I'll add to this as I go on, mostly random musings of what I thought about 2008, now that I've managed to see every show. Any questions about stuff, just ask.
The Good
All things that were great and that I enjoyed.
The Main Event Scene
Nigel McGuinness - Despite a lackluster beginning to his title reign (aside from the epic Aries match), his year started off quite well with two great matches against Chris Hero and Roderick Strong. But the fans were bored of his character and, of course, the multiple Lariats per match. It was looking to be a dissapointing reign, but then Gabe answered the fans' wants and made possibly his best booking decision of the year by turning Nigel into one of the top heels in wrestling. The repeated injuries became an advantage as he tricked Bryan Danielson, everybody's favourite, into avoiding his head, nagging about his concussion and threatening to drop the belt. This immediately turned him into the ultimate pussy heel in front of the crowd, and he went on to win using Dragon's MMA elbows against him and hitting Dragon's own injury, his eye. He then explained his actions and his new-found hatred and ego in one of the best promos of the year in an interview with Dave "Prozack". This began some hilarious Jericho-like nicknames he had for the roster: "Clamdigger" Bryan Danielson; "TNA's Trash" Austin Aries; "Claudio Castagonads"; "Fat, Pizza-Faced, Virgin" Kevin Steen; and "Jerry-atric Lynn". In a 180 spin, his title run soon became one of the most exciting in ROH history, many already putting him up with Dragon and Samoa Joe, a place I believe is justified by this point. He had so many MOTYCs throughout 2008 and helped elevate guys such as Tyler Black, Kevin Steen and Claudio Castagnoli, making them seem like serious title contenders. Aside from a short series of matches where each followed a very predictable formula (armwork, Lariat, armwork, Tower of London on the floor, armwork, finishing sequence, Tower of London in ring which is somehow more effective than the one on the floor, rest of finishing sequence), there hasn't been much wrong with it at all. He's had feuds, he's made enemies that haven't fully developed into feuds (Tyler and Lynn), he's made alliances (Claudio and Go Shiozaki), he just hasn't had a proper lengthy feud. Aries was taken for most of the year and the feud with Dragon will probably never end anyway. What's great about Nigel is that he's somehow managed to keep his heel persona fresh without changing very much, he's so very charismatic and fun to watch, but you can still easily hate him.
Nigel's Best Matches:
vs Bryan Danielson (Sixth Year Anniversary)
vs Tyler Black (Take No Prisoners)
vs Austin Aries (Supercard of Honor IV)
vs Bryan Danielson vs Claudio Castagnoli vs Tyler Black (Death Before Dishonor VI)
vs Kevin Steen (Northern Navigation)
vs El Generico (Age of Insanity)
vs Bryan Danielson (Rising Above 2008)
Bryan Danielson - For someone who hasn't had much in the way of angles or storylines, Dragon has had one hell of a year. Without a single match that I would consider bad, Dragon had remained consistantly cheered as the top face all year round, securing himself as the MVP of ROH if he hadn't already. This was a year of improvements and moving up in the wrestling world for him. He'd been to AAA several times, won the GHC Jr. Heavyweight title in Japan, and even won a dark match on RAW. ROH weren't afraid to exploit that. He also improved his look, and now he looks like a star to me. Longer hair, beard, fancier trunks, an actual tan~! and a shiny ring jacket, he could easily look great in the WWE. Dragon was also a big help for the roster, despite not doing much for a while. He played a big part in putting over Nigel as a top heel and if it wasn't for the match with Tyler Black near the start of the year, Tyler probably wouldn't have gotten his PPV title shot and become the newest main eventer we have now. He also did his part in putting over some other talent, such as Kevin Steen and Erick Stevens and Claudio (although Stevens turned out not to go very far after the Roderick feud, so that may have been a bit of a waste), and he still didn't look back in defeat. Dragon can't look bad - at all. The fans love him so much and he could probably job to his good friend, Grizzly Redwood and still be a main eventer in our eyes. He's not only the top wrestler in ROH, but he could also claim to be the top face promo guy. He's put on so many passionate promos that it's just impossible not to get behind him. Despite the lackluster effort from Yoshinobu Kanemaru in the GHC title match where Dragon basically carried him, Dragon's promos before and afterwards made it seem like he was fighting for the most important championship in the world, even with the easy win. Dragon may not have been used as the most important wrestler (that's Nigel), but he remained consistantly great in all aspects.
