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Honor is real.

Ring of Honor (ROH) is an American professional wrestling promotion based in Jacksonville, Florida. In sharp contrast to other promotions, ROH is known for placing a heavy emphasis on in-ring action over promos or storylines.

ROH was founded in February 2002 to take the place of ECW for RF Video (which was the company's main stream of revenue). RF Video and ROH went through a messy divorce in '04, leaving behind Cary Silkin as owner and Gabe Sapolsky as head writer.

ROH served as a breeding ground of talent for TNA/Impact, WWE and eventually AEW. World Champions Samoa Joe (TNA/AEW), CM Punk (WWE/AEW), Bryan Danielson (Daniel Bryan) (WWE), Austin Aries (TNA), Tyler Black (Seth Rollins) (WWE), Kevin Steen (Kevin Owens) (WWE) and Eddie Edwards (TNA) made their names in ROH, and a host of others did the same. A number of ROH wrestlers have done tours in Japan with other promotions, and vice versa: 2005 saw Dragon Gate Invasion hosted by ROH, as well as the famous Joe vs. Kenta Kobashi match. That led to Kobashi's home company Pro Wrestling NOAH working with ROH for over three years, some ROH wrestlers touring with NOAH, and eventually a few ROH shows in Japan. In 2014, ROH announced a new international partnership with New Japan Pro-Wrestling.

In 2011, ROH was acquired by the Sinclair Broadcast Group. Not only did Sinclair add programming for their stations, but they expanded the reach for Ring of Honor. Under Sinclair, ROH would go from producing a newly-revamped weekly television series and internet pay-per-views, to producing quarterly PPV events distrubited on national television and being syndicated and picked up by non-Sinclair networks.

In fact, between a 2015 deal with Discovery Channel's Destination America to air their syndicated program on the network for twenty-six weeks; TV reruns being aired on Sinclair diginets (Comet, Charge!, and Stadium); streaming replays and PPVs on FITE TV; and the eventual launch of promotion's own streaming service in 2018, HonorClub; Ring of Honor's weekly series can be easily-seen by just about everyone regardless of platform.

Ring of Honor was considered the third-largest wrestling promotion in the United States behind the WWE and Impact. By the end of 2017, it could be argued that ROH surpassed Impact thanks to the Destination America deal, its international partnerships with promotions like NJPW, and being generally seen as a better, more stable product than Impact.note 

Ring of Honor would fall into a rut in 2019. In a year that saw many of ROH's top talent make the jump to the fledgling All Elite Wrestling promotion, ROH would suffer from flagging ticket sales due to the lack of star power; received mixed-to-negative reviews for most of their events due to poor booking; and become embroiled in various controversies. Meanwhile, the "Wednesday Night Wars" between AEW Dynamite on TNT and WWE's NXT, the biggest head-to-head clash between two major wrestling promotions since the Monday Night Wars in the 1990s, would completely overshadow the rest of the industry by that Fall.

In January 2020, Ring of Honor announced that it had re-signed Marty Scurll not just as on-screen talent, but also as head booker, and tasked him with rejuvenating the company. This partnership came to a abrupt end around a year later in January of 2021, after a wave of sexual misconduct allegations.

On October 27, 2021, it was announced that Ring of Honor would be going on hiatus to be "re-imagined" for the first quarter of 2022 following Final Battle in December 2021, and that their entire roster was released from their contracts. On March 2, 2022, Tony Khan (owner of the aforementioned All Elite Wrestling) announced he had become the new owner of Ring of Honor and the promotion relaunched with Supercard of Honor on April 1, 2022. note 

As an addendum, Ring of Honor was prominently featured in The Wrestler as the promotion for Randy "The Ram" Robinson's 20th Anniversary rematch with The Ayatollah, and the match itself was filmed at a Ring of Honor show.

Ring of Honor recognizes six titles that are defended at its shows (and also frequently in AEW since the Khan acquisition):

  • ROH World Champion: Eddie Kingston since September 20, 2023
  • ROH World Television Champion: Kyle Fletcher since December 15, 2023
  • ROH World Tag Team Champions: The Kingdom (Matt Taven and Mike Bennett) since December 27, 2023
  • ROH World Six-Man Tag Team Champions: Bullet Club Gold (Jay White and The Gunns (Austin and Colten Gunn)) since January 17, 2024
  • ROH Pure Champion: Wheeler Yuta since November 25, 2023
  • ROH Women's World Championship: Athena since December 10, 2022

Not to be confused with the Malaysian horror film Roh, which is not an acronym.


Creating Trope Lists!

