Ring of Honor Review - November 14, 2018

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

ROH World Television Champion Jeff Cobb def. Shane Taylor (Non-title)

I like Taylor and believe he has potential, but this was way more competitive than it should have been. Sure, it was a fun, brutal battle between two titans, but Cobb just arrived in Ring of Honor and no one (unless they're a legitimate title contender) should be getting this much offense over him, especially someone such as Taylor. Didn't Cobb recently squash Punishment Martinez in under two minutes? At any rate, the crowd loved this, so there was that. Afterward, Cobb was confronted Adam Page, so that looks to be the TV title match at Final Battle and I couldn't be more excited for it.

The Bouncers def. Cheeseburger and Eli Isom

Beer City Bruiser being off his game was played up beforehand, apparently as a result of Silas Young ditching them not too long ago. I thought for sure that would lead to a loss for them, but that didn't end up being the case. This was a classic tale of the underdogs attempting to battle back and pull out the upset victory, but ultimately to no avail. It was a nice little match while it lasted, yet nothing too special.

ROH World Tag Team Champions The Briscoes Attacked SoCal Uncensored

As if it wasn't already evident, SoCal Uncensored are officially full-fledged babyfaces based off the promo they cut here. Yes, Scorpio Sky is still trashing whatever town they're in, but at this point, the crowd is doing the shtick along with him. They addressed how it was in this same arena that they were told by Joe Coff at the beginning of the year that they would be gone from the company when their contracts expired at Final Battle and how in order to change his mind, they need to end the ROH World Tag Team Championship reign of The Briscoes. They hyped up next week's three-way tag title match before being attacked by The Briscoes, so this as a successful segment all around.

ROH World Champion Jay LEthal, Dalton Castle and Jonathan Gresham def. The Kingdom

I honestly expected Will Ospreay to be the mystery partner since The Kingdom attacked him in addition to Lethal back at Death Before Dishonor, but Castle returning from injury was a pleasant surprise. The crowd was very much behind him here and was happy to see him. He has bad blood with The Kingdom (specifically Taven) from many months ago, so Lethal selecting him as their partner made sense from a storyline standpoint. It was a chaotic and entertaining main event where everyone shined at one point or another and Castle scored the win for his team as he should have. Post-match, he teased getting his rightful rematch for the ROH World Championship by staring Lethal and his belt down, so it will be interesting to see what direction they go in with the title heading into Final Battle with so many possible challengers to choose from.

Overall Show

With Final Battle a little over one month away, it's crunch time for ROH to put together a compelling card for the event, and I think they are well on their way to doing so. Castle returning made this a newsworthy show and the in-ring action was slightly above average on the whole between the opener and the main event as well as the decent tag team match. Throw in some hype for next week's tag team title matchup and Marty Scurll vs. The Hurricane and you have yourself an effective and enjoyable edition of ROH TV.