Drew Gulak Was Raised on a Promise

Drew Gulak vs. Mansoor WWE Main Event 11/25/21 - GREAT 

ER: This was the  6th (!) and final match Gulak and Mansoor had in 2021, and perhaps the final match they will ever have. I liked all six of their matches, but we didn't quite get one that was a head above the rest. All of them were good, none of them were quite enough to make a list (unless you were compiling a list of Gulak/Mansoor matches, to which I would say that all six of their matches belong on that list). This was a cool match, just like most of their matches, with Gulak starting things off with wrist and ankle control, and I've always been impressed by how well Mansoor stays in sequences with Gulak. It never looks like Gulak leading someone through matwork. Mansoor is always doing something like grabbing at Gulak's ankle, and he's really squirmy, constantly moving forward, so just holding onto his wrist always feels difficult. This broke open nicely with a real sick inverted atomic drop from Mansoor. He stopped Gulak running the ropes by grabbing him like he was going for an exploder, and instead just brought the hammer up into Gulak's balls. Gulak always has nice counters to throw out against Mansoor, and the best was when he threw him off mid-tornado DDT and then hit a fantastic running lariat while Mansoor was still getting his footing. 

I liked Gulak working over the ankle and back, love his little leg whip takedown. It's not a dragon screw he just has a hold on Mansoor's ankle and flings it while dropping his body weight down. There was an interesting fight over a vertical suplex, which isn't something that you really see in WWE. Both kept blocking each other's weight and kept backing the other up, until Mansoor wisely dropped back with his weight, rolling backward and came up to his feet powering Gulak into the suplex. Mansoor really looked like he was fighting to get him over, and the crowd responded much more to that fought-for suplex than they would have to either just hitting a snap suplex (source: they actually responded to that deadlift suplex and had been mostly quiet before that). My big complaint with the Gulak/Mansoor series is that they never really adequately build to a finish, and the finishes can be a bit sudden. It happened five times, so there was no reason to believe it would change for the sixth, and it didn't. Still, this was a real good way to cap off a series that a lot of people did not watch, two fun dance partners who would go on to be even more grossly underused in 2022. Unrestricted 5 minute matches on Main Event every month will always be better than random 2 minute Smackdown matches every few months.

#1 Contender Black Friday Battle Royal WWE Smackdown 11/26/21 - FUN

ER: There aren't many 2022 Drew Gulak matches, so one of his last TV matches is going to wind up being him getting eliminated 90 seconds into a battle royal. Somewhat cruelly, they teased two Gulak interactions that we've never got to see in actual matches: Gulak vs. Sheamus and Gulak vs. Sami Zayn. Gulak mixed it up with both and tried to eliminate Zayn before getting booted spectacularly to the floor by him, sprawling out onto his stomach when he hit. He wasn't the first eliminated (sorry Jinder) so he'll always have that at least. The rest of the battle royal, as battle royals go, was fine. It had Shanky without Veer, and Mace without T-Bar. Sami Zayn won, and he was far and away the best battle royal worker in the match, working constant character moments that added to the whole match, never making the match stand still the same way Happy Corbin and Madcap Moss made it stand still for their character work. Zayn knew how to cheapshot and get almost eliminated, and knew how to always be working while not always being the focus. Angel and Humberto should have stayed in the match longer, as they're better at integrating singles match spots into a battle royal setting, but both took great elimination bumps (Garza going fast to the floor, Carrillo getting body slammed into him). A lot of this felt like it was focusing on the wrong guys. Asskickers like Sheamus and Holland and Cesaro felt underutilized, and Sheamus wasn't working this like it was for a title shot. Fast guys like Mansoor were out of there before the ring was cleared out enough to do anything, but it got saved by Zayn running and stumbling through, Ricochet working a hot finishing stretch, and a false finish Jeff Hardy win before Zayn shoved him painfully to the floor. Needed more Gulak, but Zayn's 2021 was so great. 

