R-Evolution III - 3/6/2022

[eikerir]

3 hours ago, SirFozzie said:

THIS MAN IS 62 YEARS OLD.

 

 

Holy shit the distance looks much further away than in the official AEW camera shot.

I actually thought the table set up was leading to some sort of Jeff Hardy debut because it looked almost exactly like the Royal Rumble 2000 Swanton spot.

 

[Coletti]

6 hours ago, Cristobal said:

Man it was five hours including buy-in. I'm deadass tired and I watched the show on my couch

I meant specifically the constant Adam chants, like that joke is funny once and they just drove it into the ground. If they had just waited until later in the match with the Both These Adams chant, It would have been hilarious and appropriate.

Then they were booing Hangman when he had Cole tied up in the ropes as if Cole didn't do exactly that on Wednesday and was getting his comeuppance.

[Pete]

6 hours ago, Octopus said:

My son pooped during the dog collar so a missed half of it. 

The match or the poop?

[eikerir]

10 minutes ago, christopher.annino said:

I meant specifically the constant Adam chants, like that joke is funny once and they just drove it into the ground. If they had just waited until later in the match with the Both These Adams chant, It would have been hilarious and appropriate.

Then they were booing Hangman when he had Cole tied up in the ropes as if Cole didn't do exactly that on Wednesday and was getting his comeuppance.

I didn’t mind the chants, people were having fun and all chants were positive. Beats a quiet tired crowd.

Cole is billed from Florida (and an extremely popular heel anyways) so I think that explained the unusual boos for Page at some points during the match.

Edited March 7, 2022 by eikerir

[Greggulator]

I did not see the whole show yet. But my basic thoughts:

Fun ladder match. I loved the big spot they had with the announcing tables area. All of that made Wardlaw look great. 

I really hated the Punk/MJF match. I think they tried to have too much psychology with things like Punk targeting Max’s hand. The psychology of a dog collar match is simple: Punk makes this coward piece of garbage bleed a lot of buckets, MJF does something dastardly to get control, then you get to the ending. But Punk should have been beating him up for 90 percent of the match. I did not like it.

The women’s match started off great as a battle between two women who hate each other having a wrestling match. They had some flubs. But, in general, I liked the outline of the match.

I wish they actually put on the woman’s match before the Punk match. The woman’s match was about Britt’s flunkies. By having that match first, you set up in the audience a bit of an expectation for Wardlaw to interfere until he does what he did. Just a nitpick.

Danielson/Ambrose was a good quality professional wrestling match that was just sorta there for me until the great Regal reveal. Awesome.

The trios match was awesome. Just a really fun and crazy brawl. Sting has problems. Just really great carnage and my favorite match of the night.

The main event was really good. Adam Cole coming out dressed like that was not ideal for a cool heel. Good match with a lot of cheap shot heel nonsense from Cole and Hangman working over underneath. The end was a bit much as the match would have had a satisfying finish after the first BuckShot but fun all around.

I think one of the problems with the show was that it played well for TV but not necessarily the arena. A person in the 200 level is not going to clearly see and understand thumb work in a chain match or get why someone is doing that stuff. 

 

[GojiColin]

That was a great PPV, I don't think there was a bad match at all.

I'm in the minority here and the Punk/MJF match didn't really do it for me.  You really could have cut a few minutes out of it and it would have been much better.  It's The Batman of wrestling matches I guess.

Happy to see Wardlow's finally getting the trigger pulled on him.  It'll be cool to see how it all plays out for him.

Tay/Jade was my surprise match, they continue to up their game and it showed there. The tornado trio had no right being that fun either.

Everything else was fun to great for me, AEW continues to kill it.

[Casey]

13 minutes ago, Greggulator said:

Danielson/Ambrose was a good quality professional wrestling match that was just sorta there for me until the great Regal reveal. Awesome.

I don’t agree with you about the Punk match, cuz I’m a Punk fanboi, but this I can agree with. I legit fell asleep during the Mox/Danielson match and woke up in time for the finish and Regal coming out. It was perfectly good rasslin’ but I went into that match thinking we were probably going to get just a feud between the two out of this. Now, though? Shit, violence is upon us.

Random thought: Jade Cargill is a star, and she has people like Sonjay Dutt and Bryan Danielson training her and showing her old tape. She’s in fine hands, and will only get better. But she shouldn’t wear an outfit like that again probably (even if it was badass as fuck) - I’m sure some Reddit subs are gonna have a field day with it, I’m fairly certain there were… uhhhh, wardrobe malfunctions.

