Courtesy Of Mike Lafferty
As I write this, I would like to send my condolences and thoughts and prayers to the friends, colleagues and family of Ultimate Warrior, who passed away days after receiving the honor of entering the WWE Hall Of Fame during WrestleMania weekend. I have one major memory of Warrior coming from the June 10th, 1996 episode of Monday Night Raw where Warrior said “At the King Of The Ring I’m gonna kick your a$$!” to Jerry Lawler. Hearing it again in the King Of The Ring promo made it stuck in my memory. Past and present ROH competitors have tweeted their tributes about the former WWE Champion and two-time Intercontinental Champion. Plus, the promotion released on their YouTube channel, Delirious vs. Jay Lethal from The Night Of Hoopla where they paid tribute to Warrior vs. Savage from WrestleMania VII, so you could say its Black Machismo taking on The Ultimate Delirious.
#UnleashTheWarrior
Won’t be going over WrestleMania weekend here as it is part of the special edition of the Honor Report which was released on Monday.
The first few matches are being announced for next week’s first ever Future Of Honor event. The ROH Championship will be on the line as Adam Cole will defend the ROH Championship against Delirious. In addition, the former eight-time ROH Tag Team Champions, The Briscoe Brothers, will be taking on Team Benchmark. Jay Lethal will take on head of ROH security J.Diesel while Kongo will face Psycho Mike, Finally, Ethan Page will square off with Zizou Middoux and the Women of Honor will be in action as Jenny Rose will be battling Mandy Leon.
Courtesy Of Mike Lafferty
It has now been announced by ROH matchmaker, Nigel McGuiness, that the winner of the Michael Elgin/AJ Styles match will have the opportunity for the ROH Championship.
Added to the rematch between Elgin and Styles for an opportunity at the ROH Championship, there is a possibility of another challenger on the horizon or one competitor will be denied a chance at the gold for a whole year as Defy or Deny returns on April 19th. Jimmy Jacobs, Matt Taven and Mark Briscoe have the opportunity to get a championship shot in the future. Adam Cole, however, has the opportunity to deny either one or all men in the match a chance at his ROH Championship shot for a whole year. In previous Defy or Deny matches, the champion has always denied one (or more) of his potential challengers an opportunity at the ROH Championship.
Additionally, Jay Briscoe will be taking on Mike Bennett, ReDRagon will face the team of Andrew Everett and Cedric Alexander and Decade member BJ Whitmer and Adam Page will be square off with Hanson & Rowe next Saturday night in Baltimore.
Apart from big things going down at the shows in New Orleans this past weekend, at the New Japan Pro Wrestling’s “Invasion Attack” Internet Pay Per View, AJ Styles made his surprise debut in the promotion by becoming the new leader of the “Bullet Club” faction. He joins current NJPW Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Champions and ROH Tag Team Champions, The Young Bucks, NJPW Heavyweight Tag Team Champions, Karl Anderson and Doc, along with Tama Tonga in the faction. On the same show, Hiroshi Tanahashi lost the IWGP Intercontinental Championship to Shinsuke Nakamura.
WrestleMania XXX saw a big push for former ROH talents as Antonio Cesaro (formally known as Claudio Castagnoli) who won the Andre The Giant Battle Royal and Bryan Danielson defeated Triple H (to qualify to take on Batista and Orton), Batista and Randy Orton to become the new WWE Heavyweight Champion.
Next week on the Kevin Kelly Show, Kevin will sit down with his partner in crime, Steve Corino. You might also know him as The King of Kings, The King Of Old School, the God of Professional Wrestling and former ECW Heavyweight Champion. He was also the former NWA Heavyweight Champion, the former two-time AWA Heavyweight Champion, a former MLW Heavyweight title holder and a ROH Tag Team Champion. You can tweet your questions for Steve by tweeting Kevin Kelly (@realkevinkelly) and using #AsKKevin.
Kevin Steen’s WrestleMainia weekend escapades are now up on Youtube showing Kevin’s trip to ROH, Wrestlecon and the start of his live Kevin Steen Show.
Until then always…
#BelieveInHonor