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Caught Gulak in Our Room Staring' at the Light, I'd Been Up All Night

Drew Gulak/Ariya Daivari/Tony Nese vs. Gran Metalik/Mustafa Ali/Lince Dorado WWE Main Event 3/31/17 - FUN

ER: This had some real highs but also some oddly laid out peaks, giving Lince Dorado a lot of the big triumphant moments. Out of the three tecnicos in 2017, he was the least natural and spectacular - and also the clear smallest - so it was weird that the match built to him getting the hot tag and getting weaker reactions than anyone else in the match. But the peaks were strong and the pace was brisk. It starts with some pretty so-so Nese moments, but at the same time gave Metalik nice moments to shine. Metalik's nice rana off the ropes was an early highlight, but the match doesn't quite round the corner until Daivari held the middle and top ropes open so that Ali flew to the floor while running ropes. Ali is always great for one big bump per match, one real dangerous one, and him basically hitting a tope to nothing moved us along nicely. The Gulak/Ali portions were really special, with Gulak really throwing hard basics at him and Ali hitting the mat hard. Gulak throws such a hard clothesline, and he throws a straight arm clothesline here that knocks Ali into next week! The big flying moves throughout are good, like Daivari's stiff Naniwa elbow, Metalik's plancha to Nese, Ali's match winning inverted 450, even Dorado's shooting star was delivered swiftly and landed clean (Dorado's problem is more with some wait times on his set ups, and not really flowing through spots very well, all things he got much better at a few years later). Weird to me that Gulak is the one eating the pin after looking like the biggest monster during the match, but this was fun stuff.

Drew Gulak vs. Angel Garza WWE Main Event 7/22/21 - FUN

ER: Here are two modern wrestlers that I love, who have now wrestled five singles matches over a seven month span, and somehow haven't managed to have a really good one. Drew Gulak is one of the guys in WWE who you can argue has had the best matches against the widest selection of opponents over the past several years, but for whatever reason there just does not appear to be a connection between these two. Over their previous four matches, three of them never even made it to 150 seconds. Those were matches with fun, well executed ideas that didn't have enough time to build into stories. The other match went 9 minutes - longer than all but one 2021 Gulak match - and it was somehow one of the weakest Gulak matches of the year. This is more of a satisfying porridge 5 minutes, but still doesn't quite click. Their matches always have good moments, but never quite feel cohesive enough to get to that next level. Garza's transitions back to offense always feel a bit too easy, always completely shrugging off whatever Gulak just did, no matter how punishing it looked. Obviously, a lot of Gulak's offense looked punishing. Gulak never works the same offense every match, so you never know what kind of tricks he's going to pull. He throws a few cool body shots, stiff standing clotheslines, and a great bridging German that I thought was actually going to give him a rare win. Garza has great charisma and taunted Gulak in some fun ways, and he actually gets a good reaction for his tearaway pants late in the match (even though Gulak looks more and more like an idiot every time he catches those thrown pants), but it felt like he was sometimes working a totally different match than Gulak. 

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Yeah, It's Where We Are, Gulak

Drew Gulak vs. Danny Garcia 205 Live 7/17/18 - FUN

ER: Garcia has been the talk of the town lately, had a big week of matches that peaked with him working his way into the main event of AEW Dynamite. He's only 22, and yet he somehow had a televised WWE match when he was just 19. There aren't many teenagers who can say they've wrestled a match for WWE, though I can think of at least a few offhand (the Hardys, Paige, Ken Doane, maybe Waltman?). This puts Garcia into some rare company. The Hardys started as regular TV jobbers and 3 years later they were superstars. Well, it's 3 years later and Garcia's star has never been brighter, and I'm positive he's never done a quicker or more vicious job than the one he did here. You see, the match is 30 seconds long, and an absolute massacre. This beating felt like it was one bad inch away from being a new Marty Jannetty/Chuck Austin incident. It's a match made up of three moves. First, Gulak flew into Garcia with one of the hardest clotheslines I've ever seen Gulak hit. Second, Gulak threw Garcia with a backdrop driver that felt like something Masa Saito would have thrown to "toughen up/accidentally murder" Dojo trainees. Third, Gulak dragged Garcia by the back of the head and sunk in a deadly looking Gulock. Garcia got a 30 second tryout with WWE, got nuked like few jobbers have ever been nuked, and it only made him want this more. Hard not to like that. 