Dragon's Best Matches:
vs Nigel McGuinness (Sixth Year Anniversary)
vs Austin Aries (Take No Prisoners)
vs Naomichi Marufuji (A New Level)
w/Austin Aries vs Jimmy Jacobs & Tyler Black (Respect Is Earned II)
vs Tyler Black (New Horizons)
w/Austin Aries vs Motor City Machine Guns (Fueling the Fire)
vs Nigel McGuinness vs Claudio Castagnoli vs Tyler Black (Death Before Dishonor VI)
vs Katsuhiko Nakajima (Glory By Honor VII)
vs Tyler Black vs Kenny Omega (Bound By Hate)
vs Nigel McGuinness (Rising Above 2008)
vs Claudio Castagnoli (Southern Hostility)
vs Takeshi Morishima (Final Battle 2008)
Austin Aries - Aries, I've found mixed, but mostly great. His year has gone full circle by ending the way it started, frustrated for some minor reason. He started on a losing streak, but was acting as if it wasn't the losses he was pissed at, but something else, something the Age of the Fall could fix. What it was, we'll never know, because he turned down the AOTF and began a personal, brutal war with Jimmy Jacobs. While being probably the top feud of the year, it wasn't totally based on wins and losses, which I found odd the way they chose to end it with a Best of 3 series. It was a very storied feud compared to what is normal in ROH, mostly because of the Lacey love triangle and her choosing to go with Aries, then it being implied that Jimmy spiked her. All four of his matches with Jimmy were great, but the downfall was the matches that came in between. That was because they were either too storyline-involved to the point where wins and losses didn't even matter, or the matches were too similar or pointless. No fault of Aries, of course, who remained a consistantly good performer, but he didn't get many situations to put on a great match. This was basically the year of a much darker Aries, with him struggling to defeat Jimmy before he reached insanity, but it was too late as ironically it was "flavour of the month" Tyler of all people that caused him to snap, because of jealousy.
Aries' Best Matches:
vs Erick Stevens (Proving Ground)
vs Go Shiozaki (Sixth Year Anniversary)
vs Bryan Danielson (Take No Prisoners)
vs Nigel McGuinness (Supercard of Honor IV)
vs Jimmy Jacobs (Vendetta II)
w/Bryan Danielson vs Jimmy Jacobs & Tyler Black (Respect Is Earned II)
w/Bryan Danielson vs Motor City Machine Guns (Fueling the Fire)
vs Jimmy Jacobs (Rising Above 2008)
vs Tyler Black (Wrestling at the Gateway)
Rising Stars Tyler Black - It would be a travesty not to put him at the top of this list. He's the one who's been elevated the most. Simply put, the fans love him and was on some nights the most over man, even above Danielson. It all started in his "breakout" match with Dragon, in which he gained a considerably large amount of offense despite only being a midcarder. He held his own against him and it even looked like he'd win, if it wasn't for the Phoenix Splash getting reversed into a rollup. Dragon had won, but only barely. After putting on a very good match, it was then that Tyler's potential was seen and he was given yet another chance to shine and in a big way. He main evented a PPV against the champion. As much as I didn't care for Tyler's one-night-only face turns, I can't deny how much they worked in effectively getting him over. The fans absolutely loved him and both of his title shots in 2008, everyone thought he could walk away. Every false finish, the crowd went mental and it devastated them to see him lose both times. It was obvious he could hang in the main event scene. What was frustrating about it was that his push took the entire year as he was still stuck in the Age of the Fall, playing a background role in the Jacobs/Aries feud, only coming out now and again to face Danielson. In all three matches, he couldn't win, but he came out looking better than even those who defeated Dragon (Stevens, Steen). Throughout 2008, Tyler probably only had about 10 singles matches, winning only a few of them, but he was able to show that he can be great and now we know he'll be a huge part of 2009.
