Ariya Daivari vs. Komander opened last week’s ROH on HonorClub from Colorado Springs. Daivari is a member of Ring of Honor’s Premier Athletes stable, which is represented by Jade Cargill’s old AEW manager, Smart Mark Sterling, Esquire. During that bout, Sterling was on the apron barking instructions at Daivari and berating the official when Komander took him out.
The headline and main image give it away, but the bump ends badly for Sterling. Or miraculously well, considering he bounced flat back off
the apron, then ended up perpendicular to the ground so that he landed on the top of his head and forcing his neck to bend in a horrible-looking way.
As these things will, a clip of the bump went viral, often accompanied by some commentary or criticism:
Since he somehow has a relatively clean bill of health, upon realizing his bump did some numbers overnight, Smart Mark went to work. That’s nothing new for Sterling, a veteran of the business, and friend of Matt Cardona & Brian Myers who’s a regular on their Major Wrestling Figure podcast. He had some fun with it:
And shot down someone who wanted to use this as an example of the production mistakes AEW/ROH is often accused of:
Sterling used it to sell some action figures (I mentioned Major Wrestling Figure for a reason, and encourage you to check out Mark’s online work with Dalton Castle and The Outrunners around his figure’s release… it’s fun):
My favorite exchange was this one though…
… gets me every time I read it.
And hey, if you’re gonna almost break your neck, might as well use it to remind folks you’re an entertaining guy with merch to move, right?
