ROH Final Battle 2025 Post-show Media Scrum: Athena on Her Interest in Wrestling for NJPW, Lee Moriarty on Nigel McGuinness Bringing Original ROH Pure Title, Bandido Injury Update, Netflix Acquiring WBD & Impact on AEW/ROH, Potential All-Womens AEW Event, Zayda Steel

Ring of Honor held a media scrum following Friday’s ROH Final Battle 2025 event at Greater Columbus Convention Center in Columbus, Ohio.

Some of the notable highlights included:

• Similar to the feed during the Zero Hour Pre-show, the early portion of the media scrum was affected by audio issues causing those speaking to barely be heard until it was fixed mid-way into Red Velvet’s portion.
• During her portion of the media scrum, ROH Women’s World Television Champion Red Velvet stated that she was going to beat Mercedes Mone to regain her title and she did. Red Velvet also stated that she had accepted that she would be the underdog going into the match despite being a former champion. Red Velvet also stated that her loss to Mone earlier had shook her but everything happens for a reason.
• Red Velvet also praised Mone for being someone she looked up to growing up and being able to go up against someone like her is “such a blessing.”
• During his portion of the media scrum, AEW National Champion Ricochet was asked if he is considering adding more members to his The Demand stable. Ricochet responded that he cares more about quality over quantity for his group.
• Following some back-and-forth between Ricochet and ROH owner Tony Khan, Khan announced that Ricochet would be defending his AEW National title against a mystery opponent on the Saturday, December 6th episode of AEW Collision.
• During her portion of the media scrum, ROH Women’s World Champion Athena gave her thoughts about her interest in wrestling for New Japan Pro Wrestling to represent ROH as its Women’s World Champion. Athena stated “I would love the opportunity to wrestle for New Japan. I have the privilege of representing Ring of Honor in the Tokyo Dome in a four-way match for an opportunity at any championship, but then I got hit with a baseball bat to my face, but we’re not going to talk about that. It would be an honor. I’ve never gotten to wrestle on Wrestle Kingdom or for New Japan other than that show. There are so many amazing women in STARDOM and around the world with New Japan. I would love the opportunity.“
• During their portion of the media scrum, Shane Taylor Promotions’ Shane Taylor talked about not being happy at how tonight was too close to comfort for his group and how winning is the expectation and not a surprise. Taylor and Lee Moriarty also got into a storyline argument over Taylor also not being happy over how friendly Moriarty was towards Nigel McGuinness during their 30-Minute Iron Man match and claimed that he had to get involved twice to ensure Moriarty didn’t lose. Taylor also grew upset at how Moriarty has become too nice and showing too much respect towards his opponents and claimed nobody showed the same level of respect towards them during their careers.
• On the topic of Nigel McGuinness coming out with the original ROH Pure Championship and handing it to Moriarty in a sign of respect after their match on the show, Moriarty stated “Pure wrestling is a style that I appreciate so much and I feel that is a foundation of Ring of Honor. It’s meant to be what’s in that ring, the sport, the content, the art form of what we do and to see that title in person was so cool and I didn’t know that was here in the building until he walked out with it, and to be able to hold it with my generation’s Ring of Honor Pure Title is such a cool moment that I’ll never forget.“
• During his portion of the media scrum, ROH World Champion Bandido provided an update on his current shoulder injury stating that he did not re-injure his shoulder during the Survival of the Fittest match for his ROH World title. Bandido then showed off his elbow that had a large swollen bump on it and stated that was what he had hurt and would get it checked on to find out the injury situation for it.
• On the topic of the originally planned ROH World title match between RUSH and Bandido, Khan stated that it will still be taking place once RUSH is able to return to in-ring action.
• On the topic of his level of English, Bandido stated that he is putting effort into learning English so that people can understand him better when he speaks it.
• During his portion of the media scrum, ROH owner Tony Khan gave his thoughts about the current plans for more big ROH events next year. Khan stated “This year, I tried to implement on HonorClub more big streaming specials that aren’t necessarily part of the big three pay-per-views that we’ve really had a great run of doing with Supercard of Honor, Death Before Dishonor and Final Battle tonight. We’ve had four of each of those now in my three-year run. We’re starting the cycle going back through, so I’m excited to have Supercard of Honor in 2026 as well as Death Before Dishonor and then one year from now, you (Ian Riccaboni) and I will do it again at Final Battle 2026.”
• On the topic of Netflix getting the winning bid to potentially acquire Warner Bros Discovery, Khan stated “First of all, it’s early to comment on anything that’s pending. Without getting into anything that has yet to be determined, I just want to say we have a great partnership with Warner Brothers Discovery and it will continue for many years to come. We have years left on our remaining agreement with TBS and HBO Max. I’m really proud of what we’ve built and I think it’s going to be for a long time to come. It’s going to be like this with Warner Brothers Discovery before anything is settled out. I’m very excited for the future. I think we have great partnerships. What I can say, from the things that are public knowledge, all of the bidders on Warner Brothers Discovery are media partners of the National Football League and great media partners of ours. Everybody who has been in the running for this is somebody we work with on the NFL, so I have a lot of respect for all of them. We work closely with all three bidders in the mix and we’ll see what happens. I have only positive things to say about Netflix and Warner Brothers Discovery. I can tell you for sure, at least until the very end of 2027, going into 2028, we’re going to be here for years and years to come, over two more years with AEW on TBS, TNT, and HBO Max. I’m very excited about it.“
• On the topic of a potential all-women’s event in the future for AEW, Khan stated “I think certainly having more events that include more and more women’s championships and matches has been fantastic. I think the depth of the women’s wrestling in AEW and ROH has just continued to get better and better… Absolutely. Whatever platform or however it were to happen, there’s a lot of ways it could happen. I mentioned earlier the Global Wars events have been fantastic. Bringing women from all over and have a Global Wars event like that is something I’ve thought about also. Global Wars technically is a streaming special. We don’t call it a pay-per-view but really it all is on the same app and you’re paying for the whole thing the same… Definitely an event, an all-women’s event with women from all over is something I have thought about and again, potentially a Global Wars, bringing women from all over could be great too.“
• On the topic of former WWE ID talent Zayda Steel making her in-ring debut for ROH on the show, Khan stated “She did great tonight. I thought Zayda Steel was excellent. I was really impressed with her. Not only was she tremendous in the ring, but so far, working with her backstage, what a great professional. She does a great job. We were happy to have her here. I look forward to seeing her more. I thought it was a great match with her and Leila Grey. It looked like a lot of respect between the two of them. We’d love to have her back here, whether it’s a rematch against Leila or it looked like they could be a heck of a team. Stay tuned, but I’d love to have Zayda back. She was tremendous.“

Full ROH Final Battle 2025 post-show media scrum video:

Source: F4WOnline.com, Fightful.com 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, & 6