ROH in Chicago Ridge, Ill.
Report by Dot Net reader Jason Detrick

Prior to the first match, the entire roster surrounded the ring and KENTA stood center ring holding a picture of Mitsuharu Misawa, and the fans stood in respectful silence for the 10 bell salute. Sadly, I missed this due to not being able to find a parking spot.

1. Delirious defeated Silas Young, Ego Fantastico, Rhett Titus, "Sugarfoot" Alex Payne, and Sami Calihan. Lots of multi man spots and crisp action for the opener. Some good comedy too that got the crowd worked up. Lots of local yokels, casual fans, and kids in attendance due to Flair, who attracted a very big and enthusiastic crowd.

At one point in this match, Delirious chased Titus under the ring and when they came out, Titus had his thong pulled down in the back and some toilet paper in his ass crack. Not sure what the implication was there. Delirious was working together with Ego, likely because he is a fellow mask enthusiast. After a bunch of big moves, Delirious came off the top with the Shadows Over Hell for the win. High quality opener that did its job in getting the crowd excited

2. Erick Stevens defeated "HD Ready" Rache Brown. Rache Brown has apparently given up his skull crushing ways, as now I guess his gimmick is he really wants to make it onto the HDNet show. This change did not effect Rache's greatness. He brought a lot out of Stevens and the two clubbed each other with some very stiff forearm shots, spears, shoulderblocks, and lariats.

Very hard hitting and entertaining match. It should be noted at this point that the temperature in the building was approximately 150 degree with the very bright lights on the ring not helping matters. This caused all of the wrestlers to get very sweaty very quickly, which caused some difficulty in performing moves due to the slipperyness. This fact made Stevens hitting a doctor bomb on the huge Brown for the win all the more impressive. I'd love to see a rematch on HDNet.

Ric Flair came out and said a bunch of generic stuff. The crowd ate it up. He threw in a few local lines and said Chicago is the greatest sports town ever. Oh Ric, I bet you say that to ALL the cities. He also bragged about his financial immaturity over the years.

3. Kenny King (w/Rhett Titus) defeated Petey Williams. Kenny has so much charisma it's not even funny. Petey looked weird. The last time I saw him before tonight was also the last time I saw TNA, on a PPV from 05, when he was doing the Team Canada gimmick. I think he was still wearing his gear from when he was pretending to be Scott Steiner or something? I dunno but it looked stupid.

This match started slow and Petey looked lost. They clicked about half way through and had a pretty good match. Petey was very over and the crowd was dying to see the Canadian Destroyer. They teased it at least 4 times without delivering it to the dismay of the crowd. Titus distracted the ref and Petey stood there like an idiot and stared at Titus with his back to King.

King hits the double knees in the corner and the Coronation for the win. I thought the people behind me were going to start crying with how upset they were that they didn't see the Canadian Destroyer. They didn't have to wait long though as Petey fought off a two on one post match beatdown and hit King with the move.

After the match, Williams cut a terrible promo, repeating himself multiple times and stumbling over his words, but the gist of it was that ROH is where stars are born, but in his case ROH is where his star will be reborn. He implied that TNA saddled him with a crappy gimmick, but then he went on to say some Scott Steiner like catchphrases that I can only assume Petey used in TNA. All while wearing what appeared to be his TNA gear. Weird.

4. KENTA defeated Tyler Black. I think some of the casual fans were skeptical when they saw KENTA for the first time, but they knew by the end of this match why the ROH fans went crazy for him when he came out. This was as great of a match as you would expect. KENTA did spend most of the match on offense, but Tyler got a few of his signature spots in too. He did not hit Gods Last Gift or the Phoenix Splash, but he did hit a devastating Buckle Bomb.

KENTA was determined to with the match with an STF but it was not to be. The originator of the Go To Sleep hit the move (which shocked the casual fans behind me who said "He does the Go To Sleep??! Cool!"). KENTA hesitated briefly after the manuver and Tyler kicked out to the shock of his opponent and the crowd, who contended that it was a three count. He went for the GTS again but Tyler tried to counter with God's Last Gift", which was countered back into a second Go To Sleep that put Tyler down.

After KENTA headed to the back, the Age of the Fall screams started playing on a loop which confused a lot of the casual fans. Jacobs hooded goons (about 7 or 8 of them) swarmed the ring and beat down Tyler. Jacobs, who had promised something big that would change everything this weekend, ran in and joined the assault. He called for the hook from the ceiling to be lowered, the same hook that he and Tyler Black hung Jay Briscoe from two years ago to start the Age of the Fall faction.