PAS: I kind of expected this to be what Garcia vs. Moxley was going to be, and while Garcia got a ton more offense in that match, Moxley did hit versions of all three of these moves in his Garcia match. Gulak wins all three: his clothesline was up there with the nastiest clotheslines in WWE history, that backdrop driver was spine compressing, and the choke was sick, with Garcia's knees bent all weird. Garcia has so much offense these days, I never really think of him as a crazy bumper, but he was Pablo Marquez level here. 

Drew Gulak vs. Angel Garza WWE Raw 5/17/21 - FUN

ER: Well this probably puts the nail in the coffin of Gulak's time on Raw for now, as they have established that Garza is clearly his better. This is the third Raw match they've had, and each one went about 2 minutes, and ended with a decisive Garza victory. Drew Gulak is great at working guys like Garza, so I get why they'd want him opposite, making Garza's offense look as good as it can. Gulak begins things by jumping Garza and gets an early advantage, strongly enough that I just sort of assumed that surely Gulak wasn't going to lose 3 straight Raw matches to the same guy! Well, before long it became the Garza show, and it's a fun show to watch right now. Gulak leans into his kicks and has a fun bump off a reverse slingshot suplex, opting to land on his feet and whip back instead of take it on his stomach. It left him in perfect position for a seated dropkick from Garza, and it's one of those things that Gulak does sometimes that don't look like anyone else. I've said it twice before, but it's silly giving these two only 2 minutes, as they could do something really cool with just 4, but here we are. 

Drew Gulak vs. Mansoor WWE Raw 6/7/21 - FUN

ER: I'm starting to think that Gulak might not be the guy to put a stop to Mansoor's incredible winning ways. Gulak does, however, continue his trend of unique and cruelly short Raw matches. I don't know what kind of accomplishment it is to be known as the guy having the coolest 2 minute Raw matches, as I'd rather see him be the guy having the coolest 8-10 minute matches on whatever smaller show, but we take what we get. Gulak loses 90% of his matches and I'm the guy who still manages to get hooked into possible Gulak wins, and I don't think it's because I'm 90% doofus, but because of Gulak actually making each little moment of his 150 seconds matter. There is an art to the Short Match, of making your precious few moments matter, and Gulak starts by working a cool half crab, bending at Mansoor's leg while driving his bootheel into Mansoor's back. There's a cool battle over a roll up, and I loved Gulak grabbing a big handful of tights. That handful of tights was what convinced me Gulak was taking it. Sure, it helped that the tights grab happened around the 2 minute mark, and I knew from experience that Gulak is allowed no more than 3 minutes in a Raw ring or else suddenly we wind up with dozens of Gulaks everywhere, and half of them turn out to be child molesters. Alas, Mansoor reverses a reversal of a roll up reversal and I will see Gulak on Main Event next week, where he may win. 

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How Can Gulak Surround Himself in Time and Time Again?

Drew Gulak vs. Mansoor WWE Main Event 4/8/21 - GREAT

ER: Another great 5 minutes with these two, a feud I've been really enjoying. They have worked several TV matches already this year (the closest we'll get to an A-Train/Funaki or Kanyon/Orlando Jordan syndicated feud in 2021) and they've managed to work a different match every single time while doing not too obvious things to play off prior match experiences. Gulak is the guy always coming VERY close to stopping Mansoor's 40+ match winning streak and yet always finds his own shoulders on the mat for a split second longer than Mansoor's. Gulak doesn't so much find ways to lose, as Mansoor finds ways to win, and that's important to their dynamic. They know how to work a lot of interesting moments around quick armdrags, blocked armdrags (Gulak blocking an armdrag by dropping his weight or holding the ropes will always be a match highlight), shoulder holds and single leg takedowns. 

Gulak breaking a wristlock by doing a tumbling routine was a great way to keep a Regal/Danielson vibe on our syndicated programming, and I love how they essentially worked 5 minutes of just grabbing at body parts. Gulak stands on Mansoor's face, Mansoor gets a nice sunset flip with Gulak later catching Mansoor in one of his own after timing a Mansoor leapfrog, and the final exchanges were hot. They managed to work through the match with no actual striking taking place, going straight into a series of holds reversed into snug pinfalls, ending with Mansoor rolling a hiptoss through into a kind of backslide. Gulak's frustration is palpable, as they've done a good job having Mansoor go lossless in their series while making it seem like Gulak is always one step away from figuring out the puzzle, each time.  

