7/11 ROH house show results from Hopkins, MN

1. Mark Briscoe beat Danny Duggan. Duggan wears a Mr. Perfect singlet. The crowd loved Briscoe and was hot for him the entire match. I’d like to see Mark involved in more meaningful storylines on ROH television, but his high energy and comedy definitely worked in the opener and got the show off to a good start.

2. War Machine beat Silas Young and Beer City Bruiser. Silas cut a promo before the match. He said War Machine aren’t real men because they have beards like the hipsters wearing skinny jeans in the crowd, and because they wear skirts to the ring. Fun stuff and I still believe ROH could make some serious money with Silas if they really got behind him. War Machine just keeps getting better and they won a good back and forth match that included an insane frogsplash from the Bruiser.

3. ACH beat Dalton Castle (w/The Boys). Castle’s antics are always good for a laugh. The crowd seemed to like both guys. Well, except for one of the guys behind me, who didn’t like Castle’s boys. He spent so much time talking about them that I think he liked them a lot more than he was willing to let on. ACH won with a 450 splash.

4. Michael Elgin beat Matt Taven. Taven played to the crowd nicely and seems to be gaining confidence as a performer. Elgin won clean and then cut a promo after the match about loving ROH and being in the G1 tournament. The effort was there, but the crowd was pretty flat for this match compared to everything else on the show.

Intermission

5. Michael Bennett (w/Maria) beat Moose (w/Stokley Hathaway), Cheeseburger, and Will Ferrara in a four corner survival. Bennett did a really nice job as the heel of the match. He mocked Cheeseburger, taunted Moose from a distance, and was fearful of Moose when they were in the ring together. The live crowd was hot for Moose and Cheeseburger. I was surprised that Moose didn’t go over, yet it was nice to see Bennett get the win considering how much he brought to the match.

6. Adam Cole beat Bobby Fish. A very good match with a nice mix of early comedy and some great wrestling. Fish had a kid at ringside put his feet up on the rail and then ran Cole’s head into them. Cole had another kid move out of the way while indicating that he was going to throw Fish into the crowd. Cole didn’t go through with it and playfully taunted the young fan. The wrestlers were serious down the stretch and Cole picked up the clean pin.

7. Jay Briscoe and ODB beat Jay Lethal and Truth Martini. ODB pinned Truth. The live crowd was really hot for the babyface duo. ODB got the hometown reaction, and Briscoe was excellent at playing to the live crowd and getting them fired up at various points during the match. There was some fun comedy with Lethal forcing a kiss on ODB, only to have ODB return the favor by forcing a kiss onto him. I don’t have a PC handbook on me, but I’m pretty sure that two wrongs actually do make a right in this case, as the crowd ate it up. ODB took a swig for her flask and sprayed the liquid in the face of Martini and pinned him. Truth did a nice job of hamming it up and taking the beating.

8. Roderick Strong beat AJ Styles and Kyle O’Reilly in a three-way. The crowd was hot for the entrances of O’Reilly and Strong, and Styles was received a major star reaction. This was not the type of three-way where one guy was always selling on the floor while two men worked inside the ring. While there were instances of that, they had plenty of innovative three-way spots. In the end, Strong suplexed O’Reilly onto his knees and pinned him while Styles was on the floor. The crowd seemed a bit thrown off that the biggest star on the show didn’t win, but they were still appreciative of the match and applauded when all three men shook hands afterward. An excellent three-way that had me wishing it was an elimination style match.

Notes: A return date of November 14 was announced. That will be the third time that ROH has run this venue in a year. They’ve done a nice job of growing the market, as I remember years ago under previous management that they opted against returning because they didn’t feel there was a second city they could run the same weekend to make it worthwhile. I always disagreed with that notion and still believe ROH would be wise to look at running a college town such as Duluth a day before or a day after their Hopkins shows. Overall, this was a good live event with crowd estimates ranging between 700 and 900. They drew more fans last time, but that’s to be expected considering this was a summer show and there was a big outdoor block party concert in nearby Minneapolis.

Credit: ProWrestling.net