As Tyler was about to be raised above the ring, Steen & Generico made the save with chairs, taking out the goon squad. Tyler then hooked Jacobs up to the hook and Jacobs was raised above the ring as Delirious came out to mock Jacobs as well. As he hung helpless, Tyler stood under him and declared the Age of the Fall dead once and for all.

After Jacobs was lowered he lashed out verbally and physically at his henchmen. They responded by leaving him. The crowd chanted "Disappointment" at Jacobs and sang the Na Na Hey Hey Goodbye song to him. Jacobs yelled at the fans and stormed off through the crowd and went right out the entrance of the building. Good angle.

I heard from multiple people that during intermission, Jacobs remained in character and was sitting on the sidewalk outside of the front entrance sulking and pouting. Oh yeah, and Bret Hart will be doing a meet and greet at the next Chicago show in September.

5. Colt Cabana & Brent Albright defeated Joey "Magnum" Ryan and Claudio Castagnoli (w/ Dirty Ernie Osiris and Prince Nana). After some crowd brawling, some weapons were brought into play. About 10 to 15 chairs were brought into the ring and stacked into a pile. Joey Ryan gave Colt Cabana the Moustache Ride onto the chairs in a great spot.

Albright hit a very impressive drive into the crowd onto Claudio. Later on he hit an even more impressive From Dusk Till Dawn. What a high flier. Nana interjected himself into the match and got his ass kicked. Colt hit the Flying Asshole onto Nana in one corner and then hit a Flying Asshole onto Ryan in the other corner through a propped up table for the win. Good energy to the match and the crowd loved it.

6. D-Lo Brown defeated Roderick Strong. D-Lo was majorly over as the hometown boy. Roderick was cheered to. The match began with a super stiff chop fest, which almost immediately drew blow from Roddy's chest. After being scolded by the referee, D-Lo backed him into the corner and did his head shake thing while telling him off which got a huge pop. D-Lo got the cheapie win holding the ropes. Roderick yelled to Brown afterward that Brown can't beat him fair and square.

7. Kevin Steen and El Generico defeated The American Wolves (with Shane Hagadorn). If the Wolves win, Steenerico get no more title shots. If Steenerico wins they get to pick the stipulation for their next shot. Early in the match, Steen hit his Steenton Bomb off the top to the Wolves on the floor. Generico seemed to tweak his knee again and was wincing through most of the match, but I'm hoping that was just him selling. Too many great spots to remember, but it was yet another great American Wolves match. 

Davey Richards is such an entertaining heel. Towards the end, the ref bumped and Richards hit Steen with the belt. Steen kicked out in a good false finish. Shortly after that, Steen had Edwards (the illegal man) tapping to the Sharpshooter while Generico (finally!) hit the top rope turnbuckle brainbuster for the pin on Davey.

During the match, Eddie Edwards hand was bleeding badly. Immediately after the match, officials and booker Adam Pearce ran out and had him wrap his wrist in a towel and get to the back. Edwards couldn't resist showing off his injury to my section. He had a pretty big hole on his wrist. Not sure how it happened but it was really nasty.

8. Austin Aries defeated Nigel McGuinness to retain the ROH Title. Very nice reception for McGuinness with Welcome Back chants. Aries got almost 100 percent heel heat because he is an awesome heel. He got on the mic and said he has always said that ROH fans are fickle but this really proves it, since the last time Nigel was here the fans despised Nigel and loved him, and now that Nigel has lost the title they love him. He said that just proves that ROH fans identify with fellow losers.

Nigel responded by calling Aries a prick and saying something like just because Aries now has some hair around his lips, he doesn't have to be a vagina. Aries says maybe he's a vagina because he is what he eats. Nigel comes back with "Well in that case, you're an asshole". The crowd goes nuts for this and I must say the delivery from both was fantastic.

Sadly, once the match started there wasn't a lot of crowd heat left as it was late and the crowd was so warn out and tired from the heat in the building. Nigel worked a slower style and missed several lariats. The crowd was chanting for Nigel to f--- up Aries. Aries got on the mic again and said it will be impossible for Nigel to " me up" (Aries with the TV censorship style self edit) without him being able to use lariats anymore. Finally, Nigel did the kick part of an old kick-lariat combo and after considering it, he hit the lariat. He immediately said "that was a mistake" aloud and started clutching his arm for the rest of the match.

As with Generico, I really hope he's just doing some great selling. Nigel moved away from the lariats and worked on getting Aries in the London Dungeon. he hit a Tower of London from the apron to the floor. He also is magically able to hit the headstand dropkick again now that he is a semi-face. Aries hit the snap kick to the face and the brainbuster for the win. Good entertaining match, but not on the level of their matches from '07 and '08 when Aries was the challenger.

Overall a very good show.

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