Bobby Cruise talks about the news that Ring of Honor will be going on hiatus following Final Battle and reveals he had suspicions the company was headed in this direction before the public announcement was made.
Bobby Cruise has been the Ring of Honor ring announcer for decades and as such had the legacy that is intrinsically tied to that of the promotion. This Saturday, Ring of Honor will present Final Battle: The End of an Era, the final Ring of Honor show before the promotion takes a brief hiatus.
Speaking in an exclusive interview with Sean Ross Sapp, Bobby reveals when he started to have suspicions that things weren't going well for the promotion, revealing that a red flag went up for him when he was told there would be no television following Final Battle.
“I was concerned maybe for a couple of months leading up to it. The reason being with Maria and I producing the women's division, we worked on the September pay-per-view. We worked on the following TV tapings, and then the same thing for November. Once we had all of our women's matches, put together for November, then we said, ‘okay, we need to work on we knew what we were doing for Final Battle with our title match and so forth. Now that Final Battle’s done, we need to work on post-Final Battle TV leading into the new year, and we were told there were no TV tapings after Final Battle. I had not seen that happen before.
Bobby continued, “When I found that out. I was very concerned. Especially because I know the cost and getting everyone to a location, the cost and setting up now that I know this stuff, the production and everything. It's an enormous cost. Yeah. So you would obviously if you were continuing on, have all that setup still there, have all those people still there, and instead of getting one day out of them, you're getting to three days and so forth.When we found out there was no TV tapings following Final Battle, a red flag went up for me. I asked a few questions of the office and didn't really get any answers. I don't think that anyone was keeping anything from me. I honestly think that senior management was trying to work with Sinclair Broadcast Group to get something done. So this wouldn't have happened. But that was probably at least a month before we found out that I was concerned because that didn't make sense to me.”
Ultimately, Bobby Cruise’s worst suspicions were confirmed and Final Battle will be the final Ring of Honor show for at least 6 months. The promotion is expected to return with a re-imagined business strategy.
We will have live coverage of all things Final Battle as it airs on Saturday, December 11, 2021.
