The ROH Six-Man Tag Team Titles - What I'm Looking Forward to in 2017
A few months ago on the Professional 3 Tumblr page, I wrote a blog on how the Ring of Honor Six-Man Tag Team Championships would change the game in professional wrestling. On December 2, 2016, ROH did just that at Final Battle 2016, as the finals of the Six-Man Tag Team Title tournament took place at the Hammerstein Ballroom in New York City.
The newly rejuvenated Kingdom in Matt Taven, TK O’Ryan, and Vinny Marseglia faced off against Jay White, Lio Rush, and IWGP Junior Heavyweight champion KUSHIDA. In a match with the massive usage of triple-team moves, combined with the sheer athleticism of all the competitors, all six-man went ALL OUT. Ultimately, the Kingdom overcame all of the odds, and Taven’s redemption story from tearing his ACL one year prior came to fruition, as he and his crew became the inaugural Six-Man Tag Team champions.
The championships, of course, were beautiful. The main plate is silver plated with the definite homage to the WCW Six-Man Tag Team Championships with the 6 in the circle and “Six Man” on the side of the number. The belt’s shape is very unique, just like the division itself.
With ROH looking to go back on the upswing in 2017, the Six-Man Tag Team championships will, as I’ve alluded to before, change the perspective on how wrestling will presented in the company. This makes a lot of sense to how Ring of Honor has always went in a different direction with how professional wrestling was presented. Now, with the belts created and crowned, the seeds have already been planted with the directions ROH is looking to move towards.
As a bystander looking in, here are my perceptions and visions for what the Six-Man Tag Team Division will be going towards next year.
THE KINGDOM’S DOMINANCE: Taven, O’Ryan, and Marseglia were absolutely tremendous throughout the Six-Man Tag Team Title tournament. All three men, forming a bond out of the vastly underrated New England independent wrestling circuit, flowed beautifully as a team together, intertwining quick tags, combinations, and an overall trios mindset to thoroughly dominate Rush, White, and KUSHIDA, in this writer’s opinion. When you have a long friendship and partnership, you tend to flow better as a unit inside of a tag team setting instead of three singles wrestlers joining forces just to gain an opportunity for a championship. Taven, O’Ryan, and Marseglia have a genuine chemistry inside the ropes and in front of a camera. The Kingdom will reign for as long as they want. This trio is an absolute force and, to paraphrase a Starship song, nothing’s going to stop them.
CONTINUATION OF TEAM AND NEW ALLIANCES: With the insertion of the Six-Man Titles into ROH, you could look to see more trios forming loose alliances or full-fledged groups with one another. The former Cabinet are now the Rebellion and have a major trios win over the Motor City Machine Guns and Donovan Dijak at Final Battle on 12/2. Lio Rush, Jay White, and KUSHIDA have already proven their merit as a three-man tandem in the knock-down drag out in the finals of the tournament. Plus, you have the Addiction and their young boy Kamaitachi, Kenny Omega and the Young Bucks of the Elite, CMLL’s Los Ingobernables, and even Team CMLL of Hechicero, Okumura and Último Guerrero ready at any time for a title shot. This division has an attempt to be free-forming and evolving when it comes to tandems coming together for a championship match. In 2017, the sky is the limit for any and all teams to come together to be the best trio in wrestling, all in the name of the ROH Six-Man Tag Team championships.
STATE-OF-THE-ART WRESTLING: This might be a redundant piece from the original blog, but I think I will go a tad more in depth. Over the past decade-plus of Ring of Honor, the company has been known for its fresh outlook of wrestling. From its early scramble matches with Special K to multi-man survival matches and even the era of the “Pure Rules” matches, it has been state-of-the-art wrestling to the max. However, ROH has been the standard bearer of tag team wrestling, and it hasn’t been close. Not since the days of Jim Crockett Promotions have tag teams been exposed to the level ROH has placed on them. The emphasis is at an all-time high.
Now, with the way six-man tag team wrestling stole the show at Final Battle this year with the tournament finals and MCMG & Dijak vs the Rebellion, action like that will continue to get better and better. There is nothing more exciting to me than a fast-paced tag team wrestling match. This six-man tag team division will be on FIRE for 2017, just solely for the wrestling and the talent the performers inside the division implore.
In closing, there is a lot of excitement for me en route to 2017 and Ring of Honor’s Six-Man Tag Team division. I honestly have high hopes for ROH to continuously build this innovative championship throughout next year. Can the Kingdom survive? Which team will step up to become the team to beat? Will the wrestling consistently be there for the fans to enjoy?
I believe it will. The ROH Six-Man Tag Team Championships will thrive. I’m jumping on board for the ride.
Jon Harder http://hardwayhq.com jon@thejonharder.com