Drew Gulak vs. Angel Garza WWE Main Event 4/15/21 - FUN

ER: Here's one for the Unexpected Miss category. Gulak and Garza had a series of short Raw matches around this time, all of which hinted at the potential of a great longer match. I didn't actually realize they HAD that longer match until I started catching up on Main Event, and...well the match completely fell apart in the second half and wasn't actually very good, it turns out. Couldn't have seen that one coming. And a major part of the problem WAS the length, as this felt like a match with several extra minutes. The first half was the best half, showing off Gulak's ability to base for fliers while neutralizing with his own monkey flip and forearm offense. He grinds into Garza and hits a huge running corner dropkick, then misses one later that hangs him by the knees in the corner (one leg over the top, one over the middle) until Garza drops him with a cool backcracker. I was into all of this. 

But there was always going to be an odd heel/heel thorn to get around, and since neither man attempted to get around that the match outright fell apart. I'm not sure who the technical "babyface" would have been here, but I suppose it would have been Gulak. Except Gulak approached this as a heel waiting to catch Garza's flash and turn it into a grounded submission, while Garza approached this as the cocky heel who was going to out flash Gulak, and neither man budged. The whole thing built into Garza going on a chain ending with a big nearfall superkick, and it all felt laid out like tecnico Gran Metalik outquicking the mat worker, and it felt like they were finally settling into sides. But the moment things fell apart was the moment Gulak caught a second Garza superkick and dropped into a brutal heel lock. Angel Garza took SO LONG to get to the ropes, and the spot just went on for a silent eternity. We had this never-ending moment of Gulak trapping a rudo in a very sick looking Gulock, right in the middle of the ring, and Garza inching his way for the ropes. Inch by inch by inch. It was brutally paced, and by the time it was broken everyone's timing was out the window. The quick nearfalls after were sloppy, Gulak missed a clothesline (that was supposed to miss) by 4 feet as Garza was somewhere else entirely, and we had two guys winding up on different pages after a terribly laid out submission. I didn't realize how much I liked their 2-3 minute matches until I saw what they did with 9 minutes. 

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Drew Gulak is Like a Ghost in the Distance, Out of Reach

Drew Gulak vs. Humberto Carrillo WWE Main Event 2/4/21 - FUN

ER: This felt like the layout of a WCWSN Dean Malenko vs. Hector Garza match, where Dean might've eaten up most of the match working holds only to lose to a quick moonsault. There is a lot of formula wrestling going on in WWE these days, and it's always nice when someone does something to break through those formulas. Gulak breaks formula more than most, and here he completely grounds Carrillo until the final 30 seconds of the match. A match like this allows you to see different aspects of a wrestler's game, and it was cool to see Carrillo work through matwork, and that's not really something he's done in WWE. Due to the lucha feds he worked before WWE, we never got to see him work through maestro lucha exchanges, so I thought it was cool seeing him do just that. Gulak had some great holds, loved his kind of inside out deathlock where he pinned Carrillo's legs in a figure 4 and then put all his weight on them, or his different crossfaces that Carrillo fought out of by loosening Gulak's grip, throwing blind chops behind him hoping one lands, and finally a couple back elbows. Carrillo had a slick rolling single leg takedown, Gulak locked in a cool inverted armbar, and I loved the Rings of Saturn variation Gulak used while digging his elbow into Carrillo's side. The finish was abrupt, which is what reminded me of a WCW match, where someone might dominate but then lose tidily when told to go home. Carrillo finally makes it to his feet without getting taken right back down, fakes Gulak out on a kick to set up a spin kick to Gulak's forehead, giving him time to hit the moonsault. I would have loved to see this all mat based, to see Carrillo work a couple of counters, but what we got was cool. 

