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2019 Ring Of Honor Thread


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Recap article

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Taking to social media on Friday, Mercury shared major details on the behind the scenes issues in ROH, putting ROH GM Greg Gilleland on blast for his treatment of talent, among other things. You can view the tweets below, but to summarize:

- Mercury accuses ROH of providing an unsafe working environment for talent, pointing out "No security, no medical staff, no women on creative, worst looking wrestling on or off TV."

- Claims Shane Taylor will not be re-signed on January 1, but Taylor had not been informed of this decision.

- Accuses Gilleland of not taking proper care of Jay Lethal after his arm was broken during the Honor United tour.

- Reveals why ROH's relationship with Alex Shelley has fallen apart.

- Calls Gilleland a "liability" who is "inexperienced and unqualified to generate revenue in his field." Also accuses Gilleland of taking advantage of Bandido.

- Calls out Gilleland and ROH for not implementing proper concussion protocol and accuses of Gilleland of allowing Kelly Klein to travel to South Africa to wrestle despite having a "brain injury."

- Recalls treating Flip Gordon's elbow dislocation with the help of Bandido and Brody King instead of ROH providing proper care.

- Shows proof that Gilleland accuses Mercury of being "high at shows" and responds by wondering why he wasn't given a drug test.

- Accuses guys from GVP and SBG of asking him for his prescribed medications.

- "Hypothetically," says the contracts of Taylor and Bandido expire on Jan. 1 while PJ Black's contract expires on Feb. 1.

- Recalls the "be a fan" incident with Bully Ray and criticizes ROH for not having security and putting Ray in that position.

 

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10 hours ago, paintedbynumbers said:

yes, 

I was considering going to the Pittsburgh show tomorrow. Now I'm not so sure.  Ethan Page, Josh Alexander, Rhyno, and Brian Cage are also in town. May see that instead. 

I'd go with The North, Rhino, and Cage.

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https://lordsofpain.net/maria-manic-returns-to-roh/
 

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Maria Manic made a surprise appearance to begin today’s ROH special. The lights were off as the show went on the air, but when they came back on, Manic was in the middle of the ring. The commentators reintroduced her to the audience and treated this as if it was her first appearance. She was last seen assisting Kelly Klein in winning the ROH Women’s title.

Manic made headlines last month when it was discovered that her ROH contract had expired and she was spotted at the WWE Performance Center. Rumors were that both WWE and AEW had interest in signing her. Fightful broke the news that she had likely resigned a contract sometime last week. Despite being with ROH for months, Maria never had a match with ROH.

 

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https://www.wrestlinginc.com/news/2019/11/joey-mercury-reveals-kelly-klein-salary-661632/
 

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Joey Mercury Reveals Kelly Klein's Salary, Continues To Go After ROH GM Greg Gilleland

Earlier this week it was reported Joey Mercury was released from Ring of Honor. He began his time in May of 2018 and oversaw the company's dojo along with work as a producer and on the creative team. 

Yesterday, Mercury went after ROH GM Greg Gilleland for his treatment of talent, fans, and how the company has handle live events.

"Unsafe environment for Talent in and out of the ring," Mercury wrote. "No Security. No medical staff. No Women on creative, worst looking wrestling on or off tv. No job description. Nothing in terms of anything I've suggested. Total BREACH on YOUR end- and everyone involved that bulls--t, non punctuation using, grammatical pigf--- of a contract."

Mercury also revealed that Shane Taylor will not be re-signed on January 1, but Taylor and his family have not been informed on the decision. He also stated via being hypothetical that the contracts of Taylor and Bandido expire on January 1 while P.J. Black's expires on February 1.

Regarding the Women of Honor brand, Mercury called out Gilleland for not implementing a proper concussion protocol, using Kelly Klein as an example after allowing her to travel to South Africa following a "brain injury." Klein responded to Mercury's post, joining his side on the matter.

"I love Ring of Honor and I want someone guiding the company who will work for the best interests of the product and protest the talent who work hard to make it happen," Klein stated. "We had someone who wanted to do that and tried to do that, and eventually gave up trying to do that when it became clear that he didn't have the support he needed to make those positive changes. I love Ring of Honor and I want to make it better. I want us to be allowed to make it better."

Mercury tweeted out more today, with Klein's permission, he showed e-mails sent between Klein and Gilleland, revealing that she was making under $24,000 a year with the promotion in her 2019 ROH contract. 

"Hello Greg, I wanted to speak with you about a few items in the contract," Klein wrote in an e-mail to Gilleland last December. "When we spoke briefly on Friday, I did not have questions regarding the amended portion of the contract. However, I have since re-read the rest of the contract and I have a few things that I would like to clarify. In regards to the amendment, when we spoke on the phone, I asked if it was possible to make the yearly amount $24,000 to make each monthly check an even $2,000. You said you couldn't do that because then you would have to pay all of the other women that amount. As each agreement is for each individual, I do not believe that my contract should have any bearing on anyone else's, just as no one else's contract has bearing on mine. There is also, of course, the confidentiality section in the contract, which should further prevent this from being an issue.

"Three items I would like clarified and potentially modified in the contract include sections 8, 9b, and 19.

"In section 8, the company has the ability to terminate the contract at any time with 30 days notice, however I did not see any termination rights for me. I would also like the right to terminate the contract with sufficient 30 days notice.

"In section 9b, Release and Grant of Rights, there is mention of some royalties that only appear to be applicable during the term of the contract. If the company retains rights to my likeness and rights to sell any products using my name and likeness, I would like it to be clear that any and all of the royalties would be paid even after the end of the contract.

"Finally, section 19, Waiver and Release of Liability release the company of any responsibility including in instances of negligence. I understand and acknowledge the inherit risk of performing in the manner of professional wrestlers. However I am not comfortable waiver liability in instances of negligence.

