ROH Final Battle 2015
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
12/18/15
Pre-Show
1.) “Brutal” Bob Evans
(with Tim Hughes) vs. Cheeseburger: **3/4
This match was originally taped as a "YouTube Exclusive". It's the
culmination of a several month feud between these former tag team partners. I
thought this match was about as good as it could have been. Evans played his
role as the bully heel, and Cheeseburger was very good in his role as the
underdog. Cheeseburger would get the win in the end, finally vanquishing Evans.
PPV
1.) Triple Threat #1
Contender’s Match – The All-Night Express vs. The Briscoes vs. The Young Bucks:
***3/4
The winner of this match
will receive a future shot at the ROH World Tag Team Titles. The Briscoes &
The Young Bucks both got cheered pretty heavily (as you would expect), but
Kenny King & Rhett Titus actually got a lot of boos from the Philadelphia
crowd. As far as the match goes, I really enjoyed it!! It was a sprint right
from the start, with bodies flying all over the place. All three teams got the
chance to shine, and the crowd was really into it. I thought it was the perfect
match to have as the opener for this PPV. In the end, ANX would sneak in and score
the victory after hitting a Super One Night Stand on Mark Briscoe. They’re now
the #1 Contenders for the ROH World Tag Team Titles. That certainly wasn’t the
result I was expecting, but we’ll see where they go from here.
2.) Dalton Castle vs. Silas
Young: ***
Young still has possession
of The Boys, who are now wearing jeans, wife-beaters, and sunglasses. The
commentary put over a “Free The Boys” hashtag, and the fans were chanting “Free
The Boys”, but there was no stipulation attached to this match. I thought this
was fine. It wasn’t their best match, but it was far from their worst match. Nothing
really much to say other than that. The Boys tried to get involved towards the
end of the match, and Castle ended up accidentally knocking one of them down.
This led to Silas Young getting the win.
After the match, Young
takes the mic, and demands that Castle admit that he is a real man. Castle
initially refuses, but then Young gets two chairs and threatens to sic The Boys
on him if he doesn’t call him a man. This causes Castle to give in. He says
that Young is a man….but he’s a foolish man! He says those are his Boys, and as
he says this, The Boys turn on Silas Young and attack him with the chairs! The Boys
are finally free of Young’s control, and are reunited with Dalton Castle! That
was a really cool moment.
3.) Moose (with Stokely
Hathaway) vs. “Unbreakable” Michael Elgin: ***1/2
Elgin is coming off of winning
the 2015 Survival of the Fittest Tournament, and it had already been announced
that Elgin would face Jay Lethal for the ROH World Title at Wrestle Kingdom 10
in The Tokyo Dome on January 4th, 2016. I like the fact that commentary
made mention that Elgin will still face Lethal regardless of the outcome of tonight’s Main
Event, and that a win here for Moose could propel him to a future title shot.
While this wasn’t a great match, I thought it was pretty good. I know that some
people were a little down on this match, but I enjoyed it. This was just two
guys playing a game of one-upmanship, while also trying to beat the crap out of
each other. There was good back & forth action, and there were points where
the crowd was into it. Eventually, Elgin got the victory over Moose after a
series of impressive powerbombs, and the two shook hands after the match.
4.) Adam Cole vs. IWGP Jr.
Heavyweight Tag Team Champion Kyle O’Reilly: ****1/4
This is the big grudge
match between these two. I think it’s their first major singles encounter in
ROH in a very long time. Of course, Cole cost O’Reilly the ROH World Title at All-Star Extravaganza VII. I thought
this was a fantastic match!! These two went at each other right at the opening
bell, and you could really feel the sense of hatred between these two. I’d go
as far as to say that this may have been the best singles match these two have
had. We saw some great action throughout, and the crowd in Philadelphia was
really into it. The only thing to really complain about was the finish, as Adam
Cole turned a triangle or armbar submission by O’Reilly (can’t remember which)
into a pin with his foot on the ropes, and got the win. It was kind of a
deflating finish, especially given that it’s a Grudge Match. However, since the
feud would continue, it didn’t bother me as much, with the benefit of
hindsight.