Drew Gulak vs. T-BAR WWE Main Event 2/18/21 - GREAT

ER: This was maybe a step below the Gulak/Titus O'Neil Main Event match, but it's not far off and has that same layout as that match. Gulak is going to only get 20% of the match, but he takes his 20% in 2% snipes the entire match. It's only 4 minutes, and even though the match is made almost entirely up of T-BAR throwing Gulak and Gulak landing in painful ways, Gulak felt like a guy who could always craftily work his way to a win. This was not a pre-ordained T-BAR victory, no matter how decisively he was smashing Gulak into the mat. Gulak hit hard to make up the size difference, and there was a great spot where Gulak hit a hard forearm to T-BAR's chest, and T-BAR was supposed to just walk through it and feel nothing, but we got a bit of a Benoit/Ice Train situation instead. T-BAR had some great downward elbows while trapping Gulak in the corner, hit a great rolling pump kick that Gulak leaned deeply into, had a clumsy but impactful middle rope splash that felt like the glory days of 2000 where WWF heavyweights sometimes tried shit mid-match that they hadn't done before. Gulak makes slams look really painful, doesn't pinball around the ring making things look bouncy, he makes these landings look rough. It was a match long performance of a guy fighting a losing battle, that somehow didn't feel that way. 

Drew Gulak vs. Angel Garza WWE Raw 5/3/21 - FUN

ER: Gulak never seems to get much more than two minutes in ring on Raw, and it's even weirder that he already had a two minute match against Angel Garza on Raw a few months ago, but he's someone who will always have some cool things in that two minutes. He tries to jump Garza during the pants removal, but Garza whips those things off and dropkicks Drew on his way in. Gulak was good at staying off balance and stumbling into Garza's offense, and when he took over he had some really nasty chokes. Drew has a sick bully choke takeover and a snug headlock takeover, then really jams his forearm into Garza's Adam's apple. Garza matches that energy back and violently grabs at Gulak's face while screaming at him in the corner. There's no reason we couldn't have been given 2 more minutes of this, as there's only so much you can do in 2, but a full match can be had in 4 so come on man. They get 10 minutes on Main Event, give them a couple extra on Raw. Oh well, Gulak takes the wing clipper with a nice snap and then gets a rose shoved into his crack and punted in by Garza. That's a finish. 

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Drew Gulak Will Stare Straight Into Nothing

Drew Gulak vs. Angel Garza WWE Raw 12/22/20 - FUN

ER: Having a match like this go 2 minutes is never not going to be Total Bullshit. If you watch the Gulak/Cesaro match from WrestleMania, you can see what kind of genuinely special match Gulak is capable of putting together with just 4 minutes, but 2 minutes? When a match doesn't go as long as the ring intros, several different people running a multi million dollar TV show fucked up several segment time allocations. What's even more cruel, is that this was the first time these two have ever been matched up, and it's very clear from these 2 minutes that their chemistry is real. We get a great gag to start, with Garza throwing his just removed pants into Gulak's face while attacking him, setting an aggressive pace that I'm glad they worked for the 2 measly minutes they were allowed. I liked the struggle they showed during the 2 minutes, nothing ever looked like part of a sequence, everything they did looked like some kind of fight was behind it. Gulak muscling up Garza with a backbreaker, all the forearms and punches and shots to ribs, and Gulak jamming his elbow into Garza's thigh to reverse an abdominal stretch (only Gulak can make an abdominal stretch look like a finisher worthy sub in 2020, even digging his fist into that soft portion of Garza's side underneath the ribs). This was an awesome scrap, and the way they tangled and threw off balance could have turned into something really special with just a couple more minutes, but the finish we got was way too premature. 

Drew Gulak vs. AJ Styles WWE Raw 1/11/21 - FUN

ER: Disappointing 3 minute match that could have been much more worthwhile with another minute or two and some better time management. There was a frustrating amount of time dedicated to a set up shot of Gulak starting at the size of Styles' bodyguard's foot, and an unsatisfying battle up top over a superplex that didn't really go anywhere but ate up significant match time. When they stuck to grounded interactions it was great, loved how Styles started things with his nice dropkick and kicked Gulak right in the chest upon landing. Gulak falls really well for Styles, and gets to hit a cool unexpected tiger driver and this awesome bridging fallaway slam, also takes a big bump over the top to the floor. But this was about as low end as you can get for a match between Gulak and Styles, mostly due to time. 

