Michrome 0 Report post Posted August 11, 2004 The matches are in bold! My thoughts aren't! Main Event Non-Title Match: Homicide vs. Samoa Joe vs. CM Punk: This is what you call the last resort. Originally it was Dragon-Joe, but Dragon had to pull off for Japan. Then it was Punk/Joe vs. Ki/Cide, but Ki had to pull off for Japan. Now it's a 3-way, and it should be a strong match. Punk and Joe had the best singles 1 fall broadway I have seen in over 10 years, and I'm sure they will be playing up on this. Punk is still in line for a rematch somewhere down the road. This is also being billed as Cide's last match with Joe in 2004, so it would be real ironic if he pinned Joe and then was unable to get a title shot, fueling his rage even more. The safest outcome is Punk pinning Cide to get a win back from RRC II and 1/29, the most unlikely is Joe pinning Cide again. I'll bet on Punk pinning Joe after a Pepsi Plunge, proving he can do it. Tag Team Titles Match: Havana Pitbulls vs. Briscoe Brothers: Ah this should be fucking great. Their match in MN was a great "first match," they didn't do too much and everything worked. This will be one of the matches to carry the workrate load, I expect it to go 20-25. These are the 2 best tag teams in the United States, what else can you ask for? I love the recent call of putting the straps on the Pitbulls, and I don't see them losing them anytime soon. Pure Title Match: Doug Williams vs. John Walters: The storyline behind this match was John vowing to challenge for a title in Boston, reaching that goal, and now vowing to win it. It's highly doubtful, but Walters always steps it up for big matches (Cide, Daniels, Punk, 8-man, etc) and I think this will be tremendous. Doug Williams is great and this should be great. Rematch: Alex Shelley vs. Jay Lethal: I was priveleged to see their 5/22 first match. It only went about 7 minutes, and mainly served the purpose of getting Shelley over. This time, Lethal has a major push going, and a lot more fan support than he once did. Most of his support is in Philly/NJ though, don't know if it will carry over. Either way, he's the most underrated worker out there today, and Shelley is great. Everyone has been begging for a 15-20 minute rematch since the first match happened, and I think we will get it here. This could be the one that steals the show. Scramble Cage Melee: Whitmer vs. Maff vs. Alterboy Luke vs. Fast Eddie vs. Loc vs. Devito vs. Jack Evans vs. TBA?: This was done to lure the highflying fans away from H2 after Court posted Gabe's emails publicly and pissed him off. Now there is no H2 but they're stuck with the match. The rules are simple: to eliminate someone, you have to jump off the top of the cage onto them. Color me a skeptic, but I know Gabe will do everything he can to lay this out and add a story to it. It's not as if Whitmer or Maff will dive, but I imagine they are good bases for dives. The story behind them being in is Allison Danger owns their contracts from The Prophecy and put them in this hoping they would be hurt. PLUS! Austin Aries, Roderick Strong, Colt Cabana, Ace Steele, Jimmy Rave, etc I expect an Aries/Strong vs. Cabana/Steele match to materialize, and I've heard Nigel will be on this show too, so I'm expecting Nigel vs. Rave for a shot at the Pure title, but that's just a guess. Overall, it looks like a really strong show for good matches, but not really that important of a show. I'm just hoping nobody gets injured in the cage. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Guest OSIcon Report post Posted August 11, 2004 I like the way they've handled the booking of the cage match since H2 canceled their show. There's no doubt they really jumped the gun when announcing the match. It would have ended being a cool high flying exhibition and may have even stolen a few potential H2 show goers, but it ultimately would have watered down the gimmick and appeal of seeing guys leap off of a cage. ROH obviously realized this too (Gabe as said as much) and have taken the right steps in rectifying the situation after H2 threw in the towel. They couldn't cancel the match since it was a heavily hyped bout that had been promoted for a while already. Instead of just letting the match happen as planned, though, they took the right steps to correct their mistakes. The additions of the Carnage Crew, Maff, and Whitmer are all positive additions. They'll be able to make use of the cage in non-flying ways, thereby helping hold the match together and making it not as needed for everyone to do 4 dives from up top. They also act as good bases though. The other two scramble cages would have suffered greatly if they had another "flying team" in them instead of the Carnage Crew, so adding them and Maff/Whitmer should not only help the match be better, but will also keep the match from turning into a dive fest that kills the gimmick. I would hope the next step would be to change the rules form the strange "Dive on someone to win" stipulation to just a single pin or elimination by pinfall match. The card looks pretty good to me, especially considering how many times the main had to be changed. They ended up with a big main event that is not exactly being thrown out there prematurely, so it worked out as good as possible. Pitbulls vs. Briscoes is the match I most look forward to seeing. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
ulfistgut 0 Report post Posted August 11, 2004 Outside of the fact that it provides overkill in a match with many people the 'dive onto opponents' to win stip did actually make a lot of sense - and in fact I would have suggested some rule to say that the same dive could not be used twice for a win or something. The problem being in these big spot matches is that outside of it looking pretty there isn't a terrible amount of psychology towards doing all these pretty flips whereas this dive rule actually would explain why if their opponent is dazed enough for someone to climb the cage (even more so in non-tag combat) the guy doesn't just pin said dazed opponent. In mark mode speaking, i'd love to see Delerious or Matt Sydal in it. Delerious hitting his back splash off the cage would be an awesome spot to do, or tease given it would probably be hard to pull off without breaking the opponent's back or Delerious' chest/ribs Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
