ROH TV results: Violence vs. Pure episode
Location: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Before Quinn McKay appeared, cameras caught Vincent backstage. Vincent was standing in the mirror and asking himself and his fellow The Righteous stablemates if he looked good enough for a certain somebody.
Then, McKay appeared and gave her usual spiel. She then ran down the card of this week’s episode, which features a special Violence vs. Pure theme pitting members of Violence Unlimited against members of The Foundation. The matches scheduled are: Homicide vs. Jay Lethal, Brody King & Chris Dickinson vs. Jonathan Gresham & Tracy Williams, and Tony Deppen vs. Rhett Titus.
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Tony Deppen defeated Rhett Titus (12:23)
This match was a great display of the strengths of both wrestlers and gave Deppen a much-needed win in ROH.
Deppen tried to get cocky with Titus very early on, but Titus took him to the mat with a front facelock. Titus shifted the submission around and tried to keep Deppen’s head on a swivel. As the first commercial break ensued, Titus still had full control of Deppen after administering a few pin attempts.
When the bout returned, Titus picked the ankle of Deppen, sending both guys right back to the mat. After delivering a boot to the jaw, Deppen applied his own front facelock on the mat.
The match picked up steam at this point, with Deppen and Titus hitting their signature moves. Deppen ducked a few clotheslines from Titus but was met with Titus’ belly-to-belly suplex. Homicide came down to the ring to support Deppen, which lit a fire underneath the former ROH Television Champion.
After a second break, Titus attempted a running corner kick but got hung up. This prompted Deppen to springboard dropkick Titus to the arena floor, where he was met with a diving senton. Deppen would capitalize on this after throwing Titus back in the ring, where he delivered a chair shot to the mid-section of Titus while referee Todd Sinclair was busy with Homicide. Deppen followed it up with a running knee strike to get the win.
In a backstage promo after the match, Titus showed frustration with the fact that The Foundation didn’t help out when he was getting attacked.
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Violence Unlimited (Brody King & Chris Dickinson) defeated The Foundation (Jonathan Gresham & Tracy Williams) (12:52)
This was a really fun tag match that didn’t feature the usual tag match formula of the heels dominating everything.
Before the match, Violence Unlimited cut a promo. Chris Dickinson basically challenged ROH to bring Karl Gotch back from the dead to stop the faction’s current run.
Shortly before the bell rang, The Foundation jumped Violence Unlimited from behind. The chaos didn’t last for long as Brody King and Jonathan Gresham became the legal men. Gresham was isolated by both King and Dickinson as they exchanged a multitude of tags. Tracy Williams eventually snuck his way in the match and immediately planted Dickinson with a superplex before the commercial break.
Williams had a cool sequence where he practically square danced on both of Dickinson’s ankles. This was a turning point in the bout, as Gresham came in and applied a few ankle-based submissions. After a few more tags, the match went to a second break.
As the break returned, King hit an inverted atomic drop on Williams before turning it into a Boston Crab. King tagged out to Dickinson and took Gresham off the apron, making it a two-on-one affair yet again. Dickinson would go on to put Williams in a sleeper hold, prompting Williams to pass out.
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Jay Lethal defeated Homicide (5:37)
This was fine for what it was — but given the history, I would have had the match go longer.
The two competitors stayed out after the previous tag match and immediately went to war with each other.
Jay Lethal took out Homicide with a springboard dropkick and a trio of dives to the outside. Homicide responded with his own diving senton before both men crawled back in the ring.
The two traded big strikes to the midsection before climbing to the top rope. Lethal used the positioning to toss Homicide off the middle rope and hit a dropkick. Lethal went to attempt a Figure Four leglock and found a fork taped to the inside of Homicide’s boot. Homicide jumped up and tried to stab Lethal with the fork, but instead planted it inside of the turnbuckle.
As the match progressed, Lethal became more targeted with his strikes. After nailing Homicide with a superkick, Deppen made his presence known at ringside. Deppen went to hand Homicide a chair, but he was bulldozed by The Righteous’ Dutch who came out of nowhere. Shortly after, Lethal hit a Lethal Injection for the win.
As the show went off the air, The Righteous stood on the stage and applauded Lethal to much confusion.
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Next Week —
- ROH Six Man Tag Team Champions Shane Taylor Promotions (Shane Taylor, Moses & Kaun) defend against Danhausen, PCO & Sledge
- Quinn McKay & Rok-C vs. Miranda Alize & Max The Impaler
- Wildcard Trick or Treat Halloween four corner survival tag team match (all of the teams will be drawn at random out of a jack-o’-lantern)
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Final Thoughts —
Aside from a main event that I wasn’t crazy about, this week’s episode of ROH TV was one of the better ones in recent memory. The show followed a consistent theme and wasn’t just packed with nonsensical tag team bouts. Every match was good or better, meaning:
This week’s ROH TV gets a grade of: Go Out Of Your Way to watch.