ROH Reveals Claudio Castagnoli's Title Challenger For Death Before Dishonor

Ring of Honor's upcoming pay-per-view, Death Before Dishonor looks to be shaping up to be a big one, and only one match has been announced yet. ROH World Champion Claudio Castagnoli will be defending his title against Mark Briscoe.

The challenge was made, and accepted, during a backstage segment on Thursday's "ROH on HonorClub." Briscoe was at least partially motivated by a video message sent from Eddie Kingston just after he defeated KENTA to win the NJPW Strong Openweight Championship. Kingston will not be able to appear at Death Before Dishonor due to him being part of New Japan Pro-Wrestling's G1 Climax tournament, but he urged Briscoe to challenge Castagnoli in his stead.

"These people need you not to just go after the Ring of Honor Championship," Kingston said. "We need you to win that championship. We need you to have that Briscoe legacy live on."

Mark's late brother, Jay Briscoe, was a two-time ROH World Champion. However, the title eluded Mark and he challenged for it on only a handful of occasions. The last time he had a shot at the ROH World Title was in September 2013 at ROH A New Dawn, where he challenged then-champion Adam Cole.

Castagnoli's second and current reign as the ROH World Champion began after he defeated Chris Jericho at Final Battle in October 2022. His last title defense was against Komander on the June 30 episode of "AEW Rampage."

Death Before Dishonor is slated for Friday, July 21 at the CURE Insurance Arena in Trenton, New Jersey. ROH's last pay-per-view was back in March at Supercard of Honor. On that night Castagnoli successfully defended his championship against Eddie Kingston.