  • A Day in the Limelight
    • From 2005 to 2008, students from the ROH Academy received these as they competed for a "Top of the Class" trophy.
    • Some of ROH's dark matches can be viewed online, some developing into series such as Women of Honor Wednesday and Future of Honor Friday.
  • A Lighter Shade of Grey: Wrestling's Greatest Tag Team started out as the lighter shade when the All Night Express were coming off of their feud with Delirious and Jerry Lynn. The Express were the lighter shade when Haas and Benjamin were coming out of their feud with the Briscoes. Both teams were made up of jerk jock but Wrestling's Greatest Tag Team started out as a lot more appreciative and respectful of ROH. Then they weren't over the deep end while the Express learned to be a little nicer.
  • Aborted Arc:
    • Kevin Steen and Steve Corino's attempts to lure Tyler Black to their side got dropped when Black left the company.
    • The Pick Six contenders' series.
  • Acquired Situational Narcissism:
    • American Dragon after winning the World title went from a guy who didn't make much fuss about being considered one of the best pure wrestlers in North America to call himself "Best in the World".
    • Matt Sydal after winning the Tag Team Titles with Christopher Daniels. Sydal was already sort of a narcissist but before it was an act he put on, but after his time in Dragon Gate and the title wins he started to believe his own hype.
  • Affectionate Parody: Ebessan as Cactus Jack during Mick Foley's Challenge.
  • All-American Face
    • American Dragon when he still had his mask from New Japan. Best known here for being without the mask, and eventually, without the "face" part either.
    • Sara Del Rey, early on. At ROH The Fifth Year Festival: Finale The Dangerous Angels sparked chants of "USA" while competing in the UK against UK natives even, even though one half in Allison Danger is Canadian (they chanted for her too though)
  • Anti-Villain
    • CM Punk was a firm believer in (if not a practitioner of) the honor code and of course had the noble clean lifestyle stance. Samoa Joe was only interested in money, but not to the extent he'd violate the honor code.
    • The Age of the Fall began after Lacey's surgery caused Jimmy Jacobs to turn against the American healthcare system.
    • Jay Lethal may have been an ass, but he was fighting for his mother's honor.
    • Decade at some level really do care for the company's well-being.
  • Ascended Meme: Between "Glory By Honor VIII" and "Supercard of Honor V", Austin Aries's matches included a "TWINKIES!" chant. At SCOH V, what would Aries give Delirious a peace offering? Well, Twin.. err, Golden Snack Cakes! The fans even responded with a "Golden Snack Cakes" chant, prompting a fitting quote from Aries:
    Aries: "Oh, to be the puppeteer! Oh, to be the puppets!"
  • AstroTurf: Straw fans were employed during Kenny King, Rhett Titus and Caprice Coleman's campaign to "Make Wrestling Great Again" in an attempt to drown out the booing fans and make themselves look more popular than they were to the viewing audience. Kenny would invariably ruin this, as he couldn't help taunting the actual ticket buyers, thus drawing attention to them and their ire.
  • Ax-Crazy
    • Delirious after having his mask stapled to his head and being hung by Hangm3n. He took his symbolic revenge by wearing a red mask and developing a poison designed to inflame the airway that he stored in his mouth and spit into the faces of those who assaulted him.
    • Kevin Steen. Or until El Generico sent him packing.
  • The Bad Guy Wins: The Age of the Fall at Final Battle 2007, Roderick Strong at Final Battle 2010. SCUM Lost as a group but Steen beat Generico at Final Battle 2012, which also saw Mike Bennett beat Jerry Lynn in his last ROH match. Adam Cole at Final Battle 2013. Jay Lethal at the 2015 Final Battle.
  • Battle Couple: Possibly Buff E and Mace Mendoza. Confirmed with Steve Corino and Simply Luscious, Raven and Trinity, CM Punk and Lucy, Mike Bennet and Maria Kanellis, Michael Elgin and MsChif.
  • Became Their Own Antithesis: Chris Hero's associations with ROH started during the CZW feud as an outsider who hated the promotion and wanted it to go away while Steen started during the same feud as an outsider desperate to be hired. By 2012 this switched to proudly claiming to be an integral part of the company(Hero) and wanting to tear it all down(Steen).
  • Berserk Button
    • Disqualifications, unclean finishes, under two minute squash matches? The ROH crowds hate that stuff.
    • TNA, for the live crowds. TNA and ROH shared some of their wrestlers back when both were starting out, but when TNA stopped the fans took it badly. Even years later, merely alluding to TNA's existence at an ROH show is guaranteed to start loud "Fuck TNA!" chants. Not helped by TNA rekindling hostilities by letting talent trickle back in only to dramatically withdraw them at least two more times, though some of the wrestlers kept finding ways to come back even after ROH officially gave up on trying to work with TNA during their time with HD Net.
  • Big Damn Hero: CM Punk's return from OVW at Unscripted II, Austin Aries's return from TNA at Driven 2007, Chris Hero's return from NXT at Final Battle 2013, Bully Ray's surprise debut at Manhattan Mayhem VI.
  • Big Scary Black Man
    • Among them are Julius Smokes, Slugga, FIP's Antonio Banks, The Dark City Fight Club Jon Davis and Kory Chavis, Skullkrusher Rasche Brown, Black Ice, Bodysnatcher, Moose, Keith Lee, Shane Taylor, though this mainly concerns their opponents, as fans tend to like most of them and Smokes was more scary for who he managed than intimidating anyone besides non wrestlers directly.
    • Subverted by the absolutely massive Dru Onyx, because it's hard to be scary after you've been beaten by The Romantic Touch.
    • Averted with Slyck Wagner Brown, Dlo Brown, Shelton Benjamin and FIP's Uhaa Nation, who their opponents were too familiar with, who weren't trying to be intimidating in this particular manner anyway.
  • Boring Invincible Hero: A complaint frequently directed toward the Briscoe Brothers, especially by detractors of the promotion in general. This only applies to them as a team though.
  • Breakout Character: Jimmy Jacobs had spent a few years as a comedy Jobber and underwhelming tag wrestler on the indies, and was on the verge of being cut from the roster going into 2006. Then he became a Wangsty Emo Teen Stalker with a Crush who sang hilarious Narmy songs and worshiped his Defrosting Ice Queen manager, Lacey. He quickly Took a Level in Badass and became a major player involved in some of the promotion's most intense feuds.
  • The Bus Came Back: A number of prominent ROH talents currently working for AEW returned upon Tony Khan's purchase of the company, including the Briscoes, the Kingdom, Dalton Castle, and Jay Lethal.
  • Butt-Monkey
    • Davey Richards was the Butt Monkey of the No Remorse Corps stable. Roderick Strong and Rocky Romero would frequently task him with watching their bags while they went bar-hopping, resulting in a particularly funny promo where Davey, at their urging, tried to ask out a girl with this oh-so-tempting offer:
      Davey Richards: "Wanna watch bags with me?"
    • Even worse: Bobby Dempsey for Sweet 'n' Sour, Inc. Entire segments would be devoted to Larry Sweeney, Chris Hero, and Tank Toland abusing him in every way possible.
    • Senior referee Todd Sinclair will always be at the top of the Butt Monkey food chain.
  • CamelCase: Bobby Fish and Kyle O'Reilly's team is called reDRagon. Perhaps because their original mission was to eliminate Davey Richards?
  • The Cameo
    • Lucy was in attendance at SoCal Showdown. Teddy Hart and Savio Vega were in attendance at Supercard of Honor X.
    • Gypsy Joe, an innovator of the "death matches" in Puerto Rico, accompanied Necro Butcher and Eddie Kingston to their unsanctioned match with the Embassy at the 8th anniversary show.
    • Terry Funk was a ringside enforcer at Glory By Honor IX.
    • Yes, that was Bruce LeRoy with Jimmy Yang during his feud with The Embassy.
    • Lisa Marie Varon ran out at Glory By Honor XII to help Kevin Steen run off Mike Bennett and Maria Kanellis.
    • Filthy Tom Lawlor had long left pro wrestling for mixed martial arts when he showed up in ROH but is treated as an unofficial third member of reDRagon when he does.
  • Card-Carrying Villain
    • Suffering Chaos Ugliness Mayhem, SCUM sought to tear down the company, well because they were evil.
    • The House Of Truth's second ROH run was pretty much this, Paint It Black and all. However, all revealed nobler sides during the internal conflict with Donovan Dijak that lead to Martini's neck injury...all except Hendrix.
    • Takaaki Watanabe never came back. The man you see is EVIL!
    • Marty Scurll, the one, true villain.
