Ian Riccaboni On His Future With ROH

By now news that ROH was indeed purchased by AEW President, founder and CEO, Tony Khan is of course old, but the future of the company—the nuts and bolts of how it will proceed—is still in question. As it turns out, even long time company announcer and analyst, Ian Riccaboni is unsure of just where it’s going exactly…even his very own future with the brand under its new owner is in question, apparently.

Riccaboni’s Wikipedia page states that he is still signed with ROH and of course he was at Supercard Of Honor on Mic duties, where he shines and has shined from week to week with ROH since 2014; he’s a definite fan favorite.

While the company was in limbo after the announced 2021 hiatus, he made many appearances for Impact Wrestling. After all, many of the Impact Championships were contested in that company until news of the purchase by Tony Khan was made official by the man himself on Dynamite quite a few weeks back.

But just what does the future hold for Riccaboni? He spoke in detail about what his and the company’s future looks like and alluded to the fact that it’s a big question mark, even for himself. He made the following statements while speaking on the Wrestling Perspective Podcast:

“I haven’t talked to the man himself, I’ll say that…I think there’s one guy that knows what’s going on. And aside from ‘How you doing? Very nice to meet you. Appreciate what you’re doing, excited to see where it’s going,’ I haven’t had the opportunity to sit down with him…

One of the weird quirks of everything is I’m the last person to be under Ring of Honor contract with Sinclair Broadcast. And I still am. So no one knows kind of what my contract entails. If it comes with the sale. It hasn’t been established yet if Sinclair is going to buy me out; if they cancel it; if Tony Khan gets it if he wants to take it as is…

To be very clear, it’s a contract that’s performer friendly and it’s company friendly. There’s some easy outs. So I don’t anticipate getting essentially money for nothing for too much longer…

But that being said, I’ve talked to folks in Tony Khan’s orbit and I’ve let them know my phone is on and that I’d love to be a part of what’s going on. I’ve done my best to put that bug in their ear, as much as I can without being annoying and without being a pain in the butt. But I know the squeaky wheel gets the grease…

So you’ve got to make sure they know you’re out there and that you want to do it, and that there’s no weird feelings or anything like that. For me, I’m just keeping my voice in the ears of what I think might be the right people at this point, and they told me to keep my phone on too. There looks to be some sort of mutual, at least on a small level, maybe a mutual interest to see where it goes…

In terms of plans? I only know what Tony Khan has said at the press conferences, that he does intend it to be a continuation of the program, that the storylines and the history of Ring of Honor is going to continue, kind of where it left off…We saw that Supercard, there were stories that continued and the titles continued as is…

It’ll be interesting to see where it picks up. Personally, I’m hoping that it’s a weekly TV show. For me, selfishly, it’d be really cool if it taped once a month, so I get as much time with my kids as possible. But I’m willing to listen on just about anything…

Ring of Honor, like I said, half my adult life has been with specifically Ring of Honor. It’s the first company that ever gave me a break; it’s the first company that truly put me on national TV. I’d love to continue. There seems to be a lot of people that put a lot of effort into it in less than favorable circumstances…

I’m just hoping all of those people, myself included, get a shot with an ownership that cares about it, that is willing to sink some money into it, that is able to maybe appreciate it in different ways than the previous group had.”

via Ian Riccaboni /Wrestling Inc. (Transcription)

The championship reigns over at ROH have changed considerably in recent months, except for at the very top. Jonathan Gresham is holding steady as the ROH World Champion; Minoru Suzuki is the World Television Champ. AEW pro wrestler, Wheeler Yuta nabbed the ROH Pure Championship and FTR took the World Tag Titles from the Briscoes.

The infamous ROH 6-Man Tag Team Championship is still in question…as Vincent, Bateman and Dutch won those titles at Final Battle quite a few months back, but now Vincent is in contract over at Impact Wrestling, which of course brings us to the women’s world ROH championship…

That title was held by Deonna Purrazzo and still kind of is, as she never lost it. At Supercard Of Honor, Purrazzo was unable to defend her ROH Women’s title against Willow Nightingale, but Mercedes Martinez stepped in and took the title and is currently considered the ‘interim ROH women’s champion’…a bit of a sore subject for many but I digress.

And that’s no knock on Martinez, who absolutely deserves this honor, but to have seen her face Purrazzo one-on-one would have been glorious to say the least. Hope it happens down the line for both their sakes.

So yeah, in the end a lot needs to be worked out with ROH and we’ll just have to stay tuned to see where all of this goes, dear readers.

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