Ring of Honor announced the teams for their twelve-team Tag Wars tournament, which will take place between January 24-26 on their Road to the G1 Supercard shows in Texas. Tag Wars took place as a one-night tournament in 2010, 2014, and 2016, with a slightly different format each time. The 2019 Tag Wars will feature three matches on the first night, three more on the second night, and the winning teams from these nights wrestling in two different three-way matches on the third night. The winners of the triple threats will compete in the finals later on January 2016. It’s kind of Tag Wars gone BOLA.
Here are the teams for Tag Wars, a selection that paints a pretty good picture of ROH in early 2019 outside of Women of Honor and top singles stars like Dalton Castle, Marty Scurll, and Matt Taven, who will presumably be busy with non-tag team feuds on this tour:
- ROH World Champion Jay Lethal and Jonathan Gresham
- Villain Enterprises (PCO and Brody King)
- Juice Robinson and David Finlay
- The Kingdom (TK O’Ryan and Vinny Marseglia)
- Colt Cabana and Flip Gordon (“pending medical prognosis“)
- Coast 2 Coast (LSG and Shaheem Ali)
- Mark Haskins and “Hot Sauce” Tracy Williams
- The Bouncers (Beer City Bruiser and Brian Milonas)
- Kenny King and a partner of his choosing
- Eli Isom and Cheeseburger
- The Boys
- NJPW LA Dojo Young Lions Karl Fredericks and Alex Coughlin
Three of these teams are from new stables that formed in ROH this year. NJPW guest star/IWGP United States Champion Juice Robinson (SPOILER FOR ROH TV TAPINGS) formed a group called “Lifeblood” with fellow NJPW guest star David Finlay, Tenille Dashwood, and recent ROH signees Mark Haskins, Tracy Williams, and Bandido, to “bring honor back to ROH“, and the new squad has two chances to win Tag Wars. (END SPOILER.) Scurll’s new giant sidekicks in his crew straight out of a comic book, ROH newcomers Brody King and PCO, will also have a chance to shine on their own, as will the less prominent members of Taven’s The Kingdom.
Though the tournament will take place on the Road to the G1 Supercard, the winners of the Tag Wars tournament will get a title shot against the ROH World Tag Team Champions (currently the Briscoes) at the ROH 17th Anniversary pay-per-view on March 15, rather than at the NJPW/ROH sold-out G1 Supercard show at Madison Square Garden on April 6. The winners will also be entered into the NWA/ROH Crockett Cup in April. So adjust your mental kayfabe power rankings according so that one winning of Tag Wars equals one ROH World Tag Team Championship opportunity equals entry into the 2019 Crockett Cup. (I think the Crockett Cup comes out on top here.)