Tyler's Best Matches:
vs Nigel McGuinness (Take No Prisoners)
w/Jimmy Jacobs vs BxB Hulk & SHINGO (Dragon Gate Challenge II)
w/Jimmy Jacobs vs The Briscoes (Supercard of Honor III)
w/Jimmy Jacobs vs Motor City Machine Guns (Tag Wars 2008)
vs Bryan Danielson (Southern Navigation)
vs Nigel McGuinness vs Bryan Danielson vs Claudio Castagnoli (Death Before Dishonor VI)
w/Jimmy Jacobs vs Team Work (Respect Is Earned II)
vs Bryan Danielson (New Horizons)
vs Austin Aries (Wrestling at the Gateway)
Davey Richards - Started off his year pretty well by gaining his first ROH championship by winning the tag titles with Rocky Romero. This didn't lead to very much and it will eventually be a forgotten reign as not much happened in their run and they ended up losing to The Briscoes. They ended up also having a forgotten and pointless reign, as they gave them the titles despite Mark Briscoe already being injured. Throughout the first half of 2008, Davey was good in the ring and very fun to watch. He was already intense and a pretty good heel and at several times showed that he could put on a great match. It would later be revealed that the only reason Davey didn't get more big singles opportunities is because Gabe wanted to save them for his push, which is understandable. In one of the shocking moments of the year, he betrayed his No Remorse Corps leader, Roderick Strong, and sided with SnS Inc., a move that worked great in execution, but didn't sound great to me in the long term. That's because SnS Inc. members don't do much and tend to get lost somewhere in Sweeney's feuds and become just another member. But Davey went to NOAH for a few months, coming back in the best shape of his career. His character barely changed, but he was more calculating, more stiff, and he was constantly getting put over as the most dangerous man on the roster. And it worked. He looks like a monster in the ring and is so very intense. He has one of the best entrances in ROH with his badass theme and doing 3 or 4 different heelish things on the way to the ring, whether that be throwing their hats away or actually trying to kick them. Davey finished the year by forming the American Wolves with Eddie Edwards. This sounded like quite the one-sided team to me at first, but when I saw them in action, I saw the chemistry and in the course of two shows have cemented themselves as the new top heel team now that Jacobs and Tyler have split.
Davey's Best Matches:
w/Roderick Strong & Rocky Romero vs CIMA, Erick Stevens & Go Shiozaki (Dragon Gate Challenge II)
vs Kota Ibushi (Bedlam in Beantown)
w/Roderick Strong & Rocky Romero vs Takeshi Morishima, Naomichi Marufuji & Go Shiozaki (Southern Navigation)
vs Kevin Steen & El Generico (A New Level)
vs Roderick Strong (Battle of the Best)
w/Chris Hero vs Kevin Steen & El Generico vs Jimmy Jacobs & Tyler Black vs LAX (Return of the 187)
w/Eddie Edwards vs The Briscoes vs Nigel McGuinness & Claudio Castagnoli (All Star Extravaganza IV)
w/Eddie Edwards & Go Shiozaki vs Brent Albright, Roderick Strong & Erick Stevens (Final Battle 2008)
Kenny Omega - While lacking in a high number of appearances and high quality matches, everyone loves this guy. He's flashy (but not overly), he's charismatic, unique, and has very cool moves and combos. He's secured himself a midcard spot, but I think he can go further. While not only proving he can put on solid matches against the likes of Delirious, Kenny King and Claudio Castagnoli, he's had one match that allowed him to prove that with more time he can put on a
great match. The triple threat with Tyler and Dragon was one of the more entertaining non-hate-filled, non-stipulated matches of the year. Three guys went out and showed what they can do and it was very fun. In a match mostly moves-based, Omega shone and got the crowd very behind him. When he's in ROH, I love him. When he's gone, I miss him. Simply put. If he were to stay as a regular roster member, it would do nothing but benefit ROH.
