Ring of Honor has the most loyal and passionate fans in professional wrestling – and has come up with something special to thank everyone for nearly two decades of unwavering support. On Sunday, February 9th at Baltimore’s UMBC Event Center, Ring of Honor Wrestling presents Free Enterprise, a live event featuring the best professional wrestlers on the planet that is absolutely FREE to attend.
Free Enterprise is an extension of the ongoing #ROHCares initiative in which ROH gives back to the community. This program has seen top stars regularly visit children’s hospitals and has provided veterans with free tickets to live events through a partnership with Vet Tix. Now ROH is giving all professional wrestling fans the ultimate opportunity to feel the ROH Experience in its hometown of Baltimore, MD, absolutely FREE.
Two heated personal rivalries will explode in one tag match when ROH World Champion PCO and Marty Scurll of Villain Enterprises face RUSH and NWA World Champion Nick Aldis in the main event of Free Enterprise. The tag match on the free show marks just the second time the ROH World Champion and NWA World Champion will be on opposite sides of the ring.
After PCO won the ROH World Title from RUSH at Final Battle on December 13, their championship rematch in Atlanta on Jan. 11 ended in chaos. PCO won the match by disqualification, but he was left lying by RUSH and fellow La Faccion Ingobernable members Dragon Lee and Kenny King.
During the post-match melee between Villain Enterprises and LFI, Aldis entered the ring masquerading as a police officer and got in a cheap shot on Villain Enterprises’ Flip Gordon. Aldis crashed ROH’s Honor Reigns Supreme broadcast the next night in Concord, N.C., and explained that he got involved as payback for Scurll showing up on the NWA’s pay-per-view last month.
The issue between Scurll and Aldis dates back to last April when Scurll unsuccessfully challenged Aldis for the NWA World Title. RUSH has made it clear that he would rather be teaming with Lee or King in this match than Aldis, but ROH matchmakers gave him no choice.
Two of the best all-around competitors in pro wrestling will face each other for the first time in a singles match when “Overkill” Mark Haskins meets Alex Shelley at Free Enterprise. The free show at UMBC Event Center is loaded with exciting, star-studded matchups, but it shouldn’t surprise anyone if Haskins and Shelley steal the show.
Haskins, coming off a huge win over Bully Ray in a Street Fight at Final Battle on December 13, has dedicated himself to winning the ROH World Title in 2020. Haskins has defeated some of the top stars in pro wrestling during his 13-year career, and he came within an eyelash of beating then-ROH World Champion Matt Taven for the title last year. He has another shot at the ROH World Title at Bound By Honor in St. Louis on February 29 when he faces champion PCO and RUSH in a Triple Threat Match.
Shelley, a former ROH World Tag Team Champion and three-time former IWGP Junior Heavyweight Champion, has been wrestling for half his life despite being just 36. He returned to the ring last summer after a hiatus of more than a year and showed that he hadn’t lost a step. Since his return to ROH, Shelley has defeated Jonathan Gresham and Colt Cabana, and he nearly beat then-ROH World Champion Matt Taven for the title.
Brody King returns to singles action for the first time in more than four months when he faces Rey Horus. The only time King and Horus have been in an ROH ring together was on January 11 in Atlanta, when the trio of Horus, Bandido and Flamita upset Villain Enterprises (King, Marty Scurll and Flip Gordon) to win the ROH World Six-Man Tag Team Title.
King has wrestled almost exclusively in traditional tag and six-man tag matches since signing with ROH at the end of 2018, but he’s also an accomplished singles competitor. He showed what he can do on his own when he faced Jeff Cobb at Death Before Dishonor in September, as he took the former ROH World Television Champion to the limit in an awesome match that could have gone either way.
Although Horus is giving up eight inches in height and 120 pounds in weight to the 6-foot-5, 285-pound King, the luchador’s spectacular high-flying moves and speed make him a threat to win every time he steps in the ring. He’s coming off a successful weekend in which he defeated Andrew Everett the night after he, Bandido and Flamita won the six-man tag belts.
A huge tag match pitting Bandido and Flamita against Jay and Mark Briscoe has been signed for Free Enterprise. This bout, which is part of the free show at UMBC Event Center, will be just the second-ever meeting between the two teams, and the first in an ROH ring. Bandido and Flamita, collectively known as MexaBlood, defeated the Briscoes in a match promoted by The Crash in Mexico in 2018.
