One thing that was impressive was Shawn though. After Triple H got hurt he carried that match like it was 10 years ago.
I vote for Dolph Ziggler as the MVP of the pay-per-view. His match with Kurt Angle was the match of the night, in my book, and I was delighted that he went over. He got fucking hosed in the finals, though. Shane McMahon has no business beating Dolph Ziggler, especially in 2 minutes and 35 seconds, even if Ziggler had already gone through two previous opponents.
My guess is that The Miz thought he couldn’t beat Ziggler, and didn’t want to get fired, so he faked an injury. I thought they were going to bring out Miz’s last opponent, Rey Mysterio, to lose to Ziggler, and put Shane in the unenviable position of having to fire Rey.
The WWE Title match was awesome, and the Universal Title match was fucking awful. Can we get rid of Brock Lesnar already? He adds absolutely nothing to the company. I liked him better in his first run with WWE, when he was allowed (willing?) to do more than just spam the same two moves over and over. (And this time, he didn’t even bother with the second move; he just spammed F-5s.)
DX vs. Brothers of Destruction was good. Michaels carried the match well. He needs to grow his hair back, though; he looks like a cancer patient.
my god ………im reading about the crown jewel… sounds like it was a stinking pile of dog ……… in flames
lesnar cant do more than 2 or 3 big moves anymore … all that intestinal surgery ………
As I summed it up on another forum, what we got was essentially a house show paid for by a muderous theocracy and hosted by an elderly racist, where the top babyfaces refused to perform, the biggest face on the card got squashed by a part-timer in two minutes, a man who’s lost three straight title shots somehow got a fourth (which he lost), the boss’ middle-aged son was named best wrestler in the world by winning a tournament he wasn’t in, nothing happened that will matter two weeks from now, and the main event was a rematch from a “last match ever” where the youngest competitor was 49 and had to let three men in their 50s (one of them being an elected official) carry the match after injuring himself.
The whole thing was a train wreck and if WWE wasn’t run by a stubborn and out-of-touch septuagenarian from North Carolina it would have been scrapped as soon as the Khashoggi stuff hit the fan.
(PS: Yes, I said North Carolina. Vince likes to portray himself as a Connecticut blue-blood because of who his father was, but his father wasn’t there when he was a boy, and he was born and raised in a trailer park in Pinehurst, NC. Knowing that explains a lot about him.)
He’s fought twice in UFC since his surgery and is apparently training for a third. I don’t think that’s the reason.
Hey, don’t blame my state for Vince. Trailer parks are trailer parks in any state. Vince went to East Carolina University, which is mainly a party college. If you remain sober enough, you get a teacher’s degree. Vince became Vince all on his own.
That being said, I still haven’t seen Crown Jewel and think I’ll take a pass on it.
Good call, Knowed Out. Smapti got it right. It was a big market house show with some atrocious booking, especially pissing all over the World Cup at the end. Before I could even finish complaining about Lesnar/Strohman they tried to make me forget all about it with significantly worse booking. Best thing WWE could do was to pretend, beginning Monday, that this show never happened. Never mention the Cup. But that won’t happen. They’ll build a Miz vs. Shane angle out of it. Hopefully they’ll take the tag titles off of The Shield real quick and let Rollins carry the brand as Intercontinental Champion. But we all know that ain’t happening.
OK, I gotta give RoH some serious props. Bully Ray serves as their top heel, and provides some intense drama in the role. He’s really fucking despicable. He treats the “young lions” of the company like they’re spoiled scum who have no idea what toughness is like he does. His closest ally is Silas “Real Man” Young, who’s had the same gimmick for years, but Bully magnified it to a factor of 10. Bully’s so shitty, he even treats Silas like dirt. He doesn’t want anybody around him to feel good about themselves.
In his current angle, he’s feuding with Flip Gordon, who’s an apple-cheeked high-flyer army guy. Screams babyface who makes both kids and smarks pop. Bully proposed that they have a match where they each choose a guy. Whoever’s guy wins gets to do whatever he wants to the opponent. Bully chose Silas to represent him. Flip didn’t reveal his rep until the match started. When he came out, he went over to the announcers and made it look like he was choosing Colt Cabana. Bully got on the mike and said “Are you serious? This guy’s a loser!” Colt replied “I’m not his representative. I just wanted to see the look on your face up close and personal when he announces who it really is!”
The lights went out. Then they came back on and Holy Shit it’s Sandman! The guy’s like 60 and has a beer belly, but he still knows how to put on a show and get the crowd excited. He used the Singapore cane on Silas and beat him down, then laid a ladder on him and slammed a moonsault from the top corner onto his trapped opponent for a huge pop! However, Silas persevered and won the match. Bully announced that he was considering going easy on Flip, but bringing Sandman in meant no fucking way. Flip’s punishment would be 10 lashes with the Singapore cane.