Kevin Steen - Already a huge fan favourite from when he turned face after the feud with The Briscoes, but he started to up his profile as a singles wrestler when stormy conditions became a blessing in disguise. Eye of the Storm became a show practically dedicated to him when some of the main roster couldn't show up, so a one-night tournament was arranged instead. During which he managed to defeat Dragon, something that gets anyone noticed. He won the whole tournament, having wrestled 3 times in one show, thus earning a title shot. It was then that he proved he could be cared about by the fans without Generico by his side, as he put on great matches with Nigel but just coming short in them, mostly due to cheating from Nigel. They had a great short rivalry that was a clash of egos, namecalling and insulting that was both hilarious and dramatic. This culminated in a match in Canada, Steen's homeground, where the crowd absolutely loved him and wanted nothing more than a title change. They had a fantastic match that had Steen practically killing his back (getting tossed from the guardrail upside down into the apron was one of the sickest spots of the year, in my opinion). Unfortunately it wasn't enough, as Nigel finally got the clean win over Steen. Despite the three losses, he looked strong enough against the champ to show that he could be a potential main eventer one day. He's proven that not only in the ring, but with his personality - the cocky loudmouth, yet the fans can still easily get behind him. Now this is just the
singles part of Steen's 2008 run, I've yet to talk about him in the tag team scene.
Steen's Best Matches:
w/El Generico vs Naruki Doi & Masato Yoshino (Dragon Gate Challenge II)
w/El Generico vs BxB Hulk & SHINGO (Supercard of Honor IV)
vs Nigel McGuinness (Injustice)
vs Nigel McGuinness (Return Engagement)
vs Nigel McGuinness (Northern Navigation)
w/El Generico vs Motor City Machine Guns (Death Before Dishonor VI)
w/El Generico vs Jimmy Jacobs & Tyler Black (Driven 2008)
w/El Generico vs Jimmy Jacobs & Tyler Black vs Davey Richards & Chris Hero vs LAX (Return of the 187)
w/El Generico vs The Briscoes (Bound By Hate)
Brent Albright - Intense, a good big man wrestler, and the crowd loves him. Although he really broke out in 2007 with his title match against Morishima, the moment when he turned on Larry Sweeney and destroyed almost all of Sweet 'n' Sour Inc. was when you knew he was something special. With a packed Hammerstein Ballroom chanting his name, cheering wildly, you couldn't deny it. He gets bonus points for almost killing Shane Hagadorn too. He was the ultimate face for a short while too; he was insanely over and was easy to get behind and support. He was simply a badass that everyone loved. By this point in his career, he didn't have many matches that could be considered great, but then him and Adam Pearce - someone who's known for having
less great matches, probably none - provided a huge shocker. They had a Match of the Year Candidate. Very hard to believe, especially the fact that it was Pearce in this match. Then when I saw it, I was forced to agree because it was amazing. Albright's push pretty much slowed down afterwards as the feud focused on Larry Sweeney and SnS Inc. once Pearce left. Random matches, lack of much of a story, dragging out for so long until it
finally ended. It took up most of Albright's year, be he nonetheless showed his potential.
Albright's Best Matches:
vs Bryan Danielson (Transform)
vs Go Shiozaki (Double Feature Night 1)
vs Adam Pearce (Death Before Dishonor VI)
w/Roderick Strong vs Kensuke Sasaki & Katsuhiko Nakajima (All Star Extravaganza IV)
w/Roderick Strong & Erick Stevens vs American Wolves & Go Shiozaki (Final Battle 2008)
Kenny King - Cocky, charismatic, over, fun. He hasn't won many matches this year, but he's certainly raised his profile and gotten noticed. I'm glad he's continuing to stay in ROH, because out of the YRR members that got their tryouts at the start of the year, he definitely impressed the most and stood out more. The YRR is a fun faction, but without him it's nothing and Jason Blade would be the only good member left of the generic indy-tastic group. Although I'm glad they're not sticking around so King can branch out on his own and form a very fun alliance with Rhett Titus, another rising star. We know King can put on good midcard matches, he even had a good, decent-lengthed match with Dragon that nearly went to a time limit draw. In the right situation, I think he can prove to be worthy of a higher spot.
Rhett Titus - Rhett pretty much came out of nowhere, turning from just another ROH student to "Addicted to Love", who had shoulders like boulders and proclaimed that "the thrust is a must". He was one of the most entertaining acts of the year. In the ring he's nothing special, but his promos, his charisma and his antics are hilarious and it's hard not to like him, despite being a heel. The storyline with Delirious and Daizee Haze was pretty horrible, but he came out of it looking fantastic and he made for some great moments. Daizee's face painted on his underwear, anyone? Rhett basically started the revolution of students developing over-the-top gimmicks to get over and still remains the best student gimmick and one of the best gimmicks on the roster.
