Pro Wrestling Ponderings

It would be easy to write about the world title reign of Nigel McGuinness, but he had the distinction of bringing another title so much prestige, the company felt that no one man could possibly top his title reign. For just under a year, Nigel McGuinness took the Pure wrestling title from a goofy second-tier belt into something that people cared about.

On August 25, 2005, Nigel McGuinness wrestled an ROH legend in Samoa Joe. Joe was the Pure champion and since he had already been a world champion, Joe was trying to add prestige to the Pure championship because of his status. Everyone seemed to expect the same long title reign that had accompanied Joe’s world title reign. It was not meant to be as Nigel McGuinness became the fifth Pure champion in company history.

McGuinness’ title defenses were not very frequent due to lack of challengers and a couple tours to the orient. However, his work as a heel champion who would do anything to retain his title, made him one of the most elite players in the company. Even if the matches were not four star classics, they were at the very least compelling pieces of storyline nirvana. He would defend his title against a wide variety of challengers that included both Ring of Honor world tag team champions and the Ring of Honor world champion. He would also defeat two TNA stars in Joe and Jay Lethal while also defeating a former ECW superstar in Tony Mamaluke.

His most notable rivalry in the first half of his title reign came against Claudio Castagnoli. Castagnoli was brand new to the company and got a huge rub just from narrowly beating McGuinness twice in title matches. Even with a match involving two referees and a climactic battle in New York city, McGuinness found a way. Just as he did in his entire ten month reign.

He was not involved with the CZW feud during any of 2006 but was instead content to just play the foil. That is until a unification match on April 28, 2006 against world champion Bryan Danielson. It was on that night that McGuinness retained his pure title by count-out. The world title could not change on the countout necessitating a rematch on July 29, 2006 where only Danielson’s world title was on the line. McGuinness would lost this match via small package and one more unification match was set up to take place in McGuinness’ home country.

On August 12, 2006 McGuinness lost in his championship in one of the best matches in company history. He had defended the Pure title in a way no one else had. He practically made bad finishes, count-outs, and disqualifications into an art form. In a company founded on the principles of great wrestling with clean finishes, McGuinness defied these things in such a way that it came off across as brilliant instead of eye-rolling.

Perhaps the finest example came in a title defense that took place against Homicide on June 24. Homicide had earned this title chance by helping ROH in the war against CZW back on May 13 against Necro Butcher. With the need for Homcide to once again help the company out against CZW on July 15, it would have only been appropriate to possibly have him as one of their champions, but it was not meant to be. McGuinness and Homicide brawled in the crowd for roughly 18 seconds until McGuinness scrambled into the ring. Homicide also scrambled in one second too late.

McGuinness retained his title but the win created a question in the minds of fans. Would Homicide join Team ROH? We did get our answer three weeks later, but it was the type of storytelling that made ROH such a great company in 2006. And the final story about the pure title did indeed come on August 12 as the greatest Pure champion in history lost his belt to perhaps the best world champion in history.

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