wrestling / Columns
The Contentious Ten 09.27.10: ROH Champions
I’m sure there will be several people who click on this link and call these people “no name vanilla midgits” who can’t draw flies. One look through this list will show that only Tyler Black and Takeshi Morishima has not had success in TNA and WWE. Black is currently signed to WWE and Takeshi is a former GHC Champion in NOAH. You have a former WWE World Heavyweight Champion, a former TNA World Champion, a former ECW Heavyweight Champion, and the current United States Champion. The message; ROH breeds winners. The champions are among the best in the business, and anyone who claims that the ROH title means nothing is clearly ignorant and just as arrogant as the ROH fans who decry WWE and do not see the value of the promotion. With ROH’s greatest son currently making a great name for himself in WWE, I will take this opportunity to showcase the best of the promotion.
Jerry Lynnsize=6>
Title Reign: Supercard of Honor IV (4/3/09)– Manhattan Mayhem III (6/13/09)
Best Title Defense: vs. Austin Aries, Bryan Danielson & Tyler Black, ROH on HDNet Episode XII (4/10/09)
Jerry Lynn is probably the only person on this list who can legitimately claim that he was more successful before entering ROH. A former ECW Heavyweight and Television Champion, as well as TNA X-Division Champion and WWE Lightheavyweight Champion, Jerry came into ROH in late 2008 with a reputation and a lot of doubt. You can’t help but respect Lynn’s talents or his accomplishments, but there was a question of wonder the 45-year old could compete at the level expected of Ring of Honor’s top talents. In my estimation, Jerry proved that he is still as good as he ever was, and was arguably better than he ever was when he won the championship. Lynn ended the eighteen-month reign of Nigel McGuinness, succeeding where every other ROH star had failed. It would be a short lived run, as a mere two months and ten days later, he was the first man eliminated in a triple-threat match involving Austin Aries and Tyler Black, and his championship run ended.
Lynn’s inclusion here is more of an indication of how poor the runs of Homicide (booked poorly) and Xavier (who never should have held the belt in the first place) were. Lynn was the very definition of a transitional champion, taking the belt off an injured McGuinness and giving it to Aries. His run was typified by title defenses against Jay Briscoe and Roderick Strong, one a great challenger but never a serious contender and another with the reputation of a choke artist. Still, Lynn can claim one of the most important title matches in ROH history; the very first nationally televised, non-PPV ROH Title Match. The Fatal-Four Way put Lynn against three top challengers; Black, Aries, and Bryan Danielson, and was an incredible match that is still one of the top three matches in the show’s short history. Lynn did well with what he was given, but he wasn’t given a lot.
Low Kisize=6>
Title Reign: Crowning a Champion (7/27/02) – Unscripted (9/21/02)
Best Title Defense: vs. AJ Styles, Honor Invades Boston (8/24/02)
There can only be one first. When Ring of Honor was in its infancy, Low Ki was the face of the company. His persona and style was reflective of everything ROH wanted to be identified with; hard-hitting action, intensity, innovative wrestling, talent over size, and of course, honor. Along with Bryan Danielson and Christopher Daniels, Low Ki laid the foundations for what would become the biggest American Indy Fed of the Indy Boom. Low Ki would win the title in a four-man Iron Man Match with Brian Kendrick, Doug Williams and Christopher Daniels, winning the match but never pinning Daniels. Daniels would have his revenge when Xavier defeated Low Ki in his second title defense and joined the Prophecy.
Despite being the first champion, Low Ki wasn’t particularly important to ROH anymore, playing second fiddle to Homicide in the Rottweilers stable before leaving the company all-together in 2006. He never lacked success, winning titles in TNA Wrestling, New Japan, and Pro Wrestling Guerrilla. TNA fans probably know him as Senshi, and now WWE fans know him as Kaval, the winner of season two of NXT. Low Ki is one of ROH’s greatest success stories, and as his legacy grows, so does the credibility and the legacy of the title he brought into existence.
James Gibsonsize=6>
Title Reign: Redemption (8/12/05) – Glory by Honor IV (9/17/05)
Best Title Defense: vs. Bryan Danielson, Glory by Honor IV (9/17/05)
The former Jamie Noble had quite a few accomplishments to his name. A student of Dean Malenko, a former WWE Cruiserweight Champion, a third of the Jung Dragons, a man who competed at the last Starrcade and the twentieth Wrestlemania, Noble was a man who was, pound for pound, one of the best in the world. With his combination of flawless wrestling technique and willingness to emphasize his southern roots to great comedic effect, he was always entertaining, but always under the glass ceiling that being a cruiserweight not named Rey Mysterio put him in. Steroid issues would lead to his WWE release, but so began his great 2005 with Ring of Honor.
