Image provided courtesy of Ring Of Honor.

By Nicholas Jason Lopez

“Notes In Observance” features random thoughts and analysis on recent television shows. Quick results can be found at the bottom of the post.

(Aired 9/30/15)

Pure Puroresu

– The Matt Sydal-Kushida match already looked to be a high-fly happy bout on paper. The “mirror image” comparison was a fair one on commentary. Hell, the match got a “This is awesome” chant before a single grapple. We saw some cool spots (Kushida’s huricanrana counter into a cartwheel, Sydal’s “Matrix”-esque clothesline escape) and exchanges, but we have to wonder what ROH will do for its post-Pay-Per-View shows when it doesn’t have irrelevant ROH-New Japan Pro-Wrestling bouts to fall back on. Granted the quality of these matches are damn high, but it only seems to be a distraction from the problem at hand – loss of immediate momentum gained from the PPVs. As for the rest of the match, it was with strong, even-handed action that ended with Sydal’s finisher for the victory. Fun match that probably won’t be remembered past this night unfortunately.

– The Four Corner Survival match between Will Ferrara, Adam Page, Watanabe and Moose started with a Decade promo as BJ Whitmer scored heat for asking where Page’s main event matches were. This match was pretty formulaic though, never straying to extraordinary lengths. We did think it was cool that Watanabe’s “suplex prowess” was emphasized throughout and him being over with the Philly crowd helped. It only seemed to make sense to see Watanabe get the pinfall. Colby also provoked Moose and got taken off the apron to help Page get a brief advantage earlier on. Wonder if anything will materialize from that down the road.

– The Adam Cole-Shinsuke Nakamura match also looked incredibly delectable on paper. At least commentary played up Cole’s “unprofessional” actions at All-Star Extravaganza (the only direct reference to something coming out of the show), and Cole came off more heelish in his entrance to play it up. This probably confused the taping attendees as Cole was about as “nice guy” as it gets before the swift turn at ASE. The match turned out to be excellent, from little things like Cole’s growing temper (nearly attacking Referee Todd Sinclair) and blatant disrespect at times (spitting in Nakamura’s face), while Nakamura took everything Cole had and then some. With Cole’s recent actions, we figured he’d get the nod here, but a loss for him actually works too since he can reference it in future “angry heel” promos. This definitely was a main event match worth going out of your way to see, especially the final five minutes.

Quick Results

• Matt Sydal def. Kushida via pinfall
• Four Corner Survival – Watanabe def. Moose (w/Stokely Hathaway), Adam Paige (w/BJ Whitmer, Colby Corino) and Will Ferrara via pinfall
• Shinsuke Nakamura def. Adam Cole via pinfall