Claudio Castagnoli Captures First World Title At ROH Death Before Dishonor 2022
22-year veteran wins ROH World Championship from Jonathan Gresham during PPV.
Claudio Castagnoli finally reached the mountaintop Saturday night, defeating Jonathan Gresham for the Ring of Honor World Championship at the company's Death Before Dishonor PPV.
The title is Claudio's first world championship victory in a 22-year career that included stints in Chikara, ROH and of course, a decade-plus in WWE.
Competing as Cesaro in WWE, Castagnoli racked up a United States Championship win and became something of a tag team specialist, winning seven tag titles with three different partners: Tyson Kidd, Shinsuke Nakamura and of course Sheamus. He also was the first Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal winner, before it became kickoff show fodder.
Despite wowing fans with feats of strength and unparalleled in-ring ability, Claudio never was seen as more than an upper-midcard wrestler in WWE. He chose to let his contract expire earlier this year, joining AEW as a surprise opponent for New Japan's Zack Sabre Jr. at last month's Forbidden Door PPV.
Castagnoli and Gresham opened Death Before Dishonor with a fine technical display that saw Claudio end his 224-day reign with a Riccola Bomb after about 12 minutes.
#AndNew!!! Your new #ROH World Champion is @ClaudioCSRO!
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Advertisement— ROH - Ring of Honor Wrestling (@ringofhonor) July 24, 2022
That it took nearly 22 years for someone universally praised as much as Claudio to become a world champion is a bit mind-blowing, but he now has the hardware. And as we saw at the end of the ROH PPV, the Blackpool Combat Club has some serious gold with Wheeler Yuta holding the ROH Pure Championship, and of course Jon Moxley still has the Interim AEW World Championship.