  • Cloud Cuckoolander: Paul London, Spanky, Delirious, Ace Steel, Lucy and the Bravado Brothers. Also, Mad Man Manson on loan.
  • Coconut Superpowers: More like Coconut Wealth. Prince Nana would constantly talk up the luxuries he was providing for his wrestlers and claiming that they had just flown in by helicopter; none of this was actually shown.
  • Code of Honour
    • The defining trait of the promotion is the code. There have been two versions of it. The first:
    1: You must shake hands before and after every match
    2: No outside interference
    3: No sneak attacks
    4: No harming the officials
    5: Any action resulting in a disqualification violates the Code of Honor.
    • Refusal to follow any part of the code could result in disciplinary action against the offending wrestler, 4 and 5 were particularly important, as violating them could lead to being dismissed from the promotion. Gabe Sapolsky eventually did away with the code, however, when he felt there were too many wrestlers violating it to punish them all. After he was fired the code was reinstated but simplified and with no punishment for breaking it:
    1: Shake hands before and after the match if you respect your opponent
    2: Keep the playing field level
    3: Respect the officials.
  • Collectible Card Game: At least one made by Filsinger Games based around running a promotion using wrestlers and managers who have worked for ROH. The rules are close enough to allow ROH to go to war with their Chikara decks.
  • Combat by Champion
    • At Joe vs Punk II Ricky Steamboat was represented by Nigel McGuinness and Chad Collyer while Mick Foley was represented by Dan Maff and BJ Whitmer in a Tag Team match to settle their debate on whether ROH should be featuring "Pure Wrestling" or "Hardcore Wrestling".
    • Alex Law and Ricky Landell took on Davey Andrews and Anthony Franco in a tag team match representing their respective trainers, Steve Corino and CM Punk, at Do or Die IV.
  • Combat Commentator: Wrestlers traditionally cycle through the commentary seats, CM Punk and Colt Cabana being among those who appeared more than usual due to fan demand. At Festival Of Honor there was a raffle for the fans themselves to call matches with Ian Riccaboni and Kevin Kelly, silver tickets being prerecorded and gold being live.
  • The Comically Serious
    • A role frequently taken by anyone feuding with Colt Cabana, such as Homicide and Nigel McGuinness.
    • Anything lighthearted, comical or low stakes will be seen as childish at best by Silas Young. Best shown when he ended up in a quartet with the Castle's peacock boys and the Beer City Bruiser.
  • Commuting on a Bus
    • Ricky Reyes is a former Tag Team Champion along with Rocky Romero, but he has made sporadic appearances in the promotion since 2007.
    • Steve Corino for most of his run, usually due to bookings in Japan or England.
    • AJ Styles and Samoa Joe were planned to be used this way at the start of their World and Pure title reigns, which would see them defend the belts in promotions all over the world as each tried to establish theirs as the most important in wrestling but TNA's interest in them ended up seeing this played in a much different and unintentional way on ROH's part.
    • Most dojo graduates go through this, in the event they come back at all anyway. Jenny Rose commuted in and out of ROH for seven years.
  • Company Cross References: Back when Ring of Honor and Full Impact Pro were "sister promotions", the "Crazy Homeless Person" who interfered on the behalf of Jimmy Jacobs and The Age Of The Fall in ROH was Milo Beasley, a longstanding bum/minion of FIP who had previously "served" indie legend CM Punk. The only member of the FIP Age of the Fall that was respectively recognized in ROH was Radiant Rain, on account of her and Lacey working as The Minnesota/International Home Wrecking crew in ROH's other former sister promotion, SHIMMER.
  • Cool Mask: Yoh and Sho come to the ring in Ăšltimo DragĂłn like masks when teaming as The Tempura Boys
  • Cool Old Guy: Bruno Sammartino, Ambassador Ric Flair, PAPA BRISCOE~!
  • The Corrupter: Special K would expand its membership by drugging other wrestlers and gradually turning them into addicts. Jimmy Jacobs would get Delirious into Age of the Fall as well as Ta'Darius and Adam Page in Decade through emotional manipulation.
  • Creator Cameo: ROH's founders appeared as commentator Jimmy Bowers and manager Fun Athletic Guy.
  • Crossover
    • The all-women promotion SHIMMER was featured off-and-on, since ROH's former announcer Dave Prazak founded SHIMMER, and ROH recognized SHIMMER's champions. Since the sale to Sinclair, SHIMMER has been largely absent. In 2015, ROH began running their own women's division, "Women of Honor", with matches streaming on ROH's YouTube Channel. They announced the creation of a Women of Honor Championship in late 2017, with the first champion crowned in early 2018.
    • With Shimmer often and CZW famously. Ring of Honor also made some pretty big stars by having them defend the title belts in other promotions. Formerly did these with FIP and TNA. The commentators will tell you where in the world their absent talent is currently performing too.
    • Other promotions extends to those across borders and overseas. Ring Of Honor used to crossover with Dragon Gate to the point Dragon Gate wrestlers Naruki Doi and Shingo held the World Tag Team titles. They also crossover over with NOAH and it resulted in Takeshi Morishima holding the World title at the same time as the Dragon Gate wrestlers, making ROH the first North American promotion to have all its title belts held by Japanese men. They continued to see NOAH but less so with Dragon Gate. In 2014 Border Wars was replaced with Global Wars and War of the Worlds, which feature collaboration with New Japan Pro-Wrestling. ROH has even used referee Tiger Hattori! This in turn lead to Honor Rising Japan on NJPW's part.
    • Jim Cornette got them to do some crossovers with OVW in 2010, to help that company get back on its feet after WWE severed ties with them and revived FCW. OVW has since had crossovers with Ring Of Honor's regular affiliates too, excepting 2011-2013 when TNA had decided to use OVW for developmental.
    • Supercard of Honor 2014 crossed over with Preston City Wrestling and saw the return of Lance Storm. It also gifted ROH the return of Paul London.
    • CMLL got in on the War of the Worlds tour in 2017, which passed through the UK and gave some extra exposure to Rev Pro, who had already done their own version of "Global Wars" with NJPW the year prior.
    • Happened even during the 2021–22 hiatus. A title vs. title match for the ROH and AAA women's belts was held at a January 2022 Impact show.
  • Darker and Edgier: This happens to many wrestlers who stay in Ring Of Honor an extended amount of time. Delirious was an unhinged madman who lost himself trying to emulate the unfinished character on his mask, but he was always somewhat methodical, pragmatic, had a lot of humorous quirks and notably was not Ax-Crazy, until he got in feud with Hang Men Three at ROH. Jimmy Jacobs was a wannabe Kevin Sullivan Barbarian Berserker but had plenty of adorable traits too, until they ended up being exercised after an extended stay in ROH. Colt Cabana stopped telling jokes 2006. Chris Hero went from a silly superhero fan to a "Knockout Artist". El Generico was a parody of Lucha Libre but nearly became a garbage wrestler during his feud with Kevin Steen. The House Of Truth were a hedonist group of party goers but became violent squad of megalomaniacs. The misdeeds of Bad Influence were somewhat softened by a constant stream of comedy flowing besides them but their run as The Addiction in ROH saw that stream start to dry up. Adam Page and Kelly Klein had shown shades of cruelty before but ROH is where they became infamous for hanging and choking, respectively. The tournament to crown ROH's first world six man tag team champions is over and The Cabinet, feeling overlooked, has been shelved. Kenny King, Rhett Titus and Caprice Coleman are starting The Rebellion. Marty Scurll was already evil but the moment he came out to a more foreboding version of his comparatively upbeat entrance it foreshadowed things getting worse. Even Dalton Castle had a bit of this as Bullet Club got to him. With the exception of a few such as Jacobs though, most of these end up shaking it off if given enough time.
    • The company was hamstrung by being a Being the Elite and New Japan partner, the latter of whom gained success in the West on the back of ROH. ROH became a feeder system for New Japan: ROH guys are seen as lesser until they join New Japan or are featured on BTE, and audiences seemingly show up for New Japan and BTE and don't really react to the ROH guys. This resulted in most of the ROH guys becoming jobbers-to-the-stars.