Bandido and Flamita will enter the match in Baltimore with a lot of momentum. Along with Rey Horus, they won the ROH World Six-Man Tag Team Title from Villain Enterprises in Atlanta on January 11. Bandido and Flamita also defeated Villain Enterprises’ Marty Scurll and Flip Gordon in a tag match at Final Battle on December 13.
After the Briscoes had their 11th ROH World Tag Team Title reign ended in controversial fashion by Jay Lethal and Jonathan Gresham at Final Battle, Dem Boys from Sandy Fork, Del., are extremely motivated to show everyone why they still are the measuring stick in the tag team competition.
Will “business be boomin’” when Slex makes his highly anticipated ROH debut at Free Enterprise? Or will Villain Enterprises’ Flip Gordon make it a bad first day on the job for the Australian star? “The Business” Slex will be looking to hit the ground running when he faces Gordon at the free show in Baltimore, but “The Mercenary” has made it clear that he’s nobody’s stepping stone.
Slex has been a pro wrestler for more than half his life even though he’s just 33. The Melbourne native is a two-time Melbourne City Wrestling Heavyweight Champion, and he also has competed for New Japan Pro-Wrestling. Gordon has been on a roll in singles competition, having scored recent victories over Tracy Williams, Rey Horus and Flamita.
Jeff Cobb and Dan Maff have set their sights on the ROH World Tag Team Championship, and they’ll have an opportunity to earn a title shot when they face champions Jay Lethal and Jonathan Gresham in a Proving Ground Match at Free Enterprise.
If Cobb and Maff defeat the champions or take them to a time-limit draw when they meet at the free show at UMBC Event Center, they will receive a title match at a later date. Cobb and Maff have only been teaming together since mid-December, but the no-nonsense duo has demonstrated the makings of a dominant team.
Lethal and Gresham, who dethroned 11-time champions Jay and Mark Briscoe at Final Battle on December 13, joined forces with Cobb and Maff to win an eight-man tag match on January 12, but Lethal and Gresham exchanged words with Cobb and Maff after the bout.
The entertaining team of Dalton Castle and Joe Hendry tangle with the disturbing team of Vincent and Bateman at Free Enterprise. Castle and Hendry have shown flashes of being an outstanding team, but they’ve achieved mixed results because they haven’t always been on the same page. That’s to be expected, as the two talented individuals have only been teaming together for a relatively short time, and they started off on the wrong foot with each other when Hendry debuted in ROH. Conversely, there’s no doubt that Vincent and Bateman are of the same mindset. The sinister Vincent is hell-bent on turning Ring of Honor into the Ring of Horror, and his bizarre followers — Bateman, Chuckles the Clown and Vita Von Starr — unquestionably dig what he’s saying.
The stakes couldn’t be higher for the battle royal at Free Enterprise, as the winner will receive a future shot at the ROH World Championship. No competitors have been announced for the battle royal on the free show at UMBC Event Center, but ROH officials said there will be surprise entrants in addition to top ROH stars.
ROH matchmakers are wasting no time putting newcomer Session Moth Martina to the test, as the charismatic star from Ireland’s debut match with the company will be against former Women of Honor World Champion Sumie Sakai at Free Enterprise.
Until a few weeks ago, a bout between Martina and Sakai would’ve been a matchup of fan favourites, but that’s no longer the case due to Sakai’s shocking attitude change. Sakai turned on tag partner Nicole Savoy in Atlanta on January 11 and then used a chain to defeat Savoy the next night in Concord, N.C. The message was crystal clear: No more nice Sumie. Martina loves to have a good time and entertain the fans, and she undoubtedly wants to make an impact in her ROH debut. But she’ll need to be ready for anything when she faces Sakai, who now is more dangerous than ever. Will the beer-swilling Martina start off her ROH career with a win?
Fans can expect a plethora of high-risk manoeuvres when Alex Zayne and Andrew Everett meet for the first time in a one-on-one match at Free Enterprise. Zayne made a huge first impression with ROH fans when he scored a shocking upset win over Bandido in Atlanta on January 11. Zayne, who debuted on the independent wrestling scene in 2005, created a buzz last summer when a video of him executing a 630 senton over the top rope that put his opponent through a door during a Game Changer Wrestling event went viral. On the same show that Zayne defeated Bandido, Everett made his first appearance in ROH since 2018. Everett, a 2014 Top Prospect Tournament semifinalist, had a good showing in defeat that night against ROH World Television Champion Dragon Lee.
Free Enterprise is available for free for Honor Club members on Honor Club platform and Fite TV. It will air live at 8 PM GMT.
All pics courtesy of Ring of Honor