[punkenhead]

King/Jericho was my match of the night. Where people identified with Stone Cold as an everyman because they wanted to stick it to their boss, people organically identify with Eddie as an everyman because he is just fucking real. The amount of people he has inspired with this run and with his candor in interviews is awesome, and I am damn glad to see it. 

You know you are over when you are the person not named Punk getting a chant during the dog collar match. The Wardlow turn is off to a fire start.

While we are talking about Wardlow though, whose bright idea was it to have Ricky Starks take a neck bump on a ladder? The man should be protected like he was one of the pillars, because his upside is just as promising, perhaps more. 

I am going to go ahead and jump on the Jade Cargill bandwagon. If she continues to learn from Danielson on in ring and psychology and Jericho on promos, I am going to go ahead and call it. With no missteps, she will be one of the biggest stars in all of professional wrestling within the next two years. There is no limit to her potential. 

 

[J.T.]

WILLIAM FUCKING REGAL~!

[doctorhbomb]

I don't follow the weekly television (aside from watching the occasional YouTube clip), so take my perspectives with a grain of salt. Overall, I didn't think this event was worth the $50 USD, though it did have its moments.

The Good(ish)

1. Jericho/Kingston: I like how this match started, and it was well structured. Though I don't follow the product, I did watch the recent back-and-forth segment between these two on YouTube, which did its job of getting me behind Kingston. I felt happy he won. Both guys were also really aggressive, though Jericho's punches were terrible. I'll mention the finish below. (The tapout was not a great idea.)

2. Jade/Tay: Overdelivered, given how "green" I've heard Jade is. She's such an impressive athlete, and I hope she keeps improving. Tay should never do a piledriver. For some reason, I thought Tay would be WAY small than Jade, but I was pleasantly surprised that she was closer to Jade's size than some of Jade's previous opponents. Unlike Baker and Rosa, I felt like these two could actually lift and hold each other off the ground relatively easily. Really fun, and probably the most memorable match of the show.

3. Cassidy "skinning the cat" in the ladder match: The only spot that stood out from the ladder match was Cassidy pulling himself up on top of the ladder being held by two of the big guys (can't remember which two of the three were involved). It went from funny (Cassidy being lifted off the ground) to eye-popping (Cassidy almost being able to grab the ring). Very clever.

4. Opening minutes of Baker/Rosa: I really liked the aggressive lockup and some of the grappling in the earlier minutes of the second women's title match. Good stuff but ended up falling apart halfway through. Not nearly as memorable as the TBS title match or their "lights out" match (which I only saw clips of).

5. Danielson/Moxley: Very good match. Blood felt pointless—especially after Punk/MJF—but the grappling was good, the bumping was good, and the selling was mostly fine. Ending was flat but made sense, given that they're continuing this program. I popped BIG for Regal.

6. Hangman's Talent: I've never paid much attention to the AEW Champion, so this was the first time I noticed how good he is in the ring. I did not like the match, but I think his strikes and lariats are superb. I see why some people would be big fans.

The Bad

1. Repeated moves across matches: destroyers, tombstone piledrivers, apron spots, super kicks . . . sigh.

2. It may have been my feed, but the ring was BADLY mic'ed. LOTS of hard-looking strikes made ZERO sound on my television. Interesting how important those sounds are, especially in aggressive matches.

3. Video packages/match promos: they sucked. They gave the casual viewer very little sense of the storylines leading up to the matches. Even packages for feuds I was pretty familiar with (Punk/MJF) felt lackluster, incoherent, and amateurish.

4. Botched/bad finishes: Wardlow's power bomb, Hardy rolling AWAY from the coffin drop, the camera (half) missing Punk's final punch, the terrible looking stretch plum (WOW it was bad) . . .

5. Punk/MJF: did not live up to the hype. It's probably unfair to put this under "bad," given how hard they worked, but the thumbtacks were unnecessary (and Punk's bump practically missed them), MJF's selling and character-work felt out of sync with the lead up, Punk's chain whips were weak (probably because MJF's one chain whip was too hard) . . . I could go on. It didn't come CLOSE to Piper/Valentine. I initially popped for Punk's theme music, but the crowd's underwhelming response sort of killed it. The commentary team did a terrible job explaining/narrating the meaning of this shift (aside from vague comments about Punk's pre-WWE career).

6. Tornado Trios: garbage. Sting took impressive falls, given his age, and he seemed to move well (better than Hardy...), but this was a mess and really boring. The dangerous bumps weren't memorable at all.

7. Adam Cole in the main event: never liked his NXT main events; sad to see that didn't change here. His "Panama sunrise" is a terrible move, and apparently pretty ineffective, since he can't even win after executing it on the floor. What are we even doing . . . ? If I hadn't already seen him "super kick" people doing moonsaults, I would have popped big. When you see it coming, it's not very memorable.