At first glance, ROH putting the belt on a former WWE guy seems like a way to short-change their homegrown talent. It wasn’t. James Gibson EARNED his title run by having a tremendous series of great matches through his entire run. 2005 was a great year for a lot of ROH wrestlers, but Gibson was in many ways the best. Allowed to go out and wrestle the way he wanted to, he stole nearly every show he was on. He defeated CM Punk, Samoa Joe and Christopher Daniels to win his championship, and lost it to Bryan Danielson in perhaps the most finely contested title change in ROH history. Gibson would go back to the WWE and have another decent but unspectacular run as Jamie Noble before retiring in 2009 and serving as an agent for the company. If you want an idea of how much more he had to give, watch his ROH performances.
Takeshi Morishimasize=6>
Title Reign: Fifth Year Festival: Philly (2/17/07)– Undeniable (10/6/07)
Best Title Defense: vs. Bryan Danielson, Manhattan Mayhem II (8/25/07)
Takeshi Morishima made an immediate impact in ROH by shockingly ending the reign of Homicide before it even really got a chance to get going. Shima was the company’s attempt to replicate the successful monster title runs of men like Vader and Yokozuna. Morishima was utterly dominant as champion; for the first time, title matches would end in less than five minutes. Shima would also defend the ROH Championship in front of 20,000 people in Budokon Hall against KENTA, the largest audience for an ROH Championship Match to date. After eight grueling months as champion, he was finally defeated by Nigel McGuinness on ROH’s fourth PPV event, Undeniable.
Morishima’s run was met with some criticism. The idea of having a Japanese wrestler come in and dominate the roster didn’t sit well with a few people, and the five-minute title matches weren’t particularly endearing. However, after a pair of great defense against Austin Aries and Shingo Takagi, Morishima’s run really picked up steam. Midcarders like Claudio Castagnoli, Kevin Steen and Brent Albright came within inches of beating him. Challengers such as McGuinness and Bryan Danielson really elevated the champion’s game: the Manhattan Mayhem match with Danielson is one of the best matches in the company’s history, and that is saying a lot. While Morishima was certainly different from the typical ROH champion, he ended up serving his purpose well. He would go on to defeat the late, great Mitsuharu Misawa to win the GHC Heavyweight Championship in his home promotion of NOAH.
Tyler Blacksize=6>size=4>
Title Reign: Eighth Anniversary Show (2/13/10) – Glory By Honor IX (9/11/10)
Best Title Defense: vs. Davey Richards, Death Before Dishonor VIII (6/19/10)
Tyler Black’s run will always have the aura of “what could have been”. At one point during the early part of 2008, Tyler Black was the hottest commodity in the company, but rather than strike when the iron was hot, ROH bookers waited over two years to give him the belt, meanwhile giving him title shots almost every other month. When he finally did defeat Austin Aries in February of this year, a lot of his luster was lost. We ended up with a John Cena-like run, where the reaction to Black varied from city to city. Then, as soon as he began to really start rolling as champion, he signed with the WWE, finished his dates as a heel, lost to Roderick Strong and left the promotion. The Tyler Black reign that seemed imminent in 2008 never came to fruition.
All that said, Tyler delivered in his short time as the ROH Champion. I had always been a cynic of Tyler, not hating the guy but not buying into the hype. I called him overrated and said he was carried to his best matches and when put in the ring with someone other than Bryan Danielson wouldn’t deliver. Black ended up proving me wrong; Black didn’t have a lot of defenses, but every single one was worth watching. In particular, his title defense against Davey Richards is currently sitting 2nd on my MOTY list (behind the great Michaels-Taker match at Wrestlemania) and third on the all-time ROH match list. Black more than pulled his weight in that match and pro9ved that he was worthy of being the ROH Champion. His last month or so with the company, working as a full-blown heel, was perhaps his best work. Most would have crumbled under the pressure, but Black survived and thrived, and is heading to WWE to make his mark.
