ROH News: Former ECW legends set to team up at this year's Final Battle PPV

What’s the story?

Former ECW originals and WWE legends Bully Ray and Tommy Dreamer are all set to team up for the first time in over one year, as the duo prepares to take on ROH’s elite tag team of Mark and Jay Briscoe, collectively known as The Briscoe Brothers.

Ray and Dreamer will go toe-to-toe against The Briscoe Brothers later this year at ROH’s biggest show of the year called Final Battle.

In case you didn’t know…

Former WWE Tag Team Champion Bully Ray made his debut for Ring of Honor earlier this year, at the company’s Manhattan Mayhem VI event when he saved the Briscoe Brothers and Bobby Fish, from the Bullet Club who were brutally assaulting the trio.

Ray would then go on and start teaming up with Mark and Jay, as the trio had their first match at ROH’s 15th Anniversary show, where they managed to pick up a win over War Machine and Davey Boy Smith Jr.

Within a few weeks time, Bully Ray and The Briscoes won the ROH World Six-Man Tag Team Titles by defeating The Kingdom (Matt Taven, Vinny Marseglia, and TK O’ Ryan). However, after losing their six-man tag team titles to Dalton Castle and The Boys, there seemed to be dissension between The Briscoes and Bully Ray.

In September’s Death Before Dishonor PPV; Bully Ray and The Briscoes had their final match together after they suffered a loss to the Bullet Club (Hangman Page and The Young Bucks). Following the match, Jay Briscoe would turn on Bully Ray and hit him with a nasty table shot to his head, which put Bully Ray’s career in jeopardy as he started teasing a retirement.

The heart of the matter

During this year’s War of the Worlds PPV; Mark Briscoe followed his brother Jay's footsteps and turned heel on Bully Ray by attacking him, and a debuting Tommy Dreamer. Mark was shortly after joined in the ring by his brother Jay, as the duo hit a 3D on Bully Ray through the table.

However, in a recent ROH TV taping in Philadelphia, Bully Ray cut a promo saying that his in-ring career is over, but, despite that he wanted to stick around with the company and help younger talent to improve their in-ring work. The former IWGP Tag Team Champion was interrupted by Jay as the two men started a brawl. Tommy Dreamer and Velvet Sky rushed down to the ring in order to break things up between the two men by separating them from assaulting each other.

Ring of Honor COO Joe Koff would then make the tag team match official between Bully Ray & Tommy Dreamer vs The Briscoe Brothers for this year’s Final Battle PPV.

What’s next?

The two tag teams will now go head-to-head at the Hammerstein Ballroom in Manhattan, New York, come December 15th.

The Briscoes are by far one of the most experienced tag teams on the planet but they should not be taking the team of Dreamer and Ray lightly because the ECW originals are more than capable of putting up a fight.

Author’s Take

The 2017 Final Battle card is starting to shape up really well and with Cody Rhodes, Marty Scurll, and Jay Lethal already announced for the show, we can expect some fireworks on December 15th as ROH could possibly line up the best match card of the year.

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