ROH Manhattan Mayhem Review - March 3, 2018

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

The Briscoes def. The Dawgs and Coast to Coast in a Three-Way Tag Team Match

I believe The Motor City Machine Guns were originally supposed to do something with The Briscoes on this show, but an issue with travel or an injury forced Alex Shelley to miss the event, so we were given this instead. It was a nice little opening match with some good wrestling, but The Briscoes are much bigger stars than the other two tandems, so their victory never felt in doubt. This also allowed them to continue building momentum ahead of their shot at the ROH World Tag Team Championship on the 16th Anniversary Show.

Tenille Dashwood and Deonna Purrazzo def. Sumie Sakai and Jenny Rose

Before this Women of Honor Championship Tournament kicked off, the ladies were rarely ever featured on ROH's televised events, so it's hard to blame the crowd for not caring too much about this. There weren't any established issues between the four women except that they'll all be a part of this title tourney, though they deserve credit for producing an average affair. Dashwood (the former Emma) is a huge pick-up for ROH's women's division and New York crowd loved her here.

Punishment Martinez def. Soberano JR.

Oh my god, this was absolutely atrocious! I honestly don't think I've seen so many botches in one match before. In their defense, we were told by the commentators that Soberano almost didn't make the show due to travel issues and arrived later than expected, causing this contest to be moved from the opening slot to this point in the show. They must not have had time to prepare because they had zero chemistry and Soberano was sloppy more than a handful of times. This will be remembered forever, and not in the way he probably hoped. Yikes.

Cody def. Flip Gordon

If Gordon beat Cody here, he would have been added to Cody's All In event later this year. If you don't follow "Being The Elite" at all on YouTube, then you probably had no idea what the beef has been between these two men. Even if you weren't aware of their history, the match was still extremely entertaining, both in the ring and through their antics. Bullet Club's bear mascot and Brandi Rhodes added a lot to this by being at ringside and I loved the story told at the end with Cody not giving a shit about his wife getting knocked down and instead being obsessed with winning. This was a blast.

The Kingdom Crashed Coleman's Pulpit

Apparently the fans voted to see Colt Cabana appear on Coleman's Pulpit, but The Kingdom crashed the festivities before Cabana could get to the set. Matt Taven's promo was decent, but aside from hyping up the new main event of Bullet Club vs. The Kingdom and Shane Taylor, this was pretty pointless and the fans in attendance sat on their hands for it. In other words, this did not need to happen.

Silas Young, Beer City Bruiser and Brian Milonas def. ROH World Television Champion Kenny King and Chuckie Cheese

Young and Bruiser recently recruited Milonas into their little stable, and King also recently beat Young to regain the ROH TV title. I guess Beretta couldn't make the show, so Chuckie T. replaced him with Cheeseburger, and I got a kick out of their Chuckie Cheese tandem name. As a match, this was perfectly fine albeit forgettable. The heels won as they should have with Bruiser and Milonas seemingly setting their sights on the ROH World Tag Team Championship.

ROH World Champion Dalton Castle and Volador Jr. def. Jay Lethal and Ultimo Guerrero

Since all four men are (presumably) babyfaces, the crowd didn't have an incentive to side with anyone involved. Yes, Castle and Lethal will be fighting for the ROH World Championship at the 16th Anniversary Show this coming Friday night, but even they don't have much bad blood with each other. That said, this turned into a great tag team match halfway through with everyone having strong showings and the crowd came alive for it as well.

Bullet Club def. The Kingdom and Shane Taylor in an Ultimate Mayhem Match

The Kingdom had the tough task of replacing So Cal Uncensored who couldn't make the show due to travel issues, though they also have an on-going rivalry with Bullet Club at the moment as Taven is currently feuding with Cody. They ended up putting together a tremendous main event that benefited from being No Disqualification with everyone getting their time to shine at one point or another. Even The Kingdom came across as credible in defeat, and the atmosphere for this was a ton of fun. This show needed a truly remarkable main event, and this was it.

Overall Show

Manhattan Mayhem has never meant to take away from the Anniversary Show the following week, but last year's installment was definitely more newsworthy than this. In ROH's defense, a number of wrestlers couldn't make the show for whatever reason and they did their best with who they had on hand, but this event wouldn't have been anything out of the ordinary if it wasn't for those final two matchups. Certainly go out of your way to check out Castle and Volador vs. Lethal and Guerrero, Cody vs. Gordon, and especially that Ultimate Mayhem main event.