Even though Cole got the
three count, O’Reilly refuses to let go of the submission hold. He needs to be
pulled off by referees. It seems like he’s done, but O’Reilly then goes right
after Cole’s arm again, and has to be pulled away by more referees.
5.) Six-Man Tag – The
Addiction & Chris Sabin vs. ACH, Alex Shelley, & Matt Sydal: ***
This match came about after
Alex Shelley revealed himself to be the faux-KRD member that had cost The
Addiction the ROH World Tag Team Titles. Speaking of The Addiction, they’re
wearing Star Wars-themed wrestling gear, specifically based on The First Order
(as Star Wars Episode VII: The Force
Awakens, had come out the night before). ACH comes out wearing gear
inspired by Dragon-Ball Z, specifically Goku. Given the talent who was involved
here, you would think this would be great. Now this was a solid Six-Man Tag, but it wasn’t
nearly as good as I was expected. The action was fine here, but I just thought
this would be better. Part of the issues was that there were some noticeable
botches, particularly from ACH. They did tease interactions between Sabin &
Shelley, but they didn’t do as much as I would have thought. Additionally, the match went about fifteen minutes or so. It probably needed to be shortened by five minutes. If it was a sprint, like the opener, this could have been great. Sydal eventually
gets the win for his team after hitting the Shooting Star Press on Sabin.
6.) ROH World TV Title –
Roderick Strong vs. IWGP Jr. Heavyweight Tag Team Champion Bobby Fish: ***1/2
Fish earned a victory over
Strong at Reloaded Tour ’15: Chicago
Ridge a few months prior, which was before Strong won the ROH World TV
Title. I like how they’re using a prior victory by Fish to set up this title
match. For the most part, I thought this was really good. There was some very
solid back & forth action throughout, and the crowd was into it. Both guys
are just so good, that it’s impossible for them to have anything less than a
good match. Of course, the big controversy came with the finish, as they
basically used the Brock Lesnar/Undertaker finish from SummerSlam a few months prior. Fish had a Strong in a submission
hold, and Strong trapped out, but it was subtly, and out of the view of the
referee. Fish releases the hold and started celebrating like he won. Where it
deviated from Brock Lesnar vs. The Undertaker is that instead of one guy later passing out in a submission hold, Strong took advantage of the confusion to hit
a high knee out of nowhere, which allowed Strong to score the win and retain his
title. I really don’t like the fact that ROH basically used a WWE finish. You
don’t need to copy WWE. Plus, turning Strong heel after the incredible 2015 he
had just seems so odd, in my opinion. The match was still very good, but the
finish definitely hurt it.
Cedric Alexander & Veda
Scott then come out and cut a promo at ringside. Alexander was all dressed up. Veda
says that they weren’t invited to Final
Battle, and that’s a mistake ROH won’t make again. She then says that
they’ve been in litigations with ROH over “unsafe working conditions”, and that
they’ve finally reached a settlement. Veda says they all will be seeing more of
Cedric Alexander & Veda Scott in 2016.
7.) ROH World Tag Team
Titles – The Kingdom (Matt Taven & Michael Bennett with Maria Kanellis) vs.
War Machine: N/R
So this was a very
interesting match, to say the least. The Kingdom jumped War Machine before the
bell. They hit Ray Rowe with their Hail Mary Tandem Piledriver on the floor,
with Taven jumping off the second rope. As soon as Taven hit the floor, his
knee buckled, and you could tell that he was hurt. It was around this time that
commentary mentioned that The Kingdom may have jumped on War Machine early
because Bennett has a crapped rip, and they wanted to end things quickly. They then brawl for another two minutes or
so, and Taven still tried to do stuff, despite the fact that he was clearly in a lot of pain (he was visibly limping). Bennett took a nasty powerbomb into the barricades, and then got hit with
Fallout in the ring, and that was it. I’m not sure if the intent originally was for the
match to go short, or if things changed on the fly due to Taven’s injury, but
at the end of the day, War Machine are the new ROH World Tag Team Champions,
and I think everyone will be happy about that.