CM Punk size=6>
Title Reign: Death Before Dishonor III (6/18/05) – Redemption (8/12/05)
Best Title Defense: vs. Christopher Daniels, The Homecoming (7/23/05)
In 2004, ROH entered it’s most trying period; following the Rob Feinstein incident, TNA pulled all of their contracted talent out of the company, the big two being AJ Styles and Christopher Daniels, leaving a void of talent during ROH’s darkest hour. CM Punk had a contract with the company, but decided to stick with ROH where he was actually being used to his potential. He already had a following for his unique Straight-Edge lifestyle that he incorporated into his gimmick, cutting the best promos in company history in one of the bloodiest, most personal feuds with Raven. Now he was pushed even farther, and thrived as a main-event player, facing Samoa Joe in a trio of classic matches in 2004. Punk’s performances impressed everyone, notably WWE, and they came calling. In what was billed as his last night with the company, he challenged Austin Aries for the ROH Title with overwhelming crowd support, and shockingly won the match and the title. Punk then declared that he was the snake who bites the hand that feeds, and he would take the ROH title to WWE with him.
To call CM Punk the most controversial ROH champion would be a gross understatement. This guy signed a “WWE contract” on the ROH belt; nobody really knew would his last night would be, so everyone was begging for people to end his run. In the end, it took three of ROH’s finest (Samoa Joe, Chris Daniels and the winner James Gibson) to wrest it out of his hands. Punk would leave once again a fan favorite, and head to a very successful career in WWE, where he is perhaps the most well known wrestler to have held the ROH Championship. A three time World Champion as well as an ECW Champion and a triple-crown winner, Punk would have another “Summer of Punk” in 2009, where he put his values against Jeff Hardy and became the most compelling man in all of wrestling. He has spent the bulk of 2010 as the Straight-Edge Savior, and while he’s hitting a rough patch, Punk is proof of the value of ROH wrestlers in the greater wrestling landscape.
Nigel McGuinness size=6>>
Title Reign: Undeniable (10/6/07) – Supercard of Honor IV (4/3/09)
Best Title Defense: vs. Austin Aries, Rising Above 2008 (12/29/07)
Nigel first proved his worth as a champion when he was the longest reigning and best Pure Champion in ROH history. Working as a cowardly heel who didn’t need to cheat to win but did anyway, he showed a mix of wrestling skill and personality that set him apart. Eventually, he would start challenging Bryan Danielson for the title, and their titles were unified in England in a match where Nigel had the overwhelming crowd support. Nigel eventually became a babyface, trading in his iron for a set of brutal lariats, and would work his way up to being a top challenger for Takeshi Morishima, putting him away on third attempt at the title. Nigel’s win was met with overwhelming support, but that would soon change. Real life injuries kept him from appearing at key events like Glory by Honor VI and Final Battle 2007, despite the fact that he had a great match with Austin Aries at the Rising Above PPV. The fans turned on Nigel, so he turned on them, and so he became another dominant heel champion.
Nigel was the best parts of Bryan Danielson and Takeshi Morishima. Like Morishima, he faced any and all challengers and put them away in dominant fashion, creating an air of invulnerability. Like Danielson, his matches were almost always stellar; it was difficult to pick just one match for his best title defense, as matches with Bryan Danielson, Tyler Black, Claudio Castagnoli, Kevin Steen, Naomichi Marufuji, and Roderick Strong all stick out to me as fantastic title defenses on his resume. Because of the universal hatred for Nigel by the ROH fanbase, I view him as the most underrated wrestler of 2008, where he really was stellar. After losing the title to Jerry Lynn, Nigel had a rough last few months in ROH before heading to TNA as Desmond Wolfe, where he had more classic matches with Kurt Angle before getting lost in the shuffle.
Austin Ariessize=6>
Title Reigns: Final Battle 2004 (12/26/04) – Death Before Dishonor III (6/18/05); Manhattan Mayhem III (6/13/09) – Eighth Anniversary Show (2/13/10)
Best Title Defense: vs. Davey Richards, Aries vs. Richards (11/13/09)
Aries is the only two-time champion in Ring of Honor history, and there are several reasons for that. First is his incredible skill, intensity, athleticism and work ethic that makes him one of the best workers in the company. That is certainly what led to his first title run, where despite being in the company for less than a year, he was able to end the near two-year run of Samoa Joe in convincing fashion. Over the next four months he proved to be a fighting champion, with very little time between title defenses; he had great defenses against Samoa Joe, Bryan Danielson and Alex Shelley before losing to CM Punk. His work earned the internet votes to face Chris Daniels at TNA Sacrifice 2005, and he became a featured member of the X-Division until his departure in February 2006. He would return in October as Austin Starr, adding an almost preposterous amount of flamboyance to his character, while being portrayed as the pet project of Kevin Nash.