8. The tag title triple threat: this was bad. Again, I don't mean they didn't all work hard. If I had been there live, I might have loved it. But I've seen so many of these matches over the past twenty years, that I just don't care. Could have been half the length. Again, I don't follow the product super closely, but after watching this I don't care to watch anymore matches from this division. Now if Moxley and Danielson enter it . . .

[Jenalysis]

3 hours ago, Ultimo Necro said:

Jade’s outfit was great but reminded me so much of WCW’s Blood Runs Cold.

With Glacier previously being “all elite” during one of the battle Royale’s, and Jim Mitchell having made a brief appearance, we only need two new guys in the Mortis and Wrath gimmicks and we are good to go!

 

I was watching this with a bunch of fighting game vtuber fans .  They marked out hard for Jade's outfit, and lesbian feelings intensified.  ^_^  They loved the shit out of Jade, and they love AEW in general.

[For Great Justice]

Shit I don’t know who I want to tear it up with Mox/Danielson/Regal (The Red Dust Trio?) first. Where do you even start with this tag division. There’s like a year’s worth of bangers in there.

Whoever gets the win over those two in a year or whatever (Top Flight?) is as made as you can get. 

I also need Max Caster getting the shit slapped out of him mid-rap by Regal ASAP

Edited March 7, 2022 by For Great Justice

[Gorman]

6 hours ago, Craig H said:

I’m such a baby, but I had tears in my eyes for Punk’s entrance. His entrance at ROH Reborn in Chicago was one of the most epic things I ever got to experience live (shoutout to @Gorman for his ring announcing) and that includes going to two Wrestlemanias and who knows how many classic Raws I got to experience in Chicago or Indy (I was there for the episode where Kane set JR on fire!). I will always remember the thundering sound of pounding on the ROH signs and being someone who got to do that at ringside. It kinda bummed me out that Orlando didn’t really seem to get the gravity of Punk's classic entrance.

 Oh, rest of the show was outstanding. LET’S GO EDDIE!

I'm so glad you were at ROH Reborn Stage 2 and you enjoyed it so much. That was a special night for a lot of reasons. It was my first show in my college town, and my wife, kid and college roommate were there. In fact, when I was preparing backstage, my girl was in a baby carrier on my back. Then after driving Punk and Cabana from Cleveland to Pittsburgh several times for IWC, I got to announce them as ROH tag team champions.

[StevieNippz]

Overall I enjoyed the show but the stream from B/R was consistently terrible the entire 5 hours so I know that affected my thoughts on some of it. Completely missed the TBS match because of all the jank. I have some of the same gripes I've had with their other PPVs (too long, match placement, repeating spots) but when there are such quality matches it's hard to complain too much. 

My favorite match of the night was easily Eddie/Jericho. Was awesome to see Regal show up. I don't like Adam Cole but he did a fine job losing to Hangman. Very happy Cole lost as I'm going to Dynamite on Wednesday and would be bummed if I had to listen to his gloating. 

AEW keeps impressing with their big shows, now I just need to find another way to watch them. 

[AxB]

I was watching on headphones and it sounded great all night. The ring mic was perfect, and the crowd was loud and enthusiastic throughout (although a few times on TV, it's sounded like a dead crowd, but people who were there live insist it was noisy all night).

Did Kawada ever win a match by submission with the Stretch Plum? I did like that, having run through Kobashi, Akiyama, Tsuruta and Tenryu moves, Eddie had to turn to Kawada to get the big underdog win. Because using a Misawa move to win as an underdog makes no sense. Has to be Kawada.

Also, we got the return of Surprise Rising Keith Lee.

Edited March 7, 2022 by AxB

[JohnnyJ]

An AEW ppv feels like a 4-hour assault on your senses. I don't know how else to explain it. How many bangers of different styles can they throw at you one after another. After a while everything kind of blends together, but I enjoyed every minute of it. 

I just love that Hangman will not be denied. Here's a guy who is not World Champion over and working his ass off every time out to prove that he belongs in his spot. 

[Matt D]

I caught everything but the World Tag, World Title, and Ladder matches this morning and I'm pretty exhausted so I can imagine what you guys were feeling.

