ROH Manhattan Mayhem Review - July 20, 2019

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

Dragon Lee def. Jonathan Gresham

Lee and Gresham are two terrific wrestlers and were the perfect people to open this event, especially since they have no real rivalry going on at the moment. They worked wonderfully together and the crowd was electric for everything they did. I liked the subtle heel teases from Gresham, who utilized heel tactics to beat Silas Young back at Best in the World. I'm intrigued, so we'll see where that leads.

Kenny King Confronted ROH World Champion Matt Taven

I'm not normally a fan of doing talking segments such as this on live specials, just because I believe the focus should be on the wrestling, but this was necessary in adding King to the ROH World Championship match later on in the night. Both Taven and King received good heat from the New York City crowd and they played their roles well. Jay Lethal's attack on Taven was also well done and provided nice hype for the three-way. It was smart to keep this as short and as sweet as possible.

The Bouncers def. Coast to Coast and Soldiers of Savagery in a Three-Way Tag Team Match

There aren't nearly enough tag teams in Ring of Honor these days, at least ones that mean anything. That said, The Bouncers are pretty over with the audience at the moment and I'm happy they're currently in the midst of a push toward the tag titles. This was a decent little match where Soliders of Savagery were wisely protected via the "disqualification" early on (the referee opted to eliminate them halfway through when they put Beer City Bruiser through the timekeeper's table). The Kingdom's post-match attack on The Bouncers felt like it dragged on and the crowd didn't really seem to care about it, either.

Rush def. TK O'Ryan

I'm almost positive that we've seen this match on ROH TV before, and I wasn't huge on how random it was. Nevertheless, it was a quality contest with Ryan scoring plenty of offense on Rush before eating defeat. His mic skills may need some work, but Rush is a total star otherwise. Dalton Castle laid him out afterward to build toward their G1 Supercard rematch at Mass Hysteria on Sunday night.

ROH World Champion Matt Taven def. Jay Lethal and Kenny King in a Three-Way Match

After the great match Taven and Lethal had at the 17th Anniversary Show in March, I was looking forward to the one-on-one rematch here, but it was still quite enjoyable with King involved as well. They worked an excellent pace and the crowd was very much engaged in the action by the end. Lethal came close to regaining the gold on a few occasions but ultimately fell short, giving Lethal his biggest victory to date as champion. It was interesting that Taven pinned Lethal to retain his title and not King (who can claim that he is owed another shot at the strap due to not factoring into the finish), in addition to hitting him with a low blow afterward. Will all of these losses lead to a heel turn for Lethal soon to coincide with Gresham's?

Lifeblood and PJ Black def. Villain Enterprises

I'm guessing Black still isn't an official member of Lifeblood seeing as how he wasn't included as part of the group during the pre-match introductions. At any rate, this was a super fun eight-man tag team match. It was complete chaos from start to finish in the best way possible and everyone had a chance to shine at one point or another. While Villain Enterprises are a strong stable, Lifeblood desperately needed this win after losing so many matches in recent months, so them coming out on top here was the right call.

The Briscoes def. IWGP Tag Team Champions Guerrilas of Destiny in a New York City Street Fight to Win the ROH World Tag Team Championship (IWGP Tag Team Championship Was not Defended)

ROH has been without tag team champions since April's G1 Supercard pay-per-view, so it was only a matter of time before someone beat Guerrillas of Destiny for the belts and it might as well have been The Brisoces. Their last outing was entertaining, but I knew they were capable of more and thus they benefited from having the Street Fight stipulation here. They more than made the most of it by going all out and pulling off some insane spots. This was a fantastic way to close the show. G.O.D. are awesome, but it's a shame they barely showed up in ROH during their tag title run.

Overall Show

From pictures I've seen, attendance for this event was pretty weak (especially since ROH usually does well in the NYC area), but the people who were there were loud and rowdy all night long and gave this show an electric atmosphere. There wasn't a ton of buzz surrounding it going in, but ROH delivered a hell of a show with three terrific matches and three other well-wrestled ones. It also helped that this was on the shorter side and the two hours absolutely flew by, so I'd certainly recommend checking it out on Honor Club when you have time to spare. My only regret is that I couldn't be in attendance for it as I have been for the last few shows at the Hammerstein Ballroom.