Drew Gulak vs. Humberto Carrillo WWE Main Event 1/18 (Aired 1/21/21) - GREAT

ER: Now here's a cool match, and one of the strongest Carrillo performances I've seen in at least a couple months. Gulak is obviously going to be a great opponent for a flyer, but Carrillo's flash landed a lot better here than it can. They start with some fun matwork, with Gulak working an American lucha maestro style that Carrillo can roll with nicely. But I loved how the matwork and bridging wasn't really getting Gulak anywhere, so at some point he just says Fuck It and starts bending at Carrillo's arm. Gulak is great at taking Carrillo's armdrags and leaning face first into his spinning kicks, and the whole match is him getting sick of taking that flippy trickery and just slugging Carrillo in the stomach or throat, or planting him with a kneeling bodyslam or driving a knee into his torso. We get an Actually Good strike exchange that built nicely. There was no trading, nothing that looked like a prepped combo, just Gulak getting in a shot before being thrown off balance by a kick, giving Carrillo a chance to throw another kick while Gulak tried to fire back off balance. It looked great. Carrillo hits one of the smoothest version of his handspring armdrag, Gulak goes purple trying to snap Carrillo's arm and making it look like Carrillo is fighting for his damn limb. It's a lovely yin/yang. Carrillo's springboard spinning kick saw Gulak leap to take it in the face as if he was heading a soccer ball, looked fantastic, and the moonsault finish was academic. Give me 8 minute Gulak matches on a C show against weird Main Event opponents (Tucker? Slapjack? Riddick Moss?) and let's see how much cool shit he can pull off. 

COMPLETE AND ACCURATE DREW GULAK

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WrestleMania 36 Night 2 Live Blog

Big shoes to fill on Night 2, and if tonight is anywhere near as entertaining as Night 1 then I will be a happy camper. This does not have Gulak or Bryan on it, and it does have The Fiend, so the odds are stacked against Night 2. Still, I'm excited for the Brock match and weirdly excited for Otis/Dolph (because Otis is my boy).


Natalya vs. Liv Morgan

ER: This was good, but felt like it really needed Liv Morgan to make all of Natalya's stuff work. Natalya got to drive a lot of this with her offense, but I don't think her offense would have come off as well without Liv's selling. Liv's screaming and grunt selling was much better than Seth Rollins' weird pleasure moans, and I thought Liv worked sequences much tighter than some other Natalya opponents. Natalya has been working the exact same sequences for years now, so it's really easy to see what different opponents bring to a "Natalya match". Earlier this year when it was Asuka's turn, she chose to just beat the hell out of Natalya. Liv plays underdog and her roll ups all looked really tight and well placed throughout. She let Natalya work through her few pieces of offense (and I do like when it looks like Natalya really stomps vertebrae when she does her stepover to seated dropkick combo). I thought Liv's quick pins were peppered nicely throughout and I like the way she built to her finish. Nice opener, but after their high end performance in last month's Chamber match it's pretty messed up that Ruby Riott and Sarah Logan aren't on the show, but fucking TAMINA is.


Charlotte Flair vs. Rhea Ripley

ER: This is the brightest color I have ever seen on Ripley, but she pulls it off. And I thought the bulk of this match was great. I don't always love big match Charlotte, and just as I didn't like Kevin Owens' overproduced "How this for a WrestleMania moment?!" I didn't not like some of Charlotte's bad trash talk. But the work itself was super strong, especially every single attack Charlotte threw at Ripley's leg. Every pump kick, every awesome chop block, that nasty leg snap over the top rope, they all landed hard and the way Ripley sold them really made them even better. Ripley's leg buckling totally made this, as several of them looked like she was coming out of this with a torn ACL. I loved it. They held up extremely well on slo mo replays too, so maybe Charlotte was just trying to take out Ripley's knee. Ripley sold really well throughout, though she didn't seem to be laying into Charlotte to the same degree. Still, the stuff like her big dropkick to Charlotte's face worked well, and her short arm clotheslines looked and sounded great with the arena acoustics. And just like I thought Ripley's selling was good, Charlotte's selling off strikes was great. Early on Ripley kicked her while in a tree of woe and Charlotte was convincing enough to make me think she took an errant shot to the throat; later she got dropped in a pancake and Charlotte sold it like she chipped her veneers. The only thing that really hurt this for me was that Charlotte always wins, and from a storyline perspective it probably would have been better if Ripley had looked a little more dominant. Charlotte trashing her throughout for being a lesser champ and then just beating her fair and square doesn't leave a whole lot left to explore. Still, the work here was strong (even if it probably went a little long) and I probably nitpicked a bit much considering how much I loved all he stuff with Rhea's leg.