Some quick thoughts:

• I wonder if Danielson's training of Jade led to the "And then you start the match by kissing her" moment. That's just a funny conversation to imagine.
• Crowd was completely burned out after MJF/Punk and I don't blame them. It was an exhausting match from the entrances to the finish. Presuming that Rosa goes over Hirsch, there needs to be some answer to the minions at ringside for the next one. I don't think Britt can have one more big defense like this without the act losing its luster.
• There's a fascinating compare/contrast to be had with Jericho/Kingston and Danielson/Mox. For the latter, I don't think the crowd was quiet so much as it was hushed since it wasn't sure what to do with the sheer violence. They obviously went up huge for Regal.
• I wanted more Kassidy and Sting interaction in the tornado tag but the one moment where Kassidy realized he was about to be killed by him was pretty good.
• Last 3 PPVs for Kingston have been Miro, Punk, Jericho. That's a hell of a run of matches.

[Greggulator]

I completely forgot about the thumbtacks in the dog collar match. Which I think says a few things:

1) The thumbtacks didn't add anything to the match. There were a few "will he fall or won't he?' spots. But then Punk fell onto them without any real tension.

2) If they wanted to use the thumbtacks in the match, MJF should have gone through them. It's a timeless thing -- scumbag villain thinks he sets up the hero but then slips on his own banana peel, audience gets the catharsis of seeing it. 

3) Did MJF fall onto the tacks after Punk hit him with the ring? If so, then Punk really should not have fallen on them at all. Because that makes the thumbtacks feel more dangerous.

4) And the most important one: They should not have had thumbtacks in a dog collar match to start with. That takes away from the violence of the actual dog collar match.

 

That match really just needed a lot of editors. For it to work for the feud, it should have really been Punk beating up a coward, making him a bloody mess really early on, and then you go from there. They completely overthought it.

[EVA]

They’re definitely doing Rosa/Britt in a cage in San Antonio.

[Jiji]

I knew I'd see at least a couple of "the crowd was loud all night" comments because it is what happens. My friend and I were both taken right out of the show by it. During Danielson and Moxley we were watching the crowd pretty closely and the large majority looked done and/or bored. They were into big spots all night and spot matches over the longer, more psychology driven matches and they loved Adam Cole, so they were saving themselves for the main event. Orlando is awful lol. 

I don't know what to think about the dog collar match other than it didn't live up to my expectations and went long. MJF didn't bleed much and while that normally wouldn't bother me it did in such a big match where blood was going to be an obvious key element to the violence. Punk bled for two though. Some of the execution didn't work as has already been mentioned. The finish did, thankfully. In general it needed more crowd buy in to be as effective as they wanted. 

[The Comedian]

5 hours ago, Ultimo Necro said:

Jade’s outfit was great but reminded me so much of WCW’s Blood Runs Cold.

With Glacier previously being “all elite” during one of the battle Royale’s, and Jim Mitchell having made a brief appearance, we only need two new guys in the Mortis and Wrath gimmicks and we are good to go!

Unfortunately I don't think Brian Cage can fit in the Mortis suit any more...

[Jiji]

4 minutes ago, Greggulator said:

I completely forgot about the thumbtacks in the dog collar match. Which I think says a few things:

1) The thumbtacks didn't add anything to the match. There were a few "will he fall or won't he?' spots. But then Punk fell onto them without any real tension.

2) If they wanted to use the thumbtacks in the match, MJF should have gone through them. It's a timeless thing -- scumbag villain thinks he sets up the hero but then slips on his own banana peel, audience gets the catharsis of seeing it. 

3) Did MJF fall onto the tacks after Punk hit him with the ring? If so, then Punk really should not have fallen on them at all. Because that makes the thumbtacks feel more dangerous.

4) And the most important one: They should not have had thumbtacks in a dog collar match to start with. That takes away from the violence of the actual dog collar match.

 

That match really just needed a lot of editors. For it to work for the feud, it should have really been Punk beating up a coward, making him a bloody mess really early on, and then you go from there. They completely overthought it.

Agreed. But I do feel like Punk tried to avoid the tacks quite a bit before the mostly missed superplex spot and yes MJF did fall into them eventually just not after the ring punch iirc. 

Overthought is a good descriptor for the match. Too long and strayed too far away from the inherent simplicity and violence of the match type. Punk did use the Piper fulcrum spot though, so that was cool. And they did use the chain as a focus better than the cody and Brody match. 

[Craig H]

Dog collar match was stellar. Makes me feel like you guys watched a different match. It was violence and the end to a blood feud. MJF is a shitty bleeder so I never expected him to bleed much. This was all about Punk showing he wasn't too old and that he could still beat this younger guy's ass and get revenge on him. Punk did all of that AND bookended things well by using the diamond ring to finish MJF off. MJF got his comeuppance, Punk proved MJF wrong, Punk moves on while MJF tries to figure out what to do with Wardlow.

[Jiji]

Eh? 

[For Great Justice]

I actually thought MJF did a good job doing his arm wavey delayed flat back onto the tacks after the GTS to cement that he was done. Popped the crowd too.