  • Deadpan Snarker: CM Punk and Bryan Danielson had many moments, but Austin Aries has always been the chief snarker. That title now goes to Steve Corino.
  • Democracy Is Flawed: ROH Generation Next was supposed to be an event where the fans voted on who was the top upcoming star in the company but Alex Shelley, Austin Aries, Jack Evans and Roderick Strong declared themselves the best things in the company and trashed the ballots.
  • Demoted to Extra: Mia Yim was the only woman of honor to keep her roster spot during the HD Net to Sinclair Broadcast Group transition. MsChif would eventually return by the end of year but it'd take until over half of next year before they got back in focus.
  • Determinator: Fighting Spirit is all over the place, but Nigel McGuinness's face gimmick was nothing but this. (This would end up being part of the reason for him becoming less popular and eventually turning heel).
  • Deep South: The Briscoe Brothers embody just about every nasty Southern stereotype in the book: they're drunkards, loud, reckless, ugly (Mark even lost two teeth, which fit in phenomenally well with their image), implied to be a little stupid, clad in Confederate flags, and they constantly brag about their exploits in bar brawls. Ironically, they're from Delaware and announced as such. They don't call it Slower Lower Delaware for nothing. Alexis Laree from Virginia had a noticeable Southern drawl and had come to Ring Of Honor to get away from the ridiculousness of other Northern promotions. Then there was AJ Styles from Georgia, who showed up on the third show and became Ring Of Honor's first pure wrestling champion.
  • Didn't Think This Through
    • As of the first tournament to crown a Pure Wrestling Champion no less. No more punching in the head? Then we'll forearm, elbow and kick each other in the head and punch each other everywhere but the head. Only three rope breaks? Great, that means three forced breaks before my "illegal" hold is now legal. Speaking of "illegal" holds, who does that count as a break for anyway? Eventually the pure belt was just absorbed by the World title. (Of course the real reason for the pure title was not to showcase pure wrestling but to showcase matches unlike anything anyone else was doing at the time, which in that case it was a success. It was retired due to running its course)
    • While he did sign it, Chris Hero mocked Bryan Danielson for sending him a blank contract for an ROH World Title shot while Hero himself wasn't contracted the company, noting he could have had anyone else put their name on it in his place.
  • Discontinuity Nod: Lenny Leonard and Dave Prazak agreed that Larry Sweeney bringing Johnny Fairplay to Supercard Of Honor II was worse than ICP.
  • Disproportionate Retribution: Homicide tried to murder Colt Cabana in the ring three or four times over a few insensitive and borderline racist comments. You'd think the original parking lot beating would have been enough.
  • Dropped a Bridge on Him
    • BJ Whitmer was written out of ROH after objecting to Sweet 'n' Sour Inc.'s takeover of the Hangm3n. The angle aired in clip form during a short highlight package on ROH PPV.
    • This also happened to The Resilience as a group. They lost most of their matches against the No Remorse Corps, most notably one where the loser of the fall was banned from ROH for 60 days. Not only did Matt Cross drop the fall, but Davey Richards injured Erick Stevens's arm in the post-match. At Glory By Honor VI: Night 2, Austin Aries quietly disbanded the group to put the final nail in..
  • Drugs Are Bad\Straight Edge Evil: Both had representation, Special K for the former, CM Punk for the latter(sometimes).
  • Dull Surprise: An attack thrown at Eddie Edwards by the House Of Truth and at Mike Sydal by fans. Austin Aries accused Jerry Lynn when proclaiming RoHbots deserved a charismatic champion.
  • Early-Installment Weirdness
    • Ring Of Honor shoots for a minimum 52 shows a year but when they first started out were content with 20. Also, the whole running to make RF Video money thing.
    • The supposed Pretty Boy Handsome Johnny, a far cry from War Machine Hanson.
    • Silas Young was a much happier and less self-conscious man during his early appearances. He even danced!
  • Easily Forgiven: Christopher Daniels, Chris Hero but especially Kevin Steen, who was cheered when he was the head of S.C.U.M. and actively sought to bring an end to the company. Roderick Strong called the fans out on it, even.
  • Enemy Civil War: Honor Rising 2018 was largely built around conflict within Bullet Club.
  • Even Evil Has Standards
    • Cornette gets a beat down from the rest of the Prophecy because he decided to shake the hands of AJ Styles and Homicide, who came together to defeat The Prophecy, after they had injured AJ's regular partner Amazing Red. Also Dan Maff, who wasn't a big fan of the Prophecy's lying ways. The whole stable was against the code of honor but couldn't help but show respect for The Great Muta.
    • Not even Tyler Black or Joey Matthews could contend with Jimmy Jacobs's harassment of Lacey.
    • After having blood feuds with Austin Aries and Delirious within that year, Roderick Strong stood right beside them (along with Kevin Steen) at the Sixth Anniversary Show when Nigel McGuinness attempted to get out of his title defense against Bryan Danielson by getting himself disqualified. This was the same Roderick Strong who won the FIP World Heavyweight title a week prior via count out, which was the same exact way Nigel would retain the Pure division title belt.
    • Everything The Kingdom or Bullet Club do wrong will usually be brought up by a member of The Kingdom or Bullet Club, especially Taven and The Young Bucks.
  • Every Year They Fizzle Out: Homicide until he went on a path of vengeance that culminated in defeating World Champion Bryan Danielson. Tyler Black till he defeated Austin Aries for the same belt. A point was made that Roderick Strong was 0-15 in World Title matches at one point, though he'd be the one to stop Black from taking the title to WWE. Before Jay Briscoe challenged Kevin Steen, a montage of all his failed attempts at winning a singles title were shown.
  • Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep": Homicide, Barroom Brawler, Player Uno, Player Dos, Bodysnatcher, Beer City Bruiser
  • Evil Feels Good: The reason for the 2012 Face–Heel Turn of Jimmy Jacobs.
  • Evil Mentor
    • Ta'Darius realized it and worked to distance himself from Truth Martini when transitioning from mixed martial arts and boxing to pro wrestling. Unfortunately he ended up with Jimmy Jacobs, which is just as bad...though he had the sense to drop Jacobs after awhile too.
    • Kevin Sullivan became this to Steve Corino and BJ Whitmer during some cross promotion with then NWA member Ring Warriors. Whitmer in turn became one to Kelly Klein and Adam Page, attempting to bring Punishment Martinez in the "family" of evil as well.
  • Evil Redhead: ROH seems to have a weakness for redheads. Maria Kanellis, Scarlett Bordeaux, Veda Scott and Taeler Hendrix were all making different kinds of mischief during the same time span. Even Bob Evans, though it's hard to tell with him since his eyebrows are his only noticeable hair.
  • Evil Vegetarian: Bryan Danielson and Austin Aries, although only Aries put the two together, and even then he wasn't evil so much for his refusal to eat meat but rather called himself an ass.
  • Eyepatch of Power: Bryan Danielson after Takeshi Morishima detached his retina. Jimmy Jacobs after Delirious beat him in a street fight. Rocky Romero in Forever Hooligans.
  • Final Battle:
    • Well, duh. It's only the name of one of their biggest shows, and, since December 2009, their last PPV, of the year, after all. In 2017 slightly moved away from being so literal, as it was followed by a television taping.
    • Glory By Honor VIII: The Final Countdown was supposed to put a cap on the Kevin Steen\El Generico feud against The American Wolves in the second ever ladder war but the really hyped up match was the last encounter between Bryan Danielson and Nigel McGuinness before they both left ROH.
  • Finale Production Upgrade: Their annual event Final Battle (and in more recent times, Supercard of Honor) is considered the biggest event of their own calendar year.
  • Fix Fic: Delirious and Machismo King Jay Lethal redid the Ultimate Warrior/Randy Savage retirement match the way it should have gone at "A Night Of Hoopla". It was almost a spot of spot reproduction, excepting Delirious's not gorilla pressing as high as Warrior and one small change however.
  • Foreign Wrestling Heel: Subverted, as the foreign talent are usually the most popular wrestlers on a show, the ROHbots even took a liking to Rocky Romero and Alex Koslov. Played straight with "Very European" Claudio Castagnoli and Ares (who challenged for the World Title in Germany but is Swiss). Played straighter with Prince Nana...if you ignore Nana's automatic citizenship.
