Ring of Honor Review - January 29, 2026

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

ROH Women's World Champion Athena def. Vertvixen in an ROH Women's World Championship Proving Ground Match

These Proving Ground matches rarely serve a purpose, but they're especially stupid for Athena, who we know is not going to lose to a random enhancement talent (all due respect to Vertvixen, who has had plenty of matches in AEW and Ring of Honor but always loses). It's just an excuse to get her in action. I have no idea why this lasted as long as it did. Hyan and Maya World making the save for Vertvixen afterward set up what we got from them later on.

Adam Priest def. Anthony Henry

Priest is part of a tag team with Tommy Billington, so it was weird to see him in a singles match out of nowhere no storyline significance. I thought JD Drake was out injured again with Henry on his own here, but Drake was in action soon after this. Strange. Anyway, this was well wrestled in the time they were allotted. We subsequently found out that Priest will challenge Kazuchika Okada for the AEW International Championship on Saturday's Collision. Uhm, okay.

"Dynamite Kid" Tommy Billington def. Aaron Solo

Billington won his match, too, but apparently he's not interested in going for any gold, rendering this pointless. This was slightly shorter than Priest vs. Henry but hardly more interesting. Solo simply exists at this point and I don't think Billington is being built up for anything. Billington and Priest are probably better off in the tag team ranks because they're nothing special as singles stars.

Katsuyori Shibata def. JD Drake

Why Shibata continues to wrestle on ROH TV when he's a member of The Opps, no clue. It's not like these matches make much of a difference, anyway. Shibata was always going over here, so there was no reason to think it was ending otherwise. Honestly, the best part about this was Shibata's interaction with the dude dressed as Jesus at ringside. The rest was whatever.

Hyan and Maya World def. Lady Bird Monroe and Viva Van

It's cool that Hyan and World got a bunch of exposure on this show by appearing earlier on and then picking up a victory here. The match was basically an extended squash, but it allowed Hyan and World to build momentum. Post-match, Athena and her crew laid them out and challenged them to a six-woman tag team match on next week's Global Wars episode.

Mascara Dorada def. Tony Nese

Tony Khan recently announced that Dorada has a dual contract with CMLL and AEW, and based on everything I've seen from him in the last year or so, it's definitely deserved. The guy is great and this served as a reminder of that. Nese is skilled as well, so they had a quality contest, but much like with almost every other match on this show, this was pretty meaningless.

Overall Show

God bless ROH for going with a seven-match card this week. Unfortunately, it was your usual throwaway show outside of the hype for the women's match on the Global Wars episode. Nothing else was advertised to my knowledge, so who knows what the hell else we'll be getting. This wasn't offensively bad or boring, but it's wrestling for the sake of wrestling and it's not worth seeking out in my opinion.

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