Tag Teams Kevin Steen & El Generico - These two were some of the most over acts of the year, whether they be a tag team or split. You were almost guaranteed a lively crowd when they were in the ring. You've got the amazingly comical, fun, loveable El Generico and the cocky, tough, joking Steen who is always hunting for ROH gold. Together they had one of the most well-booked angles of the year with their quest to gain the tag titles. After the Ladder War, a fair share of fans were dissapointed they didn't win the championships and this was capitalized on by dragging out their hunt to the point where the fans were begging for them to win. Some pointless, short title reigns occurred, including The Briscoes winning them again for seemingly no reason and the Age of the Fall treated the belts like their second priority (neither would even bring their belt out to the ring in a non-tag match. On Up For Grabs, they put on a fantastic performance as the whole show focused on them. They won the first match of the tag title tournament, but with Nigel and Steen in a rivalry, the bitter Nigel took out Steen's knee with a chair and Generico's arm was already bad from being furiously worked on. Both of them struggled to make it through their next match, as Pearce and Hero took advantage of their injuries and made them worse. Before they went to the ring for the final match, Steen put on a great, intense, passionate promo about how they'll do everything they can to win the belts, injuries and all. This would be an even harder challenge, as their opponents, the AOTF, had two very easy matches in order to get to the final: a squash with Delirious/Pelle and a DQ win against Team Work. They attacked Generico before the match started and took him out by practically breaking his arm, leaving Steen to fend for himself. He held his own but it was all doom and gloom until Generico made it back to a huge reception from the crowd and he and Steen attempted the Package Piledriver/Brainbuster combo on Jacobs, but Tyler Black got the sudden rollup/tights for the win, snatching the dream away at the last second. Trash then filled the ring and it was a brilliant heat-getting moment for AOTF and sympathy for Steenerico. A couple months later, at Driven 2008, Steenerico would finally get a proper title shot with all men fresh and 100%. This may have had the loudest crowd of the year, as they sang Ole! to rally behind Generico to get the hot tag, then when Steen & Generico finally accomplished their goal and won the championships, the fans were absolutely ecstatic and joined in the celebrations. It was possibly the best moment of 2008. If Steenerico ended their year there, it would've been perfect. Unfortunately, their title reign wasn't exactly eventful afterwards. Despite supposedly being the top team, The Briscoes were still booked as the best. They won dream matches against stars (LAX and Kensuke Office), while Steenerico didn't even get that. They beat The Briscoes twice, but there wasn't much variety in opponents for a tag division that was getting smaller. They weren't even getting booked on every show. At least, by the final doubleshot of 2008, a new team in the form of the American Wolves arrived and they might be their saving grace.
Steenerico's Best Matches:
vs Naruki Doi & Masato Yoshino (Dragon Gate Challenge II)
vs BxB Hulk & SHINGO (Supercard of Honor III)
vs Nigel McGuinness & Claudio Castagnoli (Tag Wars 2008)
vs Davey Richards & Rocky Romero (A New Level)
vs Nigel McGuinness & Go Shiozaki (Up For Grabs)
vs Jimmy Jacobs & Tyler Black (Up For Grabs)
vs Motor City Machine Guns (Death Before Dishonor VI)
vs Jimmy Jacobs & Tyler Black (Driven 2008)
vs Chris Hero & Davey Richards vs LAX vs Jimmy Jacobs & Tyler Black (Return of the 187)
vs The Briscoes (Bound By Hate)
Team Work - The dream team of ROH's "ace" and the "best in the world" managed to put on several novelty matches and were quite the entertaining duo throughout the year. Aries and Danielson were originally meant to be a one-time team to enter a fourway match for the tag titles, but the fans were so impressed with their teamwork (hence the name) that I suppose Gabe figured some great matches could come out of them. After that, they decided to stick together and help each other. Dragon helped Aries out in his feud with AOTF and Aries helped Dragon to try to accomplish his goal of being ROH's first Triple Crown champion, although Aries wasn't a great partner since he'd rather get the team DQ'd to hurt Jimmy. They were out of the tag team division and were never a permanent team but they were still able to put on some great matches and that's why I think they count as a great part of the year. If it wasn't for Aries eventually turning heel, I'd have liked to see these two go on to win the titles from whomever beats Steenerico