  • Fun with Acronyms: When Roderick Strong turned fully heel in 2010, it was largely because he had chosen to make Truth Martini his manager despite several faces telling him that Truth was just using him and manipulating him. Truth Martini, by the way, describes himself as a "Life Intervention Expert".
  • Gambit Pileup:
    • This is the Jimmy Jacobs-Austin Aries feud in a nutshell.
    • The Kingdom-Addiction, especially concerning just who was really behind the latest Knights Of The Rising Dawn attack...it was Alex Shelley playing them both
  • Genre Savvy
    • BJ Whitmer earned himself the title of "smartest man in wrestling" by actually referring to an on-screen insult that Lacey made in his absence, defying the usual required Genre Blindness whereby wrestlers have no knowledge of segments in which they were not on screen.
    • Samoa Joe frequently got a big reaction by casually walking out of the way of a missile dropkick, and Colt Cabana similarly pulls off various tricks simply by taking advantage of his Genre Savviness. With their departures, Michael Elgin picked up the slack.
  • Girl's Night Out Episode: The Women Of Honor got their first television special in June of 2016, followed by their first exclusive live show in July.
  • Gorgeous George: Inverted by JAPW alumni the Christopher Street Connection. They claim to be openly gay yet openly harass the opposite sex if given the opportunity. Played straight with Paredyse from OVW.
  • Greater-Scope Paragon: Carry Silkin, following the RF incident. Even after Sinclair Broadcast Group purchased the company from him he's still treated as the big boss by pretty much all on screen employees, wrestler or otherwise, and is respected for being as honorable as the promotion's name implies. Silkin rejects the designation, though, describing himself as the family dog everyone likes and occasionally give scraps under the table. Officially a board of directors and an executive committee have taken this role.
  • Greater-Scope Villain: Meanwhile, Sinclair Broadcast Group themselves serve as this, thanks to the multitude of things they've done over the years, including owning nearly all the TV stations in certain markets by exploiting FCC loopholes with shell companies owned by the founding Smith family; they've also been known to cut station budgets down to the bone, have acquired two large ABC station groups in recent years (Albritton of Washington DC, and Fisher of Seattle), and forced their conservative viewpoints onto their stations; many in the industry and people who follow it hate them.
  • Heroic BSoD:
    • Delirious got one after Daizee Haze turned him down with the Rhett Titus sex allegation still up in the air. Jimmy Jacobs almost immediately recruited him into the Age of the Fall. Delirious joined.
    • Homicide BSODed frequently due to his frustration over being unable to win a title in ROH.
  • Hoist by His Own Petard
    • Jimmy Jacobs's last ROH appearance before his return as The Atoner saw him getting hanged in the rafters by his legs; he debuted the Age of the Fall by doing the exact same thing to Jay Briscoe. Bonus points for both incidents being held in Chicago.
    • Kevin Steen began his feud with El Generico with a chair shot to the head. A year later, El Generico would send Kevin Steen packing from ROH with a chair shot to the head.
  • It Will Never Catch On
    • Colt Cabana has become very decorated in the National Wrestling Alliance but there hasn't been a single ROH booker willing to pull the trigger on him. In his closest to ROH glory they ultimately decided to go with Dalton Castle instead.
    • Cornette as booker breaking up the American Wolves in favor of starting two new tag team/power trios centered around Davey Richards having a rivalry with Eddie Edwards might in of itself be an example of this but what was most glaring was him making Kyle O'Reilly the sidekick of Richards.(In hindsight, part of this was O'Reilly being in danger of deportation at any moment)
    • Cornette was iffy about the idea of Lio Rush as a wrestler, though he did like the idea of Rush as a manager. Rush was almost immediately over with ROH crowds as a wrestler though.
  • Jerkass: Probably the best way to describe CM Punk's color commentary. He took the opportunity to be an insufferable, arrogant asshole who made fun of absolutely everybody and used frequent Hypocritical Humor. With Punk's departure, Austin Aries became probably the biggest Jerkass in ROH, when Prince Nana wasn't around anyway.
  • Karmic Trickster: Colt Cabana. He will wrestle rings around opponents with a combination of trickery, Obfuscating Stupidity, and technical skill. Not that he can't pull out the hardcore skills when he needs them...
  • Large Ham
    • Required in any wrestling organization, but Bryan Danielson probably deserves the most credit for his absolutely convincing Narm Charm "Best in the World" persona.
    • While Prince Nana's true authority is suspect, he does have a very authoritative presence and voice.
    • The entirety of the original Sweet 'n' Sour, Inc. ensemble, with leading ham Larry Sweeney backed up by the showboating Chris Hero and "All-Natural Superior Athlete" Tank Toland, with Butt-Monkey Bobby Dempsey sticking around as a target for their combined ham.
    • "Adam Cole, Bay Bay!"
    • Jay Lethal, especially after joining the House Of Truth, where he ended up out staging Martini himself. If his many skills don't convince you that he is the best first generation in the world, his mouth will.
    • Dalton Castle has enough charisma to get fans eating out of his hands, though he'd be content with a kiss on the finger.
  • Legacy Character: ROH has had the pleasure of booking two Mr Wrestlings, a Black Tiger, David Finlay Jr and a Dragon Lee on their shows.
  • Lightning Bruiser
    • Former ROH champions Samoa Joe and Takeshi Morishima. Also the towering Swiss luchador Claudio Castagnoli and the beer-gutted high flier Kevin Steen. Preston City Wrestling got to show their own at 2014's SuperCard Of Honor with Uhaa Nation.
    • Highlighted in the rivalry between Hanson and The Beer City Bruiser after War Machine won the tag team titles, although Raymond Rowe's equally impressive in his ability to toss the two larger men around. Even more so in War Machine's later feud with Keith Lee and Shane Taylor, which consisted mainly of four huge guys flying around, and not just when they were throwing each other.
  • Malevolent Masked Man: The weapons of MASK destruction Prince Nana introduced to defeat Jay Lethal, though they failed. He also had Abyss in his Embassy.
  • Manly Tears: They were shed at the end of ROH Punk: The Final Chapter, which was held in hometown of the main eventing Second City Saints for added measure.
  • Masked Luchador
    • Blue Demon Jr has made a handful of appearances and later, Stuka Jr and CMLL's second Dragon Lee came. After an official deal with CMLL opened the flood gates for many more, Hechicero was the first to take advantage on the 2016 Road To Final Battle.
    • Other significant examples are Jushin Thunder Liger, Dragon Kid and Black Tiger, who aren't Mexican but trained in the style there. Super Dragon represented CZW and every now and then some from Chikara such as Ophidian and Amasis pass through.
  • Mooks: Jimmy Jacobs tried to continue The Age of The Fall with numerous, anonymous masked men. Martini had his "Guardians of Truth". Dalton Castle has two personal mooks in peacock masks and can call on many more if the situation requires it. The Boys were more like Red Shirts in that they rarely got into fights or matches voluntarily but after The Briscoes and Bully Ray imploded The Boys found themselves two thirds of the ROH World Six Man Tag Team Champions with Dalton Castle.
  • Morality Pet: El Generico for Kevin Steen, until he wasn't anymore; Jimmy Jacobs played this for Lacey, with the two eventually reversing roles.
  • Mr. Fanservice: Jack Evans, the Sydal brothers, Zizou Middoux, Tyler Black, Adam Cole, Cedric Alexander. KENTA is a more rugged take on it and Takeshi Morishima was this to those who like their men a little...thicker.
  • Mundane Made Awesome
    • American Dragon won the best of five series against Homicide, at ROH The Final Showdown inside a steel cage with an airplane spin. A 100 rotation airplane spin.
    • Naomichi Marufuji was known for a "perfect small package" but Danielson's was supposedly unbreakable.
    • Dalton Castle's entrance got chants of "This Is Awesome"
  • Names to Run Away from Really Fast: Homicide, Necro Butcher, War Machine. Heck, some of their entrance music is credited to Adam Massacre!
  • Ninja: The ninja, the ninja, Red Ninja and Ninja Cheetah of Pro Wrestling RESPECT (AKA, ROH's Academy shows before it became more heavily associated with CHIKARA). The Briscoes would use the Ninjas' masks to attack The Kings of Wrestling for assaulting their father.