Before the Main Event, Mr.
Wrestling III leaves commentary, as ROH Matchmaker Nigel McGuinness is going to
call the Lethal/Styles match with Kevin Kelly. BJ Whitmer (who was barred from
the show, along with Adam Page) shows up, and tries to take over on commentary,
claiming once again that Mr. Wrestling III is Steve Corino. Security quickly
sends BJ Whitmer off.
Former ROH World Champion
Jerry Lynn comes out to be on commentary with Kevin Kelly & Nigel
McGuinness. Lynn recently had a confrontation with Jay Lethal on ROH TV, after claiming that AJ Styles was going to win the ROH World Title.
8.) ROH World Title – Jay
Lethal (with Truth Martini & Taeler Hendrix) vs. “The Phenomenal” AJ
Styles: ****1/2
This is actually a pretty
big moment. AJ Styles has been pretty dominant in ROH since his return
in 2014. His only singles loss was against Michael Elgin in April of 2014.
Despite his long winning streak, Styles is coming into this match with a bit of
a disadvantage, as he’s been having nagging issues with his back over the last
few months (It got bad enough that Styles had to pull out of New Japan’s World
Tag League a few weeks prior). However, Styles was able to fight through the pain, and stepped up
in a big way here. I thought this was an awesome Main Event!!! They were
actually able to incorporate the back issues Styles was suffering into the
story of the match, which was actually really cool. The action, of course, was
fantastic. There was some really insane stuff in this match, including Styles
leaping up on the barricade to intercept a dive to the outside by Lethal, and
an unexpected table spot, where Lethal just dropped Styles right through the
table on the floor (the fact that it came out of nowhere actually made it that much more of
a big moment). The crowd was really behind both guys from start to finish. They
were awesome here. Lethal & Styles both hit their finishers, and both kept
fighting. The match finally came to an end when Lethal, in a insult to Jerry
Lynn, hit AJ Styles with the Cradle Piledriver (Lynn’s finisher), before
hitting a 2nd Lethal Injection to definitively put Styles away. The
fact that Lethal beat Styles clean as a sheet in the middle of the ring with no
interference just added onto what was already a fantastic match. For me, this
was the best ROH match of 2015.
Jay Lethal posed with the
ROH World Title, standing over the defeated AJ Styles, to close the show.
Overall: 8.5/10
I should note that, when I
watched this show live, I decided to watch it on my PS4 through the Live Events
App. If you have a PS4, I would totally recommend watching future ROH PPV’s on
your PS4!! The cost is lower than ordering on traditional PPV, and the stream
is a lot better compared to watching the show on ROH’s website. I only had very
sporadic streaming issues, which only lasted five seconds max. I heard from
others who watched the show via PS4 that their streams were totally flawless, so again,
definitely try ordering and watching ROH PPV’s on PS4 in the future.
As far as this show goes, I
thought it was great!! I think it’s fair to say that this might have been ROH’s
best PPV outing of 2015. You had two must-see matches with Jay Lethal vs. AJ
Styles for the ROH World Title (which is my ROH MOTY from 2015), as well as
Adam Cole vs. Kyle O’Reilly. Those matches alone make this show worth checking
out. Aside from the ROH World Tag Team Title Match (which was, at the very
least, hindered by the injury to Matt Taven), the rest of the undercard was
pretty good, with the opening match being the real standout. There were a few
questionable booking decisions, mainly revolving around the finishes of Cole
vs. O’Reilly and Roderick Strong vs. Bobby Fish for the ROH World TV Title, but
other than that, the match quality of this show was relatively great. An
action-packed show from start to finish, and (for the most part) a pretty great
way to end 2015!
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