Aleister Black vs. Bobby Lashley

ER: Has Lana even been on TV since that abortion of an angle that everyone knew would be awful from miles away? Is there a reason these two are fighting or is this just one of those "getting people on the show" matches. Is Lashley a secret member of The Skulk and is trying to pay Black back for the Black Mass he laid on Leon Ruff a couple weeks ago? I could not get into this one, no matter how cool I thought Lashley looked in black and gold tights. This is a 2nd hour Raw match that showed up on WrestleMania for some reason. Lashley looked good, Black looked good, but it's weird something like this is on the show getting more time than something brilliant like Gulak/Cesaro.


Dolph Ziggler vs. Otis

ER: I've actually been into the Otis/Mandy stuff so this was one of the Night 2 matches I've been looking for. But I'm not sure how good of a friend Sonya is if she was trying to trick her friend into a relationship with Dolph Ziggler of all people. Sonya is the friend who would convince her Ted Bundy's car is a way quicker way home than the subway. One real annoying thing about Ziggler is that he wrestles every match the same, no matter the circumstances. He went for the same kind of layout here as he has in any other match this month, a guy who will go out and work the same match regardless of stakes. I liked all of the work from both, but outside of the actual involvement of Mandy and Sonya this didn't feel like they had been through any kind of personal drama. Dolph flew around nicely once Otis made his comeback, smashing his face into the middle buckle off a catapult, running hard into the buckles on Irish whips, and I loved Otis throwing him to the floor with a fallaway slam and smashing him with a great lariat. The finish was the easiest way to wrap this, and I had been wondering why Mandy wasn't out there from the beginning anyway. It was all pretty basic but the match itself just didn't feel like anything that was built to, and it should have. And if Otis has any doubts whether Mandy likes him or not, the fact she kissed him on the mouth during a pandemic should be a real confidence booster.


Edge vs. Randy Orton

ER: I had forgotten this was Last Man Standing and that makes me even less interested. It feels like the counts have gotten slower and slower on those, and it always takes me WAY out of a match when every time someone takes a back bump we get 15 seconds of paused action. Also, lol at Edge working a match with like three people at ringside, and not doing a quick check to make sure the guy who frequently hides to sneak attack people is not one of them. And just like the Boneyard Match was so insanely good and infinitely better than an actual in-ring Taker/Styles match would have been, THIS match would have benefitted from ANY other format. A 10 minute in ring match between them, with each doing the same spots they did in any of their matches 15 years ago, would have been so much better. Because folks, this was bad. And I thought it actually had some promise early on, because Randy was throwing hard right hands and Edge had a bunch of actually painful looking clubbing offense. But this whole thing weirdly played out like they were doing it all live, because you assume had it been taped in advance that this would have been edited down to at LEAST half the runtime. And the crazy thing is that you know this actually WAS edited. A group of people watched THIS and thought they had kept it tight enough. Which means that the original match was probably somehow EVEN LONGER. This came off like a joke brawl that they forgot to write jokes into, and the longer it went on the longer it felt like they were just playing a prank on anybody who actually works in the Performance Center. How many disinfectant wipes are going to be needed to clean off all the surfaces these sweaty germ machines are carrying? Also, the announcers have been yelling over everything on both nights and suddenly they decide this match to speak in hushed whispers, probably because drama and acting like this shouldn't be distracted from.

I actually like a LOT of the landings in this match, and thought Edge was throwing some of his best actual strikes. He was always a lousy striker, and here it looked like he was really battering Orton's chest and ribs. The problem is the stipulation lead to an abundance of moments that relied on the acting of both men, and Edge is one of the worst actors in wrestling history. The drama required to make a 30+ minute match work was not going to be found in Orlando this evening. And I typed all of this before the referee tried to reason with Orton. THAT right there might be the dumbest thing I've seen in wrestling. "Randy come on, he has a family!" Hey dummy, if either of them actually cared about their families they wouldn't have subjected them to any part of this match. This was abysmal, they didn't have nearly enough decent ideas to justify a match even half as long as this, and as predicted the Last Man Standing stip made a long match into Shoah. Every single person involved in the making and execution of this match made exclusively wrong choices.