  • Off Screen Inertia: Fans made the assumption Jimmy Jacobs and BJ Whitmer had been fighting for an entire day when ROH The Fifth Year Festival: Liverpool ended with them brawling in the locker room and ROH The Fifth Year Festival: Finale opened with them brawling in the locker room, Whitmer knocking the camera away. They continued to show up, brawling with one another in between two matches and two promos and eventually fought their way through the crowd to start a falls count anywhere match.
  • One-Steve Limit
    • On the 100th show, Delirious defeated Jimmy Jacobs, Jimmy Rave and Jimmy Yang.
    • Rhino's red baron is "War machine", which is also the name of Raymond Rowe and Hanson's tag team.
  • Parts Unknown
    • Mr. Wrestling III is their official spokesperson. Also, MsChif and Delirious from The Inferno and The Edge Of Sanity.
    • Hania The Howling Huntress is from the woods and Solo Darling is from the forest.
  • Plucky Comic Relief: Colt Cabana, especially when teaming with the angry, condescending CM Punk. The Boys are such to Dalton Castle, who himself is pretty comedic but is so strong and has so much amateur credibility that he doesn't need to be "plucky".
  • Pom-Pom Girl
    • Pom Pom Boy. The Boys who follow Dalton Castle are this in function, just replace pom poms with fans. The exception was when the main two teamed with him to win and defend the Six Man Tag Team belts, but then they were mainly back to fanning him on.
    • Sonny Kiss is a literal Pom Pom Boy, more so or less so than the boys since he's a competitor, first and foremost but more looks the part.
  • Power Stable
    • Usually at least two kicking around. The Second City Saints, Special K, The Prophecy, Lacey's Angels, The Rottweilers, The Embassy, The Carnage Crew, The Vulture Squad, Age Of The Fall, SCUM, The Kingdom/OGK and Decade for a sample. Many of them bled into other federations such as Pro Wrestling Unplugged, FIP, AAW, JAPW or Pro Wrestling Guerilla. Generation Next even showed up in TNA, ever so briefly.
    • In the other direction, New Japan's CHAOS has repeatedly made their presence felt in ROH between the members who became tag team or television champions as well as recruiting ROH wrestlers for various causes. Bullet Club followed suit, with three of their members(and a mole) debuting in ROH.
  • Power Trio
    • In the vein of the Mexican UWA, ROH held a tournament for trios in 2005. In September of 2016 ROH admitted on their website that they were introducing six man tag team titles largely to facilitate their deal with CMLL, as NJPW had earlier in the year.
    • Some individual examples: Hangmen 3(or Hangm3n), The Spanish Announce Team, The Pantheon Of Gods, The Cabinet(though Coleman claims there are more members of The Rebellion).
  • Pretty Fly for a White Guy: Jack Evans, Chris Hero sometimes likes to think he is too. Also, the white rapper P-dog, though his "Get Along Gang" had a lot more black members than either of the former two's.
  • Produce Pelting: The Age Of The Fall and Nigel McGuinness victories were infuriating enough to get them pelted with whatever the audience had on hand. If the ROHbots are happy, or are being particularly mocking, they will probably throw streamers instead.
  • Product Placement
    • CM Punk reading from "Tales From Wrescal Lane" to stall for time during "Weekend Of Thunder" night 2 until Joe, who had been feuding with Mic Foley, answered his challenge.
    • Silas Young's ACH campaign on the 2016 Road To Best In The World included a stealth commercial for The Best Coloring Book On The Planet.
  • Put on a Bus: ROH sent Alex "Sugarfoot" Payne for more seasoning in the Pro Wrestling NOAH dojo.
  • Rated M for Manly
    • The Briscoes with their various attempts to "Man Up" before big matches.
    • The Bryan Danielson manliness meter, which sometimes crosses over into parody.
    • Silas Young, who claims to be this sport's last real man.
    • If you miss seeing pro wrestlers who were men instead of little boys pretending to be men, The All Night Express is here for you.
  • Real Women Don't Wear Dresses: Lacey had this attitude toward Tammy Lynn Sytch, Sara Del Rey toward Maria Kanellis. Kanellis was kind of asking for trouble though by calling herself "The first lady of ROH"(and by attacking Del Rey without provocation). Sytch by contrast was trying to be supportive to Lacey but Lacey held Sytch's previous Stay in the Kitchen attitude against her.
  • "The Reason You Suck" Speech
    • Christopher Daniels's promo at "Good Times, Great Memories." He saved his sharpest jabs for the ROH fans.
    • Austin Aries on Jimmy Jacobs and Age Of The Fall after he took Lacey out of the group.
    • Adam Page's rant to BJ Whitmer at Supercard Of Honor X.
  • Recap Episode: Several episodes of the television show since the SBG purchase. There are also various rundowns such as Inside ROH on various platforms.
  • Redemption Quest
    • James Gibson was once regarded as a great wrestler and to fight his degraded reputation he regarded to stay in Ring Of Honor as long as it took, doing whatever it took, until he held a title belt.
    • Homicide began one in 2006 for largely the same reason. His reputation was still intact, but his pride was not. He needed a title belt and was going to take revenge on all his enemies in ROH while on the road to getting it.
    • Jimmy Jacobs and Steve Corino went on one, not for lack of success, but out of a genuine desire to atone for all their misdoings.
    • After Hiromu Takahashi returned from ROH and kicked his ass at Sakura Genesis, KUSHIDA returned to ROH to reinvigorate himself, and maybe get his hands on one of those ROH belts that always seemed a little out of his grasp while he was at it.
  • Reluctant Fanservice Girl: As stated further up the page, Alexis Laree had come to ROH specifically to get away from the displays she had put on in other Northern promotions she worked for. She still ended being forcibly kissed by Allison Danger but notorious exotica Sumie Sakai respected her wishes.
  • Revisiting the Roots: What the 2022 relaunch was going to be about. According to wrestling news sources, the idea is returning to the "Super Indy" format with wrestlers getting paid per appearances instead of established contracts... at least until Tony Khan confirms that in essence, the roster will be comprised of a few upcoming AEW talents in a developmental format akin to WWE with NXT.
  • Ring Oldies: Father Time, the oldest rookie in pro wrestling. Bushwhacker Luke has wrestled for ROH at age 68.
  • Roaring Rampageof Revenge
    • El Generico against Kevin Steen and Steve Corino. Culminated with Generico knocking Steen out of Ring of Honor.
    • Homicide's "Road of Homicide" in 2006 against Adam Pearce (for serving Jim Cornette), the Briscoe Brothers (rivals since 2004), and Steve Corino (stemming from Homicide slapping Corino so hard, he caused Corino to go deaf in that ear) came before challenging Bryan Danielson at Final Battle '06.
    • Adam Page against BJ Whitmer, as he blamed Whitmer for the fall of Decade and had been abused by him throughout the group's existence anyway. Steve Corino tried this on Whitmer too for stalking his wife and beating up his son but got himself fired for it...sort of.
    • Taeler Hendrix and Joey Daddiego against Donovan Dijak for breaking Truth Martini's neck, though their efforts were some of the final steps to the end of a House Of Truth presence in ROH.
  • Romantic False Lead: Colt Cabana to the Jimmy Jacobs — Lacey romance. Cabana was actually the face despite being a textbook Jerk Jock who was very condescending toward Jacobs...at least at first. Cabana eventually took a liking to Jacobs and encouraged him to ditch the manipulative Lacey, but Jacobs sided with Lacey anyway to cement himself as a true heel (whereas before that he was more like a face working for a heel).
  • Rule of Three: ROH celebrated it's third anniversary by having three back to back shows.
  • Separated by a Common Language
    • Referenced by the "Frontiers Of Hono(u)r" events done with FWA and IPW:UK.
    • Chris Hero and Larry Sweeney created a series of "Pure Wrestling Commandments" in regards to Nigel McGuinness at Death Before Dishonor V, #2 being that he was no longer allowed to speak British, lest he forfeit all his rope breaks.
  • Serious Business: Aside from the near-mandatory use of the trope in pro wrestling, ROH is known for bragging about being far more Serious than WWE and TNA/Impact Wrestling.
  • Shout-Out
  • Smug Snake: CM Punk and Nigel McGuinness as World Champion. Chris Hero and Claudio Castagnoli filled this role as tag champions, but Hero quickly became far too lovable in his Large Ham role after breaking up with Claudio to fulfill his Smug duties.