Team Work's Best Matches:
vs Nigel McGuinness & Go Shiozaki (Double Feature Night 2)
vs Roderick Strong & Davey Richards (Up For Grabs)
vs Jimmy Jacobs & Tyler Black (Respect Is Earned II)
vs Motor City Machine Guns (Fueling the Fire)
vs Nigel McGuinness & Claudio Castagnoli (Night of the Butcher II)
Jimmy Jacobs & Tyler Black - I'm pretty mixed here. On the one hand, they had some great matches, played a big part in Steenerico's quest for the belts and were very good heat-getters. On the other, they had two bad/meh title reigns that will probably end up forgotten. They didn't even seem to care too much about the belts unless they had them; for example, when they lost the belts the first time, Jimmy said they were going to do everything it takes to get their power back. Then they pretty much just forgot about the titles until they won them the next time. Not to mention the circumstances surrounding their reigns. The first time they lost, they only had one defence and suffered a rollup pin. The team that won, the NRC, ended up losing to the already-injured Briscoes who then forfeited the belts, leading to the tournament in which the AOTF won them again. Now I don't see why they couldn't have just had a nice, lengthy run instead of having 3 forgettable runs. As for their positives, they were definitely a big part of the year as a team, in which they had a lot of high profile matches and even managed to go over Team Work, two of the most over guys in the promotion. Aside from Nigel, as a team they were the biggest heels and they always had heat, especially at Up For Grabs when they had trash thrown at them. Jimmy is a great talker and is also a great character who is a natural heat-getter, but in a non-hardcore environment, he's pretty average. So it's good that Tyler can make up for that aspect, especially when he's nothing special on the mic and he was the opposite of the most hated man in ROH.
AOTF's Best Matches:
vs The Briscoes vs BJ Whitmer & Brent Albright vs Jack Evans & Jigsaw (Proving Ground)
vs BxB Hulk & SHINGO (Dragon Gate Challenge II)
vs The Briscoes (Supercard of Honor III)
vs Motor City Machine Guns (Tag Wars 2008)
vs Kevin Steen & El Generico (Up For Grabs)
vs Team Work (Respect Is Earned II)
vs Kevin Steen & El Generico (Driven 2008)
vs Team Work (The French Connection)
American Wolves - Perhaps a bit of a surprising entry considering they only had two matches at all in 2008 and had only just formed, but when the tag division was getting noticeably smaller and was in need of a top heel team now that Jimmy and Tyler had split, Davey and Eddie Edwards were a great choice. These two had instant chemistry together and I can tell they'll soon be able to put on some great matches. On paper, they seem a bit mismatched. After all, the fans are a lot more familiar with Davey and he is a lot more over and higher up on the card, but I found myself instantly forgetting that once I saw them in their first match. They work like they're made for each other. I can see Davey going in and out of this team whenever he sees fit and still being a great singles and tag wrestler. They're both very intense and already have some cool double team moves. They've already been established quite well and made to look very strong after their first weekend, as they practically destroyed the top two face teams, The Briscoes and Steenerico. 2009 will be a big year for the Wolves, and if they don't take the tag belts, I would think Davey will almost definitely be in the main event scene.
Feuds and Rivalries Roderick Strong vs Erick Stevens - These two may have been treated like the midcarders they were for the second half of 2008, but before then whenever they were in the ring together, they were stars. They were always given the time they needed to put on a brutal and exciting match and these two always left the crowd happy, grateful for almost killing themselves. This feud was great because it was kept simple. Neither Strong nor Stevens are great on the mic, it's probably their weakest aspect, but they told the whole story in the ring. Every match the violence escalated, going from stiff forearms and chops, culminating in tables, ladders and chairs, all because one would want revenge on the other for winning the previous match. They simply wanted to kill each other because of the pain they caused. Their matches could have main evented any show because they were consistently great, I honestly can't think of a match they've had that went under ****. These are matches that need to be shown to fans wanting to get into ROH that like a good brawl.