"Please let me know when you have time to clarify these items. I am happy to scheduled a phone call or meeting before or after my work day, or during a break if time allows. Thank you for your time and for all of your help with this. - Kelly Klein"

Mercury then posted Gilleland's e-mail back to Klein about her questions regarding her contract.

"Hi Kelly, While we have the NDA language, unfortunately it seems that everyone knows everyone's deal regardless. I'm not suggesting that you would divulge it at all, it's just an assumption that I have to make. However it is more so a fairness internally, aligning the completions for the division as it continues to grow. It things take off or change for the better, we can review/renegotiate at any time.

"In section 8, this is protection that we reserve in all deals and one that legal has resisted change to over the year. It is one that we have not used to date/would never use "just because." It's self-governing in that if we were to exploit or abuse this language, then our deals would mean nothing and talent would not want to work here. If we gave a mutual right, then the contract is essentially a month to month contract is that what you want?

"9b. Royalties are paid after your contract expires at 10% even though the contract rate expires and we reserve the right to continue selling compilations and T-shirts with your likeness. With that said, we wouldn't produce new apparel after you left anyway. It would simply be liquidating old stock. We can add a sell-off period or enter into a separate merchandising agreement at the end of any expiring talent agreement if you wish to do so.

"Section 19 will involve an internal review by our legal team. This is our standard liability language and would involve an extension risk analysis and management decision to change. I can raise the case."

In addition, Klein's husband, BJ Whitmer (who gave a letter of resignation to ROH last December and is currently with AEW as a coach) wrote on Twitter, "From someone that actually worked in that office with Greg Gilleland, everything Joey is saying is 100% true."

 

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I was working a local indy here in Tucson, and we all agreed that while Greg The Office Boy is totally in the wrong- Jim Cornette been telling y'all- Mercury is just as wrong for the way he approached it, because you just don't do that in the wrestling business if you want to get employed elsewhere when leaving a promotion. 

I'll never abandon ROH, by the way. 

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When you scorch the earth, you immolate yourself too. This is one of the few cases where the term is being used correctly. It sounds like Mercury considers office boy Greg to be such a danger to ROH's roster that he's willing to sacrifice his own career if that's what it takes to get rid of Greg (or at least change the way he does business).

I do strongly suspect that ROH won't be in business this time next year, though. It's been run on a "minimise costs" basis for years, but the amount of revenue coming in has drastic go down since Jan 1st. With NJPW cutting ties (or at least loosening them greatly), and the draws they do have coming to the ends of their deals (and almost certainly leaving immediately afterwards) I don't see anywhere they can go. 

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Casey from SquaredCircleSirens:

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Lots of people reaching out to me about the ROH news that has come out. It's even worse than what Joey is saying. Feel bad for lots of the talent who worked for them, especially WOH. People have reached out to me saying that ROH made them sign waivers and stuff saying they were paid before wrestling and still have yet to be paid for work. Also, that Bully vetoed bringing in popular indie girls and was fixated on bringing in Velvet and Angelina, saying they were bigger stars. They used to have a bigger team working with WOH but many left and decided to do other things in the promotion as no matter what they did and said nothing changed for the girls in WOH. WOH does high numbers on youtube so the demand for a division is there. Many within it have voiced frustrations and it has fallen on deaf ears. WOH Wed. was brought up, about how long content took to be put up, how they should run woh matches at least at every show. Worth noting that everyone in ROH says Velvet and Angelina are great to work with and good to have around, just they don't feel like they were bigger names than the names they were looking into bringing in.

 

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https://www.ewrestlingnews.com/news/tk-oryan-defends-ring-of-honor-amidst-criticism
 

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Amid all the recent controversy about Ring of Honor and their structure, which was brought upon due to revelations courtesy of Joey Mercury, Kingdom member TK O’Ryan took to Facebook to defend the Ring Of Honor brand and said that all of the rats have left the company:

Look at the negativity in the comment section. These are not fans. The real fans of Ring of Honor Wrestling are in attendance at every event around the country.

This is my family. I have been to hell and back with the people in this photo and I will not allow the great name of my company to be dragged through the mud.

If a ship is perceived to be sinking, the rats will jump off.
The ship isn’t sinking.

The rats have jumped off.

It seems like we’ve got ourselves a golden opportunity.

 

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https://finance.yahoo.com/news/ring-honor-now-available-across-180100198.html
 

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Ring of Honor Now Available Across Sinclair Broadcast Group's Newly Purchased Regional Sports Networks

BALTIMORE, Nov. 4, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- Sinclair Broadcast Group (SBGI) today announced the start of a weekly airing of professional wrestling promotion Ring of Honor (ROH) on its regional sports networks (RSNs). Beginning Friday, November 8, matches will air at midnight in the applicable time zones for wrestling fans who receive from their TV provider any of the 21 RSNs that Sinclair acquired earlier this year and on Marquee when it launches in early 2020. This marks the first original sports entertainment content brought by Sinclair since acquiring the RSNs.

"The one thing that has always made Ring of Honor so special and able to overcome any hurdle over the past 17 years, is our undeniable commitment to wrestling fans," said Ring of Honor Chief Operating Officer, Joe Koff.  "Gaining distribution in a fixed time every week is a major breakthrough that makes it easier for our audience to find and follow Ring of Honor. We are constantly endeavoring to bring more to our fans, so we are thrilled to have the opportunity to expand our offerings to reach more viewers geographically and offer more programming time for our existing viewers."

"This is a significant step for Ring of Honor and the Regional Sports Networks, and we look forward to delivering more original content to our viewers," said Jeff Krolik, President of Sinclair's regional sports networks.

Viewers can tune in every Friday at midnight starting on November 8th to watch Ring of Honor Wrestling. 

 

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