  • Spell My Name With An S: We'd known him as Punisher Martinez for years but apparently "Punishment", specifically "The Punishment, Damian Martinez" is preferred. Punishment's even "trended" worldwide on twitter after the correction so it may just stick.
  • Spin-Off:
    • ROH's former sister promotion (by way of sharing a head writer) was Full Impact Pro based in Florida. The FIP title has been defended in ROH events. After Sapolsky left in October 2008, the relationship wound down and FIP split of by 2009. ROH has also served as a sponsor to the UK-based What Culture, which later became Defiant Wrestling.
    • ROH was a major backer of the independent pay-per-view event All In in 2018, with Jay Lethal defending the ROH World Championship on the night. All In was the brainchild of ROH-contracted wrestlers Cody Rhodes and The Young Bucks, aka The Elite. The event was pitched as a celebration of indie wrestling, and was the first non-WWE/lucha libre event to sell 10,000 tickets in the U.S. since WCW. It was also the beginning of the end for ROH. All In turned out to be proof of concept for Rhodes’ own promotion All Elite Wrestling. At the start of 2019, Cody, the Bucks and several others left to found AEW, which rocketed to the position of second-largest promotion in North America. ROH, who had built themselves around the Elite for years, suddenly found themselves without their biggest draw and facing stiff competition from a brand-new company backed by the billionaire Khan family. This is eventually subverted as ROH itself is now bought by Tony Khan, making it a sister promotion of AEW from now on.
  • Spiritual Successor: "Survival Of The Fittest" is one to Maryland Championship Wrestling's Shane Shamrock Memorial Cup. Originally the plan was for ROH to continue the event but then the RF Video scandal caused MCW to reconsider. ROH kept paying attention to the original MCW kept running without their input though, gaining interest in Lio Rush after he beat Eddie Edwards on route to winning it in 2015.
  • Spot Monkey
    • An accusation frequently thrown at the promotion by detractors, sometimes justifiably in the cases of Jack Evans and Matt Cross. Incidentally, ROH was home to the Special K stable, which served as a Lampshade Hanging on the concept - their gimmick was that they were a bunch of barely-trained and coked out kids who could do nothing but fancy flips.
    • There was also an incident involving Teddy Hart showing off everything wrong with the style - see the Spot Monkey page for details.
    • Don't call The Young Bucks spot monkeys, it'll only make them do more spots.
    • Broken Matt Hardy reluctantly released the reigns on Brother Nero's spot monkey tendencies when his successful but premature challenge for the world tag team titles caused them to be inserted into The Young Bucks vs Roppongi Vice street fight at the fifteenth anniversary. He didn't bother picking them back up either, as The Bucks Of Youth wanted a ladder match at Supercard Of Honor XI
  • Squash Match
    • Rasche Brown had a lot of these in 2010 but Takeshi Morishima became infamous for what were dubbed "extended squashes", particularly a match where he beat up BJ Whitmer for nearly fifteen minutes. During the Morishima era Larry Sweeny introduced fans to Tank Toland by having him give such a squash to Mitch Franklin...which was then overshadowed by the afformentioned Whitmer match.
    • Also when ROH got a show on HD Net, a few Ohio Valley Wrestlers ended up on the wrong end of mercifully short squashes.
  • Start My Own: In 2001, All Pro Wrestling held the second "King Of Indies" event. The guys at RF video happened to be among those who saw it and after doing so, decided not only did they want their own, they wanted an entire promotion just like it. It's no coincidence most of the KOI field became part of ROH's roster, including the three founding fathers Low Ki, winner American Dragon and Christopher Daniels.
  • Strictly Formula: Due to the promotion having a lot of well balanced (to the point of being generic at times) wrestlers, a lot of their matches have a very similar structure, around five minutes at the beginning of the wrestlers locking up and exchanging amateur throws and pins, then one wrestler starts using high impact maneuvers, both wrestlers will work a body part as they trade momentum this all concludes with a series of near-falls with a climactic finish. Which is a nice structure...if they don't use it. All. The. Time. Roderick Strong is especially guilty of this.
  • Stunned Silence
    • ROH All Star Extravaganza VI, Jay Briscoe defeats Michael Elgin in his hometown to become the second man to win the World title belt twice and cuts Elgin's reign before it even reaches three months. Most fans did not know whether to cheer or boo, leaving the Mattamy Athletic Centre almost silent.
    • Nigel McGuinness, who was on commentary during the 2016 Death Before Dishonor, had this twice. First at the sight of the bloody slabs of broken table resulting from Adam Page's match with Jay Briscoe, then when Adam Cole decided to hit Jay Lethal with two last shots in route to becoming the third two time ROH World Champion.
  • Suspiciously Specific Denial: Tank Toland, notable for being a dwarf of a wrestler with an outrageously muscular physique that everybody knew was steroid-enhanced, turned the "Ste-roids!" chants into an Insult Backfire by proclaiming himself an "All-Natural Superior Athlete!"
  • Tag Line: Creating Excellence
  • Tag Team
    • Da Hit Squad, Natural Born Sinners, The Backseat Boyz, The Murder City Machine Guns, The Strong Style Thugs, The Havana Pitbulls, You Can Call Me Al, The Dark City Fight Club, Wrestling's Greatest Tag Team, Alabama Attitude, reDRagon, Forever Hooligans, The Young Bucks (AKA, Generation Me), Adrenalin Rush, The C&C Wrestle Factory, The Addiction and Outlaw Inc... ROH has called its tag team division the deepest in the world and throughout the 2010s its teams dominated the IWGP Junior Heavyweight tag division. The Briscoes also made their way into the six man and heavyweight divisions.
    • Downplayed in scramble matches, which follow the Mexican rules of anyone being allowed to enter the ring so long as their partner is not inside of it, making tags less important. That is unless more than two teams are involved, then anyone allowing to tag in and out to anyone else makes tags more important. Tags are also unnecessary under 'Dragon Gate Rules'.
  • Tag Team Twins: The Boys who work for Dalton Castle and The Beer City Bruiser. They only entered a wrestling role after being forced to by Silas Young but later became Six Man Tag champions alongside Castle.
  • Take That!
    • Subtly in the HD net stretch, but if you know Ring Of Honor's history you know exactly what taglines such as "The Real Wrestling Alternative" or "We Don't Imitate, We Innovate" are referring to.
    • At ROH Gold Rush in 2010, Jim Cornette came out after the dark matches to announce that the fans had a role to play, and that it was very simple. When the camera turns on, chant "ROH, ROH", which is what the RoHbots do anyway. This was a take that to TNA telling its fans they had a role to play after they booed Hulk Hogan and chanted "We want six!".
    • In a shot at WWE for releasing Bryan Danielson, the trailers for Death before Dishonor VIII intimated that PPV is not rated PG and showed a footage of guy getting strangled by a tie.
    • The crowds have been known to chant "Fuck The Divas" during SHIMMER matches (incidentally, these chants never breakout on SHIMMER's own shows, traditionally having a more family friendly atmosphere than ROH) though there is usually a catalyst for it, the most appropriate perhaps being when "The Anti-Diva" Serena Deeb returned, following her WWE release, to back up Sara Del Rey against Daizee Haze and Amazing Kong at Final Battle 2010.
  • Talk Show with Fists: Colt Cabana's "Good Friends, Great Memories"; "Sweet N Sour" Larry Sweeney's "The Sweet Shop", Bobby Fish's "Fish Tank"
  • Tall Poppy Syndrome: The Decade started as three guys who had been with the company for a decade who were upset the ROH fans were celebrating the careers of people who left the company. Petty resentment to be sure, especially considering the alternative but one can understand why they would feel that way, especially since Roderick Strong gave up a contract with a larger company to continue working for ROH. Then they started attacking promising and or popular rookies on the grounds they were only using Ring Of Honor to springboard into larger companies, putting them beyond mere resentment.
  • The Cracker: Subverted with The Age Of The Fall, who had underlings who had infiltrated the ROH tech and production crews. Played straight when Kevin Steen made the website play his videos, Marty Scurll inserted a promo into one of Kevin Kelly's updates and Broken!Matt Hardy crashed the ROH lighting system before putting his face on the Hammerstein jumbotron.
