ROH Glory by Honor Review - October 12, 2019

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

Silas Young Won a ROH World Championship No. 1 Contender's Battle Royal

This featured a number of notable names including Kenny King, The Bouncers, Josh "The Goods" Woods and Joe Hendry. It was weird to see King relegated to such a throwaway Battle Royal, and even weirder to see him not last until the very end, so perhaps his push has been put on hold. It was a pretty standard Battle Royal and the finish was well done with Young outsmarting Woods and eliminating him. I believe Woods recently pinned Young, so this was a clever way to play off that. Young's win earned him a shot at the ROH World Championship against Rush later in the night.

ROH World Six-Man Tag Team Champion PCO def. Dalton Castle in a Final Battle No. 1 Contender's Tournament Semifinal Match

It's incredible that PCO continues to be as over with the audience as he is. It's going to be a real shame once his fellow stablemate in Villain Enterprises Marty Scurll leaves Ring of Honor, but I have faith he'll be fine on his own, even though he's in the twilight of his career. Granted, I wouldn't have him headline ROH's biggest show of the year for the ROH World Championship (more on that later), but there's no denying he's insanely popular. He and Castle worked well together and PCO advancing was the right result.

ROH World Six-Man Tag Team Champion Marty Scurll def. Jay Lethal in a Final Battle No. 1 Contender's Tournament Semifinal Match

I was in attendance for the first one-on-one meeting between Scurll and Lethal at Final Battle 2017 and absolutely loved it. I'm shocked it took them this long to have another match with each other, but it was worth the wait. I don't know if Scurll had ever beaten Lethal before, so that was a cool story and the in-ring action was excellent. The sense of urgency this had was also appreciated.

ROH World Television Champion Shane Taylor def. J. Spade

I guess Taylor has history with Spade, which is why he handpicked him as his opponent on his show. Spade scored way more offense than I thought he would and put in a quality performance. Of course, he was never going to win the title, but I applaud his effort, nonetheless. Taylor was right when he said that he has exceeded expectations as ROH World Television Champion. He's really come into his own since winning the title and has been one of ROH's few success stories this year I'd say.

Kelly Klein def. Angelina Love to Win the WOH World Championship

Good lord, the Women of Honor division is the worst it has ever been at the moment. Klein and Love are literally the only two players that matter, which isn't saying much because The Allure is an atrocious act. It speaks volumes that ROH went back to this bout so soon after Death Before Dishonor and already put the belt back on Klein. What was the point of taking the title off of her in the first place then? The match was more shenanigans as expected with the referee getting knocked down and then Mandy Leon and Maria Manic getting involved. Please let Klein regaining the gold mean we can finally move on from this feud.

ROH World Tag Team Champions The Briscoes def. Luke and Perry Hawx

I had zero idea who Luke and Perry Hawx were coming into this show, but the live crowd reacting to them like they were stars definitely made them feel like a big deal and added to my enjoyment of the outing. It helped that the audience was into the action and made it known that they wanted them to win the tag titles. The Briscoes delivered as they always do and thus this was a really fun match. I wouldn't mind seeing more of the Hawx duo in ROH in the future.

Alex Shelley def. Jonathan Gresham

Gresham is coming off a huge victory versus Lethal at Death Before Dishonor, so I wouldn't have had him lose here. Shelley is very talented and is a star in his own right, but the only way I could see this making sense is if Gresham gets frustrated and goes full-fledged heel soon. He came close afterward and nearly battered Lethal with a steel chair, but Lethal talked him out it. Otherwise, this was a wonderful match that stole the show in my opinion. Shelley hasn't lost a step in the squared circle and you can always count on Gresham to bring the goods regardless of who he's up against. This story with Lethal and Gresham is one of the best things going in ROH at the moment.

Lifeblood def. Villain Enterprises

The Lifeblood vs. Villain Enterprises feud continues and you won't hear any complaints from me. Their matches are always top-notch and this was another awesome installment in their ongoing saga. Mark Haskisn and Tracy Williams represented Lifeblood while Brody King and Flip Gordon represented Villain Enterprises. This was all action and very exciting from start to finish. The commentators mentioned King and Gordon didn't have that experience factor as a team, which was what cost them in the end. Bully Ray once again resurfaced afterward to lay a beating on Lifeblood for what felt like the millionth time. Where is this going and why should I care?

ROH World Champion Rush def. Silas Young

This was Rush's first title defense since becoming ROH World Champion at Death Before Dishonor. There was virtually no chance that Young was going to take the title, but at least he was able to look competitive against Rush before losing. It was a well wrestled match and Young had a solid showing, but it was hard to buy into any of the nearfalls when it was painfully predictable that Young wasn't winning.

The Kingdom Addressed the Attack of TK O'Ryan

After Matt Taven announced at the Death Before Dishonor Fallout show a few weeks ago that he had re-signed with ROH, apparently O'Ryan and Vinny Marseglia were ambushed backstage. Taven acted in this segment as if he knew who it was, and after calling the attacker out, footage was shown of Taven and Marseglia arriving to the arena earlier in the day and then they rushed to the back to go find them. We've got a whodunit on our hands, so color me intrigued. If I had to take a guess, I'll go off on a limb and say it was Marseglia himself, who feels The Kingdom has lost their edge following Taven's defeat at Death Before Dishonor.

ROH World Six-Man Tag Team Champion PCO def. ROH World Six-Man Tag Team Champion Marty Scurll to Win the Final Battle No. 1 Contender's Tournament

I don't agree with the decision to hold the finals of the tournament on this show, especially since Final Battle isn't for another two months. Maybe ROH doesn't have many more major shows on the horizon, but PCO vs. Scurll definitely should have been built up more in advance considering it pitted two members of Villain Enterprises against each other. Scurll told PCO beforehand to keep it clean, but of course he cheated every chance he could in order to overcome the unstoppable PCO (including utilizing King and Gordon). In the end, he lost anyway and put over PCO big time on the mic post-match. Unless something changes between now and December, it will be Rush vs. PCO for the ROH World Championship in the main event of Final Battle. I like both guys, but that really isn't an intriguing matchup. I assume they didn't go with Scurll in that spot because he'll be gone from the company before then.

Overall Show

I honestly forgot this event was even happening until earlier in the day and it's not hard to see why. The lack of buzz with ROH is a serious problem and it's only going to get worse when more stars leave such as Scurll and God knows who else. Sure, Taven recently re-signed, but that obviously isn't enough. At any rate, the minimal amount of above-average matches on this show makes it easily skippable, but at least Scurll vs. Lethal, Lifeblood vs. Villain Enterprises and Gresham vs. Shelley were a blast. Everything else was either forgettable, fine, or way too overbooked. Three-plus hours is also too long for a show of this caliber.