gives himself a sensible chuckle by saying Matt Thompson reminds him of Kenny G. He looks nothing like Kenny G. Dip shit. This actually wasn’t AWFUL. Thompson broke out a few okay moves. Seemed to be going the route of a DHS squash til Mamaluke started working his SHOOTAH~ bullshit. Mamaluke had Mack in a butterfly lock but Maff hit Thompson with a burning hammer. He got the pin but right after the 3 we see that Mack had tapped to Mamaluke.
*1/2
Match #5: The Amazing Red, The SAT & Divine Storm vs. Special K [Izzy, Deranged, Angel Dust, Joey Matthews & Slim J] [Tag Scramble]
So we finally get to the blow off match in this feud that has cooled off immensely, AND, the catalyst for this feud, BrianXL, hasn’t been around in months and I’m pretty sure is done in ROH. This is the debut of Deranged, Angel Dust and Slim J. Fuck yeah Slim J. This is a really fun spot fest. Flippity stuff galore. Special K pull out a really neat five man simultaneous dive to the floor here:
And the spots keep getting crazier including Mikey’s kids doing quadruple Liger Bombs:
And Special K hitting quadruple moonsaults!
No this isn’t some all timer or even a certified god damner. But it was a blast. I usually hate that “what match would you show to someone wanting to get in to watching wrestling” because it’s usually filled with cringey answers like Omega/Okada or Rock/Austin or whatever. No non-fan is going to give a fucking shit about those matches. Show them this match instead where ten young dumb kids throw themselves around like assholes. Hell yeah dude. Red wins for his team with the Infared on, I think, Deranged.
**3/4
Match #6: Samoa Joe vs. Ring Crew Express
ABSOLUTE MURDER.
*
Match #7: Michael Shane & Bio-Hazard vs. Paul London & Rudy Boy Gonzalez [Street Fight]
They really dropped the ball on this feud big time. It was borderline the hottest angle in the company like 3-4 shows ago and a popcorn fart ever since. Maybe Spanky leaving and Bryan touring elsewhere so much put a damper on it. I dunno. Anyway, hey fuck it, enjoy this gif of Rudy Boy attempting Rey’s 619 fake out taunt:
Fantastic. Shane & Bio-Hazard get beaten down for the most part. Bio’s left to take the fall as Rudy superbombs him and London hits the running SSP to win. Waste.
*3/4
Match #8: Carnage Crew [DeVito, Loc & MASADA] vs. Fast Eddie, Don Juan & Alex Arion
This is MASADA’s debut. Another TWA kid. And he’s apparently joined up with the Carnage Crew. This is another tune up/showcase for the Carnage Crew heading into the Abbycide match next month. Just straight up brawling and they win with the spike piledriver.
*1/2
Both Boston shows have honestly felt more like house shows that made tape as opposed to actual ROH events like the ones in Philly. Not sure why.
Match #9: Samoa Joe vs. Homicide
This was a little disappointing. They were only given ten minutes and honestly didn’t do too much with it considering this is supposed to be Joe trying to avenge his friend Steve Corino. Homicide tries to avoid letting this go to the mat or allowing Joe to over power him so he keeps the pace sped up until Joe finally stops him in his tracks with his awesome corner uranage. Homicide continues to try everything. Eventually they get into a slap battle. Joe goes for a lariat of his own out of that but Homicide ducks it and schoolboys Joe for the win.
**1/2
Post-match, there’s a tense staredown but eventually the Code of Honor is observed and they even hug. See, that’s going to be where I have a problem with the Code of Honor. Joe said earlier he’s out for retribution because of what Homicide did to his friend. Observing the handshake is one thing I guess, but a hug? What are we doing here?
Match #10: AJ Styles (c) vs. Christopher Daniels [ROH #1 Contd’rs Trophy]
Again, this just feels like a glorified house show match. These two did better in ROH earlier this year and would go on to do much better things in TNA (can’t believe that’s a sentence I just wrote regardless of who it is about). There’s just nothing unique to this but it’s entirely fine and inoffensive, even borderline “good”. They go into their pretty standard reversals spot. Daniels tries a sunset flip out of this but Styles holds on to his legs impressively and hits a Styles Clash to win and retain.
**3/4
When ROH returns to Philly for “Night of the Butcher”, AJ will get his title match against Xavier.
Post-match, Xavier & Mark Briscoe run out and beat down AJ to soften him up for next month. Jay Briscoe runs out to save but they take him out. Amazing Red & The SAT run out to help clear the heels out and Styles is back up to lay out Xavier and talk his shit before the Prophecy pull him out of the ring and they leave in a huff.