Aries ultimately decided to stay with ROH when they went to PPV, and became in many ways the ultimate babyface in the promotion for the next several months before becoming engaged in a blood feud with Jimmy Jacobs and the Age of the Fall. After this feud, he seemingly snapped before coming into 2009 a new man, with more extravagant ring attire and more arrogant promos. This Aries toned down his wrestling ability in favor of blatant cheating tactics to get the ROH crowd to turn on him, but he proved perfect for television. Aries would win his second championship in 2009, and would switch between playing a cowardly champion (with the Austin Aries lucky lottery sticking out) to showing signs of his in-ring greatness against men like Danielson, Kenny Omega and Davey Richards. Aries lost the belt to Tyler Black and has had some mixed performances since then, feuding with Delirious while also managing the Allnight Express.
Samoa Joesize=6>
Title Reign: Night of the Champions (3/22/03) – Final Battle 2004 (12/26/04)
Best Title Defense: vs. CM Punk, Joe vs. Punk II (10/16/04)
Ring of Honor is the House that Joe Built. Samoa Joe’s 23-month run as ROH Champion is arguably the most important title run in the company’s history. First of all, he won it by ending the bogus run of Xavier. Then he defended worldwide and made it a World Championship in a true sense of the term. Joe’s title run is the longest run with a title in the U.S. in the last decade plus. His reign was punctuated with several great title defenses against the likes of AJ Styles, Bryan Danielson, Paul London, Homicide and Jay Briscoe. But most famous were his defenses against CM Punk; the first two were hour draws and the third was another thirty minute classic. The second one, taking place at the event named Joe vs. Punk II, is the greatest match in Ring of Honor history and has the unique distinction of being the first American match to receive ***** from the Wrestling Observer since Michaels vs. Undertaker in Hell in a Cell. For whatever that’s worth.
With the sheer length of the title run, the quality performances, and his importance to ROH, Joe obviously has a case for #1, and if anyone wants to call him the greatest champion in ROH history, I can’t really argue. After Joe’s run, he would go to TNA and have more classic matches in TNA that rivaled his best matches in ROH, and eventually became the company’s champion by beating Kurt Angle in 2008. Joe has had a rough couple of years since then, but remains one of the top talents in the world.
Bryan Danielsonsize=6>
Title Reign: Glory by Honor IV (9/17/05) – Final Battle 2006 (12/23/06)
Best Title Defense: vs. KENTA, Glory by Honor V, Night 2 (9/16/06)
While I don’t put a lot of stock in Dave Meltzer’s opinion, his assessment of Bryan Danielson as the Most Outstanding Wrestler of the decade is absolutely dead-on in my opinion. I won’t call Danielson the greatest of all time, because that encompasses a lot of factors, but in the ring, he has a very short list of in-ring peers; Flair, Michaels, Thesz, Misawa, Steamboat, Hart, Benoit, Guerrero, Angle, Kobashi. In terms of his execution, his versatility, his creativity, and his almost ungodly ability to pull out a classic match against anyone at any time, Bryan is one of the all-time greats. He is the epitome of everything ROH represents, and in his fifteen months as ROH Champion, he proved to be second to none. Perhaps no wrestler has defined the company as much as Bryan Danielson.
Bryan’s run isn’t the longest, but he faced more challengers, higher quality challengers, and delivered the best title defenses of any champion. I could easily do a top ten list of Bryan title defenses without finding a match that wasn’t excellent. Matches against McGuinness, Roderick Strong, Samoa Joe, Christopher Daniels, AJ Styles, Delirious, Lance Storm, Naomichi Marufuji and Austin Aries all stand out as great matches. His gutsiest performance was his classic title defense against KENTA, where he gave perhaps his best match, despite working with a torn shoulder. By the time he lost the title to Homicide, he had seen ROH grow to new heights under his run and set a new standard for ROH Champions that may never be topped. Bryan remained a top challenger in ROH for the next four years, producing more great title matches as the challenger. Now the WWE United States Champion after a roller-coaster of a year in 2010, Bryan looks to prove to the rest of the world what ROH fans already know; he is the BEST in the World!
