ROH Final Battle 2008 Live Report and Thoughts

ROH Final Battle 2008 Live Report and Thoughts
Posted by John De Large on 12.28.2008

Can Tyler Black look any more like Austin Aries? Can Nigel overcome the NOAH Grand Slam Champion? Can Danielson finally get his revenge?

ROH Final Battle 2008!
December 27th, 2008- Not quite 7:30 pm bell time
Manhattan Center, Hammerstein Ballroom
311 West 34th St.
New York, NY 10001

Me and my boy Morgan has seats that were double booked, so that should tell you how many people were at this show. Ended up sitting on floor seats, but off to the right, not in an actual row, really strange.

1. Kenny Omega upsets Claudio Castagnoli with a small package. Slow, "methodical," opener. Kenny was over like ice cream and Claudio went for the cheap heat with a Boston jersey. Har har. Claudio got in a lot of offense, while Kenny got in smidges of offense with kicks and a leapfrog stunner. In the end, Kenny reversed Claudio's Ricola Bomb to a small package to win.
Rating: **

2. Jerry Lynn pins Chris Hero in a Four Corners Match that also featured "Addicted To Love," Rhett Titus and The Necro Butcher. Necro got way over mocking Rhett Titus's hip swivel. Holy shit chant for Necro reversing a Jerry Lynn armbar to one of his own. Necro also hurricanrana'd Titus on the floor! Lynn pins Hero after blocking a loaded kick and hitting the Cradle Piledriver.
Rating: **1/2

Post match beatdown on Necro by Age Of The Fall. Kel Steenerico make the save, which leads to:

3. ROH World Tag Team Title Match: Kevin Steen & El Generico (w/ Daizee Haze) defeat Jimmy Jacobs & Delirious to retain their titles. Steen went for a corner cannonball early on, but got knee-clipped and ended up playing face in peril while TAOTF worked his leg. In the end, Steen could not dive onto TAOTF, so he asked Daizee to do it. Jimmy got in Daizee's face, but Delirious got in the middle of things and Steenerico hit with the Assembly Line (Package Piledriver -> Brainbuster) for the win.
Rating: **3/4

Post match, Jimmy tells Delirious to go to hell and walked out on him.

4. Come As You Are Street Fight: Roderick Strong, Erick Stevens and Brent Albright defeat Sweet and Sour Inc. (Go Shiozaki and The American Wolves: Davey Richards and Eddie Edwards) Crazy match, lots of hard stiff strikes from everybody to everybody. Roddy's boot is sickening. Davey and Roddy fight to put each other through a table but Roddy gets the upper hand, sending Davey through with a blue thunder bomb type move. Everyone gangs up on Shiozaki and he ultimately succumbs to a Fujiwara armbar from Albright for the tap out.
Rating: ***1/2

Post match, The Wolves walk out on Go, who flips the crowd off.

5. Jay and Mark Briscoe defeat Kensuke Office (Kensuke Sasaki and Katsuhiko Nakajima) in a small upset. Big chants for Nakajima. Nakajima goes berserk with rapid fire superkicks and Sasaki goes apeshit with his clubbing blows. Sasaki also broke out a lariat, the Stranglehold Alpha and a leglock I've never seen before, but no Northern Lights Bomb. Briscoes finished off Nakajima with a Doomsday Device and a J-Driller. Intense and fast paced!
Rating: ***3/4

Post match, American Wolves attack The Briscoes, but Steenerico saves. Albright comes out and yells a bunch of stuff that I can't hear, but I do hear him say something about "next time," and "Steel Cage," so I guess they'll all fight in a steel cage next time.

Intermission. A long one at that, I had time to meet new people and catch up with old friends.

6. Austin Aries defeats Tyler Black in a Number One Contender's Match. Great match with Tyler outsmarting Aries in the early stages. Aries locked in the Last Chancery fairly early, but got hit with an F5 on the apron and the Paroxysm. Black also hit a sweet no hands twisting dive that would make AJ Styles sit up and take notes. End came when Tyler went for the Phoenix Splash, but out came Jimmy to tell Black something along the lines of "You don't need this win." This momentary distraction allowed Aries to dodge the Phoenix Splash and hit the Joe Killer Combo for the win. I loved this match and I'm not even an Aries fan!
Rating: ****

Post match, Jimmy and Aries join forces to beat down Tyler! Didn't see that coming! Some douche grabs Aries on his way to the back and gets punched out. Another fan tries to jump the rail but gets OWNED by referee Paul Turner. Crowd loves it!

7. ROH World Title Match: Nigel McGuinness defeated Naomichi Marufuji to retain the title. Marufuji went all out with kicks. He also managed a Shiranui on the floor and on the apron! Nigel focused on the arm with the Divorce Court and a hammerlock front powerslam, but the London Dungeon was never used, which struck me as odd. Finish came when Nigel pinned Marufuji and use Marufuji's kickout momentum to swing into the ropes hit a Jawbreaker Lariat.
Rating: ***3/4

Post match, Jerry Lynn tries to get an immediate ROH World Title shot, but fails. Nigel escapes from Lynn by running through the crowd.

Also, Nana returns and is carted off by security.

8. Bryan Danielson defeated Takeshi Morishima in a Fight Without Honor. My pick for match of the night. To start, Danielson dives into the crowd and onto Morishima while his music is still playing! Glorious! It wasn't until about 5 minutes in that Morishima got any offense in and in his anger, he busted out a chain! Morishima strangled Danielson, bloodied him and even hit a back drop driver, but Danielson hung on and managed to kick Morishima down. Danielson then chained Morishima and stomped away! Brutal! Not wasn't enough to stop Morishima, so he chained his own arm and elbowed Morishima 20 times THEN put on Cattle Mutilation to get the win. Awesome match, completely sublime from bell to bell. Thunderous cheers for Dragon.
Rating: ****1/2

This was my first ROH show since the booking change and style change. It's like the beginning was more character and entertainment oriented and once they got to the 6 man street fight, they forgot all of that and said "Let's just do what we usually do." From Aries vs. Black on, the card had matches that managed to blend story and great wrestling, so let's hope they can keep putting on matches like those!

Great show! Can't wait for March!

411mania