20 YRS AGO – WWE Live Event Results (10-25-2003): CM Punk vs. Steve Corino, plus BJ Whitmer, Daniels, Walters, Sabin, Cabana, Rave, Justin Credible

The following report was originally published 20 years ago this week here at PWTorch.com…

Ring of Honor house show report
October 25, 2003
Spencerport, N.Y. (Rochester area) at Salmon Creek Country Club
Report by Ron Cicoria, Torch VIP/Newsletter subscriber

Us Upstate N.Y. smarks got our chance to check out Ring Of Honor tonight at at the Salmon Creek Country Club in Spencerport (in Rochester area). I’m a longtime sheetreader, but had never had the chance to check out ROH’s product. Venue was fine, a little hard to get to in the rain at night, with detours. Funny thing is, somebody had posted makeshift “ROH” signs on the detour road signs so people could find the place. The venue was appropriate, and easily fit the crowd of maybe 300 fans. It was a very “smart” crowd. Lots of dudes, not a lot of women or children.

Before I run down the matches, let me firstly say this was a great wrestling show. I’m going to say a few negative things in this review, but overall I was very impressed. This is the best thing out there. No out-of-shape former “legends” or green bodybuilders like many indy shows. To a man, the entire roster was obviously very talented and the crowd ate it up with a spoon. Here’s a synopsis of the matches (I apologize for any missing or wrong names).

Ring announcer announced that Teddy Hart was not appearing. Luckily, 95% of the crowd only knew of Teddy Hart as the failed stuffed-bear merchandising idea in the ’90s WWF. The announcer then said some brief words about Road Warrior Hawk and they did a 10-bell salute. You could hear a pin drop, and I actually did take the 10 seconds to spiritually salute the man who introduced me to the word “sphincter.”

(1) Slyk Wagner Brown beat ??? (the African-American member of Special K). Good opener, except for the 87 members (actually 7) of Special K, who walk around the ring wearing big furry hats, blocking the fans from actually seeing the match. Really too much. If I were one of the two guys busting my ass in the ring, I’d be annoyed by a half-dozen teenagers stealing my heat from ringside. They were hamming it up, jawing with the crowd, just really lame “look at me I’m a wrestler” stuff. Special K would get even more annoying later, as I’ll explain. Finish came when Brown hit a bossman slam off the top rope. A really nice looking move.

(2) Tag Team Scramble: Dunn & Marcos defeated Outcast Killahz & Fast Eddie/Don Juan & Jacobs/Shelly. Dunn & Marcos were very over with their 80’s rocker gimmick, coming out to Poison’s “Unskinny Bop.” There was tons of action too quick to call, with Dunn & Marcos really shining. The other real standout team was Oman Tortuga & Diablo Santiago. Lots of near falls and really innovative double-team moves by Dunn & Marcos. To the delight of the crowd, Dunn & Marcos won via basically dropping Tortuga on his head.

(3) Dan Maff defeated B.J. Whitmer. Whitmer came out very generically with little charisma and no hoopla. Maff came out like he was Tazz, but wearing flashy ring attire and accompanied by a manager. I wonder who is going over here? Highlight was Maff throwing Whitmer into all 4 ring barricades at the request of the crowd, which chanted “Over-Here!” and “One-More-Time” at Maff. Whitmer made a comeback with a nice suplex on the floor. Maff eventually won, using a maneuver that I cannot recall at the moment.

(4) Chris Daniels defeated John Walters in the 2nd “He Has A Gimmick And The Other Guy Doesn’t, So We Know Who’s Going Over” match in a row. Great great stuff. Daniels is as good as the hype. My only gripe would be that Walters kicked out of several brutal bumps, but only to fall victim to Daniel’s finisher, which is similar to the Test’s “Testdrive” or Reno’s “Roll Of The Dice.” The finisher which finished off Walters had significantly less impact than the previous 4 bumps in the match (which Walter’s kicked out of), so the end was a bit flat. After the match, Daniels took the mic and told Walters that while he won’t shake his hand, he does respect Walters. Daniels said he doesn’t do the handshake because that’s what ROH wants him to do and he won’t do what ROH wants him to do. As Daniels began to invite Walters into his ministry, Xavier came out and took out Walters. Daniels was over huge.

(5) Special K’s Izzy & Dixie defeated The Carnage Crew of Loc & DeVito to retain the tag titles. Special K continued their backyard wrestling antics by geeking themselves 5 minutes into the match. Even half the entourage geeked themselves. Really. You had a half-dozen kids who look 15 years old walking around bleeding at ringside. Very gross and unnecessary. The ridiculous display outside the ring made the actual match mean nothing, and the heels went over with interference from one of the 15-year-olds.

(6) Xavier defeated Chris Sabin. Very good match. Xavier won via tapout.

(7) Steve Corino fought C.M. Punk to a draw. It was being sold as the hardcore partier vs. the straight-edge guy. Way way way too long. What would have been a funny 4-minute segment was made into a painfully long 20-minute pre-match segment that saw Corino’s ring introduction list over 100 wrestlers that were “cut from the same mold” as Corino. So we got to hear an insider’s list of all of the alcoholics and druggies in the business. Scott Levy was listed 3 times, as Raven, Scotty the Body, and Johnny Polo. After Corino’s intro, C.M. Punk then had the announcer read a list of drugs that CM had never taken. This was just as long, yet even more painful as it’s easier to get a pop for saying “Buzz Sawyer” than it is for saying “Welbutrin.” So the match started. At first C.M. played face but he had turned heel by the end of the match. When time expired, the crowd wanted 5 more minutes but Corino and C.M. Punk decided that they were both heels and both took the mic and told the crowd that they didn’t deserve it. Really weird. Corino and Punk got into it with some fans, put each other over on the mic, and left together as heels. Strange. The whole thing took probably 40 minutes at least, and it killed the crowd. The pre and post-match stuff came off as really too insider and self-indulgent.

(8) John Walters (replacing Teddy Hart) defeated Colt Cabana, Jimmy Rave, and Justin Credible in a four-way when Walters made Justin submit to a sharpshooter about 5 minutes in. This was obviously cut short because it was getting very late, and the Corino-Punk stuff went so long. Up till then, the pacing of the night was perfect, but the Corino-Punk stuff really threw things off. Crowd was shocked by Credible losing clean via submission in such a short time. Not a good match, not a bad match.

At this point it was 11:00 and the show had been going on for 3 1/2 hours. I had an elderly person with me, so I left before the Samoa Joe vs. Homicide match. Overall, it was a great time. Ring Of Honor has a great product and I would recommend that any fan go out of their way to check them out.

RECOMMEND NEXT: 20 YRS AGO – WWE Smackdown Results (10-23-2003): Radican’s review of Big Show & Brock Lesnar vs. Undertaker, plus John Cena, Vince McMahon, Sable, Guerreros, more

OR CHECK THIS OUT AT PROWRESTLING.NET: Baron Corbin on Pat McAfee, receiving death threats over a WWE angle with Becky Lynch, creating the End of Days finisher, retiring Kurt Angle