2020 Ongoing MOTY List: Bryan vs. Corbin

39. Daniel Bryan vs. Baron Corbin WWE Smackdown 5/1

ER: I really liked the Corbin/Gulak match last week, and this was even better. This was all about Bryan going after Corbin's leg - not to do any kind of Sell The Leg match, but with a cool MMA strategy of targeting one part of the body to pay dividends the longer a match may go. Bryan had to land at least 20 leg kicks in this one, and all of them were winners. He starts with an early low dropkick that was so precise, and Corbin is a really underrated bumper for those kind of strikes. I loved all of Bryan's leg work, a nicely twisting kneebar and a real firm grapevine on the legs. Bryan is so good at keeping those types of holds locked snug, and knows better than almost anyone just what position to hold them in to make it look like tight leverage is being applied. I really liked his ropes escape from a Corbin front facelock too, backing into the ropes and slipping his head out before going back on the attack. Bryan's leg kicks were the steady motorik drumbeat of the match, and Corbin filled in the melody by sneaking strikes where he could. I liked his mounted punches after catching a leg kick, a nice straight right hand while trash talking, some 12 to 6 elbows, and a nice body shot after being separated by the ref. I thought his Boss Man tribute offense was integrated into the match in interesting ways. He hits a 'round the ringpost clothesline, but when he goes back to hit another one Bryan catches him with a cool diagonal tope; Bryan hits his awesome corner dropkick, but when he goes for another that's when Corbin hits a big time Boss Man slam. You see these moves thrown out often with no relation to each other, only a guy doing something he saw on YouTube, and I like how they instead established some easy and productive cause and effect stuff. I had figured this was not going to get a clean finish, but we got a lot of match before the DQ, I liked the ladder shot that drew the DQ, and thought Bryan's spill into a bunch of ladders was rough stuff.

PAS: This was a real hidden gem, Corbin is a guy with an interesting background (Golden Gloves boxer, Submission fighter) who doesn't really wrestle interestingly, but we saw flashes of it here. Nasty punches to the temple, a good looking front face lock takedown, some good looking mounted elbows (a spot which is very hard to look good). Empty arena Bryan was one of the few wrestling treasures of the post COVID world, and he really starched Corbin with every shot. I liked the leg work a lot too, and I also really dug him losing the string a bit and stomping Corbin in the head after all of the trash talking, nicely combined both parts of Bryan's wrestling persona, the technician and the hot head. Could actually see placing this really high with a real finish section, but what we got was very good.

2020 MOTY MASTER LIST