Back from commercial break, RoH had a notice saying they edited certain parts of the following to be airable for TV. They didn’t show any shots of Bully hitting Flip directly on the back. They instead showed Flip from the front as Bully hit him from behind. It *still *looked painful. Bully wasn’t even hitting in the “safe” zones. He hit Flip in the back of the head a couple times. Other wrestlers came out to support Flip, like Cody and the Young Bucks. Bully would get on the mic after a few whacks and tell Flip he would stop and leave Flip alone. All Flip had to do was say “I quit.” Flip replied “Never.” A few whacks later, Bully asked again. Flip said “<bleep> you!”
Bully was still determined to be as big a prick as possible, like he was catering the Red Wedding. When Flip braced for the 10th whack, Bully instead elbowed him in the nuts and scampered out of the ring. Damnation, did that ever put Flip Gordon over. He showed he could take some serious abuse and wasn’t just a pretty boy flyer. That was a really gripping storyline. RoH deserves more than a one hour show.
Whoops, substitute “Kendo stick” for “Singapore cane.” I got my whippers confused.
Actually, War Games predates Survivor Series by a few months; besides, War Games had 10 men wrestling all at once, whereas a “Survivor Series match” is a straightforward 10-man elimination tag match. (There was a time when a 10-man tag was so rare that it was on a WWF tape called “Wrestling’s Strangest Matches,” along with a women’s battle royal. I’m pretty sure the tape is available to view on WWE Network.)
They might mention it once or twice, and maybe get a match out of it, but I don’t see Shane doing anything long-term. The cup might be in some background shots somewhere, similar to the cactus plant.
After Cormier’s win on Saturday, he called out Lesnar, and now there are rumors that Cormier wants Brock as his retirement match. Then again, if it happens, most likely it’s in early March, although there is one scheduled for Royal Rumble night (there are two more before then, but they already have main events announced), and then one in Melbourne two weeks later.
And I missed the show, but is it true that (a) the commentary was done from a studio rather than ringside, (b) they never mentioned this on the air, and (c) it, well, maybe, just possibly, there’s a chance that, it had something to do with the combination of words “Renee Young” and “Saudi Arabia”?
Nope, Renee Young, dressed all in black, was at the ringside announce table for Crown Jewel, and I’m as surprised as you are.
Sadly, I may be partially correct. Wrestling Observer is reporting the idea is for Shane to turn heel and be more involved. I guess that, in Vince’s eyes, crappy booking constantly burying your best performers and characters isn’t what WWE needs to correct. Smackdown just needs more McMahon. 
After Cormier won the title in July, Brock got in the cage, shoved him and cut a promo. His suspension from the last time he fought doesn’t end until the beginning of January, and Cormier is still planning to retire on his 40th birthday towards the end of March. So if it’s going to happen, that’s the window.
I just have to blab more about the RoH episode mentioned above.
See, Bully Ray, unlike other heels, doesn’t ever get his comeuppance. The faces may spoil his plans, but he still manages to get off a “fuck you” attack before leaving. He’s yet to get a proper beat-down for his actions. He doesn’t do anything to make him likeable. He even treats Silas Young like shit and blames him when his plans don’t succeed.
I’m sure wrestlers are trained to take weapon shots, but in some cases they’ll totally eat the damage. Abyss and Cactus Jack will fall on tacks and barbed wire, for instance. In most cases, they at least have clothing to mitigate the damage. Flip was taking those cane shots unprotected. He of course sold the pain, which I guess he didn’t have to work too hard to do. He had genuine welts on his back, and Bully was doing his best to draw out the process and make the audience cringe with each strike. It was like a Game of Thrones episode, where the villain enjoys drawing out the torture. Flip has only been in RoH for a few months, and he’s already sacrificing himself. He’s also half Bully’s size, so he looks even more abused, and Bully adds to the effect with constant taunting. Only LU has matched this level of intensity.
BEKKEH BEKKEH I’ll play with you! hiss hiss I’ll play wit ya…
Nikki Cross has finally arrived to SD and things just got more surreal!
I finally had a free night and could watch wrestling for once!
Glad to see Nikki on the main roster, although it’s a wonder she didn’t get called up when the rest of Sanity did, but Sanity has done jack shit on the main roster and, frankly, Nikki didn’t do too terribly much more in NXT so whaddyagonnado?
I’m still oddly in love with her though, she’s quickly climbing the ranks…
I’ll admit, I marked when the Sanity music hit and it became obvious that Nikki was coming. Too bad she had to job in her debut. They couldn’t throw Lana out there for that? Or have Nikki destroy Lana? There’s useless on the roster.
There’s not too many heel women in SD aside from Becky and the IIconics, so I’m guessing Nikki’s going to accompany sAni+Y in their matches more than wrestle on her own.
Then what’s even the point? Why even HAVE a women’s division then? They only use 5 total girls. I made this comment in a Facebook group I’m a part of, the women have 5 stars, then 10 levels of shit, then the other women. They need to double their roster count and create a real and viable midcard, otherwise they’re the same feuds over and over again and it’s just boring.
I think the problem is, exactly when is this “real and viable midcard” supposed to wrestle without it turning into a bathroom break?