  • The Remnant: After the end of both Special K and Lacey's Angels, Cheech and Cloudy would continue on as "Up In Smoke". A subversion comes in that they turned face though.
  • The Unintelligible: Delirious
  • Third Movie Goes To Asia: The third Ring Of Honor Champion took the title to Europe and declared it the Ring Of Honor World title, defending it in promotions based in the United Kingdom and Germany. Generation Next did the same with the tag team titles and actually did so in Asia. Roderick Strong also declared the FIP Heavyweight Championship a World Title belt after successfully defending against Pac while ROH was in the UK.
  • Trash the Set: A sign the CZW "invasion", which started as little more than Chris Hero and Necro Butcher running their mouths, had actually gotten serious was when the CZW wrestlers actually destroyed the ROH ring.
  • Three Month Rule: Shockingly, ROH does not use this rule, at least regarding feuds. Continuity is surprisingly strong for professional wrestling, and Evil Is One Big, Happy Family nearly never comes into play.
  • Time to Unlock More True Potential
    • Davey Richards got his groove back by training with NWA Champion Dan The Beast Severn.
    • Kyle O'Reilly and Bobby Fish claim Shayna Baszler was the mastermind of reDRagon which she in turned credited to the training the three of them had been through. Still, The Reveal was her interfering when The Young Bucks were going to beat them for the tag team titles.
  • Title Drop: On ROH's traditional pay-per-views, there was never a show where Prazak and Leonard did this not. Joe Dombrowski reprised this during "Salvation."
  • Took a Level in Badass
    • After being the Butt-Monkey of the No Remorse Corps and experiencing Badass Decay as a result, Davey Richards is not to be fucked with in 2010.
    • Can also apply to his tag partner, Eddie Edwards. Existing mainly as a jobber in 2007 and 2008, Eddie joined up with Davey as the American Wolves in early 2009. He quickly went from bland nobody to total badass, culminating in a legendary weekend where he broke his elbow on Friday, then wrestled a ladder match the next night. The ROH fanbase were completely won over by that, and Edwards has had an amazing 2010, becoming the first Television Champion.
      • This culminated with Edwards winning his first ROH World title on March 19, 2011, also becoming the first ever recognized Triple Crown Champion in Ring of Honor.
      • On June 26, 2011, both men met in the main event of Best in the World 2011 for the World Title. It was an epic, 36 minute Match of the Year candidate that showed just how effective that level they took was.
  • Toothy Issue: Jim Cornette and Jimmy Jacobs damaged teeth working here. Julius Smokes just has toothy issues. Mark Briscoe has missing teeth and the Briscoes would mock Team Ambition, stating "Terry Funk ain't wear no mouth piece! Bruiser Brody ain't wear no mouthpiece!" The Briscoes have also broken one of Alex Shelley's teeth.
  • Tournament Arc
    • Many, though the Field Of Honor and Round Robin Challenge are specifically based on All Japan Pro Wrestling's Round Robins, as you can tell from the name of the latter.
    • Other recurring ones are Survival Of The Fittest, Top Prospect and Trio/Tag Wars(depending on if the teams are two or three).
    • The Decade Of Excellence limited to those who have been with the company for ten years, though an exception was made for Chris Sabin, who had been on and off for ten years.
  • Two-Part Episode: In response to fan demand for more shows in 2003, ROH began doing "double shots" where two shows would make up a single event for the weekend.
  • Villain Episode
    • Honor vs. Evil for SCUM.
    • Downplayed example with "A Night Of Hoopla", where the House Of Truth did successfully make themselves the center of attention but were much nicer, and sillier about it than usual.
    • Undisputed Legacy, a night dedicated to the son of the son of a plumber became one when Cody cheated Jay Lethal at Final Battle and joined Bullet Club in the lead up.
  • Villainous Legacy: Lacey's Angels were largely made up of Special K's gone sober (Izzy, Deranged, Cloudy, Cheech) starting with The Lovely Lacey herself. After Lacey did away with her former associates, she brought in The Forgotten (what Jimmy Jacobs and BJ Whitmer would come to be known as). When Lacey's Angels fell further apart it lead into The Age Of The Fall. As Jimmy Jacobs went on to found S.C.U.M. and Decade, while S.C.U.M. centerpiece Matt Hardy helped The Kingdom during their feud with Elgin and the Briscoes, one can trace a successive line of power stables terrorizing Ring Of Honor for the majority of its existence, even though most of the original Special K members either turned face or had nothing to do with the latter groups. It's actually kind of strange that a bunch of drugged out, rich kid Spot Monkeys would have a longer lasting impact on ROH than any other stable during that time, including the Prophecy.
  • Weak, but Skilled
    • How many of the wrestlers are billed due to the fact that the roster is much smaller, on average, than WWE's. Bryan Danielson and Jimmy Jacobs were probably the epitome of the trope, both being average (Danielson) or tiny (Jacobs) but eschewing the high-flying tactics of most wrestlers their size. Kyle O'Reilly is another(tall but lanky) who stands out for actively pursuing larger wrestlers and usually being paired with any mixed martial artists who stop through.
    • Jushin Thunder Liger, draws attention to this trope when the larger wrestlers mock the petite Cheeseburger, insisting he will train him to be skilled enough to make up for the difference...it doesn't but he's no longer someone the rest of the locker room can walk over and has beaten some larger wrestlers.
  • Wham Episode
    • 5/22/2004 - Generation Next: Alex Shelley, Austin Aries, Jack Evans, and Roderick Strong all made their debuts by destroying Special K, The Christopher Street Connection, The Ring Crew Express, John Walters, and Jimmy Rave. They also had enough in them to beat Special K in a trios match, and then the team of the Briscoes, Walters, and Rave in an eight-man tag later on.
    • 2/17/2007 - Fifth Year Festival: Philadelphia - Takeshi Morishima unseats Homicide to become the new ROH World Champion less than two months after Homicide's title win at Final Battle 2006.
    • The Unscripted shows fall into this - Unscripted: The Prophecy wins all of the belts on ROH with Xavier defeating Low Ki for the World Title, and Christopher Daniels and Donovan Morgan defeating Michael Modest and Bryan Danielson to become the first ever Tag Champions. Unscripted II has the one night return of CM Punk. Unscripted 3: Jimmy Jacobs scores a clean win over Bryan Danielson.
  • Wham Line: "I AM THE DEVIL HIMSELF, AND ALL YOU STUPID, MINDLESS PEOPLE FELL FOR IT!"
  • Who's Laughing Now?: The transition from The Cabinet to The Rebellion was based on the fact Kenny King thought ROH fans weren't taking them seriously because management was deliberately making them look bad. They first started with attacks on random wrestlers (Motor City Machine Guns, Donovan Dijak), then started targeting fan favorites (Lio Rush) and management favorites (Jay White).
  • Wrestling Doesn't Pay: The Briscoes are wrestling chicken farmers. D-line are wrestling football players (which, to be fair, is pretty common. Bison, Moose and Mike Orlando were simply former football players). Veda Scott is a wrestling lawyer. Sonny Kiss is a wrestling cheerleader.
  • Wrestling Psychology: Critics have always said Ring Of Honor showcased kids fresh out of wrestling academies who haven't learned their psychology because that can only be learned first hand in the ring. Of course, one of the main reasons for the promotion's existence was to showcase the best wrestlers in the world, always having a good sampling of veteran talent. Mainstays of the ROH roster included plenty who had been wrestling for a decade or longer, e.g. Chris Hero, Claudio Castagnoli, Davey Richards, Eddie Edwards, Colt Cabana, Christopher Daniels, Roderick Strong, Homicide, El Generico, Kenny King, Rhett Titus, Steve Corino, Shelton Benjamin and Charlie Haas, and the Briscoes. Still Dave Meltzer has long maintained that all ROH main events are "one or two kick outs too many" from a great match, in that there tends to be a ludicrous series of near falls before the final pin.
  • The X of Y: Supercard Of Honor
  • You Are Fat: Delirious to Todd Sinclair, Nigel McGuinness and Davey Richards to Kevin Steen, the fans to Matt Hardy.
  • You Wanna Get Sued?: Faye Jackson got reprimanded on Reality Check Radio for trying to hype the debut of Cody Rhodes at Final Battle, as neither ROH nor Cody have the rights to his last name at the time.

Alternative Title(s): ROH

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