Strong/Stevens' Best Matches:
FIP Redefined (I know, I know. But ROH still acknowledge the match happened and the FIP title still counted back then)
Supercard of Honor III
Fight Without Honor - Supercard of Honor III
I still think any of their matches are worth watching, though.
Nigel McGuinness vs Kevin Steen - While the official feud may be over, I'm sure the rivalry will last much longer. The clash of egos between these two was destined to be fun, and who didn't enjoy Steen mocking the Jawbreaker Lariat and kicking Nigel in the balls during his sexually suggestive entrance? The matches these two had were some of the most entertaining of the year, culminating in a MOTYC (at the time). After Nigel cheated twice in the first two matches to win, something Nigel surprisingly hadn't done very much in his title reign, everyone was behind Steen, who was showing that he could very well be a future main eventer. Their final match at Northern Navigation was Steen's best singles performance of his ROH career, as he practically broke his back in two of the sickest spots of the year, but fought on and sold the pain extremely well while the Canadian crowd went absolutely nuts for him. Unfortunately, in the end, Nigel proved he could beat Steen cleanly and solidified himself as a dominant champion, but not without helping to make Steen look like a million bucks.
Nigel/Steen's Best Matches:
Injustice
Return Engagement
Steen & El Generico vs Nigel & Go Shiozaki (Up For Grabs)
Northern Navigation
Nigel vs Steen vs El Generico vs Go Shiozaki (The French Connection)
Nigel McGuinness vs Bryan Danielson - While not necessarily an actual feud, more of a continuation of their long-lasting competitive rivalry, this was a big part of the year. Elements of their rivalry existed throughout almost the entire year, starting off in a big way with Nigel's heel turn. Instead of the epic moment where Nigel finally conquered Dragon by defeating him for the first time, we got a different side of him where he whined about his concussion and threatened to drop the title if Dragon targeted his head. It was at the end of the match that Nigel hit Dragon's injured eye and cheated to win, thus cementing himself as the top heel in ROH. Nigel would spend most of his title run taunting Dragon, calling himself the "Best Wrestler in the World" and mocking him in his matches. In interviews, he would call him a "clam-digging virgin". With a lack of matches between them and trips to Japan, Dragon didn't have many opportunities to fight back. So Dragon wanted another chance at the title, but Nigel made it a stipulation that he wouldn't be allowed until Dragon defeated those Nigel defended his title against on PPV. A few months later, Dragon had beaten Go Shiozaki, Claudio Castagnoli and Tyler Black, earning his shot. In a definite MOTYC, they had one of their best matches at Rising Above 2008, in which Nigel targeted Dragon's injured knee and interference from Claudio attributed to Nigel beating him. By proving he can defeat Dragon more than once, Nigel had asserted his dominance as champion.
Dragon/Nigel's Best Matches:
Sixth Year Anniversary
Dragon & Austin Aries vs Nigel & Go Shiozaki (Double Feature Night 2)
Nigel vs Dragon vs Claudio Castagnoli vs Tyler Black (Death Before Dishonor VI)
Dragon & Austin Aries vs Nigel & Claudio Castagnoli (Night of the Butcher II)
Rising Above 2008
Dragon & Jerry Lynn vs Nigel & Claudio Castagnoli (Wrestling at the Gateway)
Bryan Danielson vs Tyler Black - The rivalry that made Tyler Black. While Tyler's match with Nigel McGuinness gained him a lot of popularity and fans, that may have not happened had it not been for his first match with Dragon. By showing Gabe that he could put on a very good, long bout with the top guy and make himself look great, Gabe probably became confident in Tyler's ability and decided to let him main event a PPV. The interesting thing about the matches between these two was that every loss Tyler had, was a gain. His popularity grew and every match afterwards he came closer to beating the top man, even pinning him in a tag match at Respect Is Earned II. He still hasn't beaten Dragon, but has managed to wrestle to two draws against him. By the time Tyler defeats Dragon, it will likely be a much more special moment than if he won the first time.
Dragon/Tyler's Best Matches:
Southern Navigation
Dragon & Austin Aries vs Tyler & Jimmy Jacobs (Respect Is Earned II)
New Horizons
Dragon & Austin Aries vs Tyler & Jimmy Jacobs (The French Connection)
Linear Mode
