ROH Summer Supercard Review - August 9, 2019

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

ROH World Six-Man Tag Team Champions Villain Enterprises def. The Kingdom

I think Brody King and PCO will continue to do very well for themselves once Marty Scurll inevitably leaves Ring of Honor. They likely won't be ROH World Six-Man Tag Team Champions for much longer, but those belts are about as pointless as the WWE Women's Tag Team Championship, so they'll be just fine. This was a very good tag team match with Villain Enterprises keeping the crowd invested with their entertaining offense. The Kingdom brawled with The Bouncers afterward to further that feud.

ROH World Six-Man Tag Team Champion Marty Scurll def. PJ Black

Black was originally supposed to face Silas Young on this show, but Young refused. Scurll answered the call instead and had a fun match with Black, even though the outcome was never in doubt. What really resonated with me the most about this matchup was how much of a star Scurll is in ROH and how big of a loss it'll be when he likely leaves soon. I love Villain Enterprises, but he honestly should have held the ROH World Championship at least once during his stint with the company (and by that I mean he should have won the world title over Matt Taven at G1 Supercard).

WOH World Champion Kelly Klein def. Tasha Steelz

I don't want to say that Steelz is terrible, but she did nothing to impress me here. It's nice that ROH wants to focus on fresh faces and gave her the opportunity to compete for the WOH World Championship on a big stage, but I never doubted that Klein would walk away still the champion. They've clearly been building to Klein vs. Angelina Love for the title since Best in the World in June, so unless they're holding off on that until Final Battle (which isn't until December), I would have just done it on this show.

Lifeblood def. Jay Lethal and Jonathan Gresham

Between David Finlay getting hurt, Juice Robinson staying put in Japan and Tenille Dashwood leaving the company, Lifeblood were struggling for a while to find their footing, but I feel that their recent string of matches with Villain Enterprises were a turning point for them. They've been winning a bit more frequently and their matches have been very exciting to watch. Of course, it helped that they had quality opponents to work with in Lethal and Gresham, who also put forth an excellent effort in this outing. Lifeblood winning was the right call and I'm looking forward to the eventual Lethal vs. Gresham feud.

Rush def. Dalton Castle in a No Disqualification Match

I understand why Castle would want revenge for Rush embarrassing him at G1 Supercard earlier this year, but Rush beating Castle in less than a minute didn't exactly establish Castle as being credible. That made it tough to take Castle seriously as a threat to Rush here, even though the actual match had its moments and was largely well wrestled. It's been pretty obvious for a while that Rush is being groomed for a run with the ROH World Championship and thus it was logical for him to maintain momentum by putting his rivalry with Castle to rest once and for all.

ROH World Television Champion Shane Taylor def. Tracy Williams

Williams has been on a roll as of late in ROH and I had high expectations for this championship clash, so you can imagine how disappointed I was when it turned into more of an angle with Flip Gordon attacking Williams beforehand and ensuring that Taylor would dominate a majority of this. Williams sold well for Taylor's offense and they told a solid story, but fingers crossed a rematch happens at some point because this wasn't what it could have been.

Caristico, Stuka Jr. and Soberano Jr. def. Barbaro Cavenario, Hechicero and Templario

This was all action and just an absolute blast. Regardless of whether you're familiar with any of these six stars from the Mexican wrestling scene, you had to enjoy this for what it was (spot-fest or not). Caristico, the original Sin Cara, was the most recognizable name to U.S. fans in this match and had a hell of a showing. This was largely designed to keep the crowd awake so late in the show, so in that respect, it was a success. That said, I won't mind seeing Caristico and his team vie for the six-man tag titles at some point.

ROH World Champion Matt Taven def. Alex Shelley

I'm happy Shelley is back in the business of professional wrestling and is finally getting a chance to shine in singles competition, but I don't think many fans actually bought into the possibility of him becoming the champion. ROH didn't give themselves enough time to build up Shelley as a viable threat to the title, but to his credit, Shelley had a great performance against Taven and came close to capturing the gold down the stretch. Taven retaining his title in clean fashion made total sense. Now, he turns his focus to Rush, who emerged afterward as the newest championship contender. It's clear the Taven as world champ experiment isn't working, so I'd pull the trigger on Rush taking the title sooner rather than later.

ROH World Tag Team Champions The Briscoes def. IWGP Heavyweight Tag Team Champions The Guerrillas of Destiny in Ladder War X (IWGP Heavyweight Tag Team Championship Was Not Defended)

The New York City Street Fight these teams had at Manhattan Mayhem was unreal, so I can't say I'm surprised they managed to raise the bar even higher here. This was an incredibly brutal main event, or in other words, everything you'd expect from The Briscoes and G.O.D., filled with crazy spots and buckets of blood. It won't be for everyone, but the crowd sure seemed to love the violence. While it wasn't the strongest Ladder War I've ever seen, it was definitely memorable and satisfying, sending the crowd home happy in the process. Now I'm left to wonder how The Briscoes are going to top this as ROH World Tag Team Champions seeing as how there isn't a ton of tandems for them to defend against in ROH.

Overall Show

Summer Supercard is worth checking out for that extremely hardcore main event alone, though the rest of the card was consistently entertaining and featured a few damn good matchups. It ran a little longer than it needed to in my opinion, but they didn't have to worry about time constraints with this not airing on standard pay-per-view and instead on HonorClub. It wasn't enough to generate ROH the buzz they need right now (just look at the abysmal attendance for proof), but even with little hype, I thought Summer Supercard delivered.