Photo Credit: rohwrestling.com
With the recent acquisition of Ring of Honor by AEW owner Tony Kahn back in May, it seems the wrestling world was ecstatic that their beloved “Indy Darling” company would be living on! Khan was quoted, “Ring of Honor’s influence on modern professional wrestling is etched permanently in the history books, and this acquisition ensures that its legacy will be kept alive and treated with the utmost respect. This deal adds thousands of hours of content to our rapidly growing library. It creates new opportunities to expand our footprint on a national and global scale while having the potential to produce new content under the ROH banner.” And the wrestling world rejoiced.
The wrinkle in this whole thing is that before Ring of Honor sold everything to AEW, they released their entire roster from their contracts. So despite gaining the rights to the name “Ring of Honor,” along with the video archives and the Championships, if Kahn wants to get this thing kick-started again, they’re either going to have to move wrestlers over from their currently overpopulated AEW roster or possibly sign some former RoH talent.
Last week, AEW and RoH announced their first Pay-Per-View event since the acquisition, a great tradition! The 19th installment of RoH’s “Death Before Dishonor” will take place in Lowell, MA, on July 23rd. And the wrestling world is hoping this will be the complete relaunch of Ring of Honor, with a TV deal hopefully being announced before or during this show.
Now, this begs the question. Who will comprise the Ring of Honor roster? There is a precedent set with WWE, which currently has four different brands under the WWE moniker, all having their specific rosters, but cross-promotion and roster shuffling on an annual basis keeps things fresh. So there is no reason why AEW can’t do this with Ring of Honor. So to get things started for Ring of Honor and get them off on the right foot (whenever a new TV deal is announced for them), here is whom I would put on Ring of Honor to start this next chapter in their lineage.
**Current Ring of Honor Champions: JONATHAN GRESHAM (World), MERCEDES MARTINEZ (Women’s), FTR (Tag Team), SAMOA JOE (Television), and WHEELER YUTA (Pure)**
It’s looking like RoH World Champion Jonathan Gresham is now just getting in the swing of things in AEW after being somewhat absent from the company. Gresham won a Championship Unification match at “SuperCard of Honor XV” against Bandido. Since then, Gresham has been seen on Impact Wrestling with the RoH Title. Gresham defended the RoH Championship a couple of times in Impact, most notably against Chris Sabin at Impact’s “Hard to Kill” major PPV Event this past January. Gresham has only appeared once on AEW Television, defending the RoH World Title against RoH Alum Dalton Castle at “Battle of the Belts II.” But with an upcoming match on AEW Rampage, it looks like everything will be good to go for Gresham to defend his Championship at “Death Before Dishonor.”
The Remaining Champions are all AEW contracted wrestlers and were explicitly selected after the purchase of RoH to win the Championships and represent RoH on AEW Television during the ownership transition. FTR and Wheeler Yuta won their respective titles at the last RoH PPV, “SuperCard of Honor XV,” and have defended those titles successfully on AEW Television numerous times. Mercedes Martinez won the Interim Women’s Title at that same event, then won a Championship Unification Match on Dynamite against then-Champion, Impact Wrestling’s Deonna Purrazzo. Samoa Joe defeated NJPW’s Minoru Suzuki to win the TV Title on Dynamite a while back. And with Joe, his Championship has been the focus of one particular wrestler.
**JAY LETHAL, along with Sonjay Dutt & Satnam Singh**
Jay Lethal was Ring of Honor. He was “The Franchise.” When you hear “Ring of Honor,” nine times out of ten, Jay Lethal is the first wrestler you think of. The two-time former RoH World Champion would be a lay-up to start the new Ring of Honor. Lethal, along with Dutt & Singh, have been highly vocal in the past month or so that he wants that title back as the longest-reigning RoH TV Champion in history. At AEW’s “Double or Nothing” PPV, Lethal attacked and sidelined current TV Champion Samoa Joe. And Lethal mentioned on the June 29th edition of AEW Dynamite that he wants to challenge Joe at “Death Before Dishonor.” And this should excite everyone! All the cards are on the table for both Lethal and Joe to be a part of the Ring of Honor.
**THE BLACKPOOL COMBAT CLUB (minus Jon Moxley)**
Mox has his own thing happening in AEW after recently winning the Interim AEW World Championship, so just let him stay there. But Bryan Danielson and Claudio Castignola have the history with Ring of Honor to want to go there and help the company get started on the right foot. Castagnoli is a former RoH Tag Team Champion. Danielson (announced recently as an inaugural inductee into the Ring of Honor Hall of Fame) had a 462-day reign as RoH World Champion back in 2005 through 2006. No, I’m not saying break up the BCC. Like Bullet Club, you can have a faction separated into more than one company/brand. Let their “Star Power” get people to want to tune into RoH to see them. Keep them as friends with Wheeler Yuta. Give them Regal (who can bounce back and forth if he wants to). And then, when everything is good to go with the relaunch, and they have some months or a year of steady viewership, you can put all of them back with Mox in AEW.