Match #11: Bryan Danielson vs. Doug Williams [30 Minute Iron Man Match]
I’m not entirely sure why this is happening, the match or the stip, but fuck it I guess. Like okay I can fuck with the idea that Williams beat him at Road to the Title but that was months ago and there had been no mention of this since. This is obviously extremely mat based and focused on counter-wrestling which is great. The first ten minutes or so of this was about them trying to figure out a way to simply out wrestle the other but much like Danielson/AJ they found themselves at a stalemate often. Williams uses his power to, well, overpower Danielson. He does a fun spot where he’s got Danielson in a Vertebreaker set up (or as commentary calls it a “reverse Gory Special”) and Williams RAMS Danielson into the corner. But then Danielson shows off his strength and returns the favor!
Danielson uses this momentum and gets a few near falls. Eventually, two simultaneous Dragon Suplexes get Danielson the first fall to go up 1-0.
This goes another 15 minutes with both men absolutely wearing each other down. One thing I liked was this old school tussle they had in alot of spots that may come across like botches or whatever but are in actuality really well timed bits of story. Dragon tries for a super backdrop suplex but he’s exhausted and it allows Williams on the flip to just weigh himself down on Danielson and covers him on the mat for the closest near fall of the match. Williams is working on a second wind and is able to hit the Chaos Theory BUT DANIELSON KICKS OUT! First man to kick out of Chaos Theory apparently. Williams gets flustered and starts throwing everything he has at Danielson. Rolling German suplexes, brain buster, another Chaos Theory but this time Danielson gets his foot on the ropes! Danielson starts throwing desperation forearm smashes but the momentum gains. He hits another super backdrop suplex with just 30 seconds left. He is SPENT. He crawls over to cover Williams, BUT WILLIAMS GRABS HIM FOR A NEARFALL AND THEN IMMEDIATELY INTO A CROSSFACE! Danielson’s got nowhere to grab but he just has to listen to the ring announcer count down the time and time expires. Danielson wins 1-0.
Not AS great as I was hoping. But it was still really good and far and away the best match of the night.
***1/2
The cameras follow Danielson backstage. He congratulates Williams on an incredible match but says it proves that nobody beats him twice. He says he and Williams are the two best mat based wrestlers in the world and he thinks that down the line they need to have the rubber match.
Well, sadly, they never face each other in ROH again. In fact, this is Doug’s last ROH match until spring of 2003. Matter of fact he only has 20 more ROH matches ever between 2003 and 2018, and that’s a bummer.
Doug Williams speaks elsewhere backstage and he’s frustrated. He doesn’t know what else he could’ve done to beat Danielson tonight. He says he too wants another match. Over in England, they do it two out of three falls and he knows he can beat Danielson in that so he asks that their rematch is 2/3 falls.
Indeed, this specific match DOES happen, but not in ROH. FWA:UK hosts it in June 2003 with Doug’s British Heavyweight Title on the line.
Elsewhere, the Prophecy are preparing for a pretape and seem disheveled. But once Daniels yells to start tape they “get into character”. Daniels starts to talk but sees Luscious is on the phone and yells to cut. He asks who she’s talking to and she says Corino. He says enough of Steve Corino and asks her to get off the phone. Joe then gets in Daniels face and asks if he has a problem with Corino? Daniels freezes but evades the question saying he just doesn’t want to talk about Steve Corino. But he does have an issue with Joe not helping Mark, Xavier and him earlier tonight. Joe says he was paid to beat up Dunn & Marcos tonight and he went after Homicide on his own. He calls Daniels the R word and reminds him he’s not about this Prophecy stuff and leaves. Daniels is flustered but asks to restart the promo. He puts over Xavier. Xavier again does a cringey promo about being the best. Even the way he speaks is cringey. Fuck this dude. Daniels says that when Xavier has his title defense against AJ he’ll be in Japan but he’s leaving Luscious behind as an insurance policy. Daniels says to cut tape and then groups up with Luscious, Xavier & Mark and says they need to go take care of that other thing right now.
Elsewhere, AJ Styles is talking to Alexis Laree. He asks if she’ll have his back to counteract Simply Luscious. Alexis rants about how the Prophecy have disrespected ROH for far too long. Cue the Prophecy running on screen and beating them both down to end the show.
An ad airs for an array of RF Video shoots including the absolutely incredible Raven & Sandman one. You need to watch that if you never have.
Anyway, there have been other ROH shows that had far worse matches on it. But this was the first show that collectively was just average or slightly below it. The opening angle and ten man tag gave me hope but I was really let down by Joe/Homicide and Styles/Daniels. Hoping for better with NIGHT OF THE BUTCHER.
Die!
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