**SERENA DEEB**
Let Serena Deeb and Mercedes Martinez be the locker room leader and help this women’s division grow. Deeb is coming off a fantastic match at AEW “Double or Nothing” against AEW Women’s Champion Thunder Rosa, where she shined! That match was excellent! And the good thing with Deeb is she has a habit of having great games! As the “Woman of 1,000 Holds,” Deeb would be a pivotal addition to the RoH Women’s Division to help them through a challenging hurdle.
**REDRAGON**
You’ve got so many teams to choose from in AEW that you might as well go with another RoH Alumni to get the nostalgia to feel back and help that division get off the ground. Before Kyle O’Reilly & Bobby Fish were in AEW and NXT, they were three-time RoH Tag Team Champions and had a long tenure with the company, with O’Reilly being a former RoH World Champion as well. With current Champions FTR, reDRagon would be critical to continue the tradition Ring of Honor had in the past (and AEW has currently) of an exceptional tag team division.
**HOOK**
SEND HOOK! AEW Rampage’s staple needs to grow. I think putting him on Rampage week in and week out, beating people in less than 2 minutes has started to lose its shine. The hook is the potential future of AEW. And fans genuinely get excited to see him. It seems like AEW is taking their time with hook, which is understandable. So let’s get hook off of Rampage and put him in a new setting in Ring of Honor where he can have the time to develop other skills of the wrestling craft that he might need.
**AMERICAN TOP TEAM**
I know Scorpio Sky is a “Day 1” guy at AEW. He’s one of four wrestlers to compete at all four “Double or Nothing” events (Chris Jericho / The Young Bucks). But if you can put Sky, Ethan Page, and Paige VanZant in Ring of Honor for a bit to start, that will lead to some great feuds and matches all across the Ring of Honor divisions and get people who tune in to stay and more importantly, come back to watch again. Plus, with all of the trials and tribulations Ring of Honor has gone through to get to this point in time, this gives Dan Lambert a TON of material to use on the mic to crap all over Ring of Honor and their fans, as well as continuing to do the same to AEW for purchasing it. This would be a lot of fun and make for great TV!
**DARK ORDER**
It’ll get these guys back on TV and give them something to do until they find a leader capable of returning them to AEW and being an actual threat.
**Former RoH Stars not currently signed**
We recently saw Silas Young on an episode of AEW Dynamite wrestling Hangman Page, which got some buzz with people hoping Silas would fit into the New Ring of Honor mix. As I mentioned, former RoH World Champion Dalton Castle was on AEW “Battle of the Belts II,” challenging for the RoH World Title. That created a lot of buzz as well. Another former RoH World Champion, Rush, has been seen very recently alongside Andrade El Idolo. All of these guys can help Ring of Honor in the relaunch in potentially get back the recent collection of Ring of Honor die-hard fans.
What about the Former RoH Wrestlers in Impact Wrestling?
After Ring of Honor released their natural talent, some wrestlers wasted no time and signed with Impact Wrestling. Matt Taven, Mike Bennett, Maria Kanellis, PCO, Kenny King & Vincent all got signed and are shining together as Honor No More, which is a fun play on words with leaving the Ring of Honor. Their leader, Eddie Edwards, is an RoH Alum as well. The seven of them have a great thing going in Impact Wrestling at the moment, which includes a current feud with the Greatest Ring of Honor Tag Team of All Time, The Briscoes, who’ve just recently appeared in Impact Wrestling in the past couple of months after spending 19 years in Ring of Honor. We all know there is a great working relationship between AEW and Impact Wrestling, as there have been numerous crossovers since Kenny Omega. Maybe they can eventually cross these nine over at some point? Only time will tell. But it seems that Honor No More and the Briscoe’s should stay put in Impact.
Who else should be in the Ring of Honor?
Not sure where Brian Cage has been, but this would be good to get him back on TV. I think separating Jake Hager from Jericho and letting Hager do his own thing would be good. I like Danhausen in RoH so that he can be taken more seriously with his in-ring work. Jamie Hayter and Leyla Hirsch would be good additions to the women’s division. Not sure what Kip Sabian & Penelope Ford have been doing, but this would be an excellent way to reintroduce them. I also like Top Flight and Private Party in the tag division to get them more TV time to shine.
Here’s the Roster I would submit to relaunch the Ring of Honor
So, where does that leave AEW?
In good hands! Plenty of wrestlers. Plenty of star power. And honestly, still pretty overpopulated.
As you can see, even if you take away Bryan Danielson and Claudio Castignola, and FTR, you still have an incredible and stacked talent roster for AEW to continue what they’ve been trying to do.
Who would you like to see compete in the Relaunch of Ring of Honor? Let us know! Let me know what you think in the comments below!
Tune into the “Essential Wrestling Podcast” through the Eastern Observer’s YouTube or Facebook page at 5 pm on Tuesday evenings! And make sure you join the EWP’s Public Pick ’em Pool on ProWrestlingPickem.com, as we will make our first-ever Ring of Honor PPV picks for “Death Before Dishonor.”