Angel Garza/Austin Theory vs. Street Profits

ER: Another match that felt like a 2nd hour Raw match, nothing at stake, nothing that made this felt like it was a "big show" match. Garza hits a nice moonsault to the floor, Ford does a nice tope on hilo that was caught almost entirely by Dawkins, and I guess I'm wondering what Austin Theory was supposed to bring to this? If this past week has taught me one thing, it's that Austin Theory not only cannot catch a dive, but there's a chance he might not actually know what a dive is. I guess he can jump high? This would have been more interesting as a 6 man with Vega and Bianca added to the match itself.


Sasha Banks vs. Lacey Evans vs. Tamina vs. Naomi vs. Bayley

ER: Again, I must point out that Ruby Riott and Sarah Logan both actually looked great at Elimination Chamber and somehow they're not on the show but TAMINA is in the title picture. Matches with odd number participants always have an uphill battle, they easily could have just had Riott and Logan in this one and Tamina could have watched at home. Tamina is always put into these situations where she gets all her offense in one clump right up front, before everybody teams up to get rid of her, and they always do that because Tamina has somehow been on the roster for a DECADE and still gets crossed up doing one minute of offense. So this marks yet another time where they bring back Tamina, immediately insert her into a big match, but seemingly realize that she is still actually bad and get her out of there right away. It's easy a "what does she have on Vince?" joke, but it has to be something. It can't just be weird family murder cover-up loyalty, because we never got a decade of Deuce getting put into title matches. And Tamina was just one part of what made this not work. Nearly everyone in it was made to look like a chump: Naomi's great comeback reactions from earlier this year seem like a distant memory, Bayley retaining after she's already shown to be a completely uninteresting champ, Sasha loses at Mania again, etc. The only interesting thing was the interaction between Sasha and Bayley, I actually loved their moments of working together. Sasha coming back at the end to help Bayley in spite of getting eliminated by a nice Evans' Woman's Right. Also I watched this match after watching a feature length Edge movie, so now I'm just grumpy.


Firefly FunHouse

ER: This show has been terrible, I mean the attitude I had when watching Charlotte shoulder tackle feels like hours ago. This show desperately needed HUGE performances from this match and Brock/McIntyre, and seeing Bray Wyatt come up when your team is one out from elimination is the last thing you wanted to see. But then this match goes out and has their Travis Ishikawa in the 9th moment, and has the first actual creative and fun segment of The Fiend gimmick's lifespan. Cena being Luke Skywalker battling his demons on Dagobah was highly entertaining, and wonderfully different from the Boneyard Match. John Cena reliving his greatest failures and greatest successes was tremendous, and the editing of all the old footage integrated it was fantastic. John Cena whiffing on Ruthless Aggression punches, getting cricket sound effect reactions opposite his best rhymes, and him acting like a malfunctioning Ultimate Warrior robot on Saturday Night's Main Event were just some of the great moments, WWE improbably coming up with two outrageously entertaining cinematic matches on back to back nights. Seriously, John Cena doing lightning fast curls had me in stitches, and if they had smoke come out of his ears I probably would have howled. Just like the Boneyard Match, just think how lame this would have been as a straight match. Instead, this was awesome, and hey, it was a third the length of one of the worst segments in Mania history. I can't believe they did it, but they did it.


Drew McIntyre vs. Brock Lesnar

ER: This was a good moment for Drew, and it's cool that they're going through with it for him. He's been a good soldier and them getting behind him would be cool. And I love Brock, but I think he really needs a crowd to mock and feed off of. Brock crowds always react, even on the coldest shows. Brock gets noise, and Brock reacts great to noise. He's great at reading a room, and he's incredibly fun to watch which he reads a room, and this had no room. Brock has crafted several excellent and unique matches built around finisher spamming, but two guys trading finishers in an empty room just kind of feels like move practice after awhile. You need that reaction of shock, you need that excitement. When the whole story of the match is "It is shocking that this guy kicked out of this" over and over, you need to hear shock. I don't think this kind of match was going to work here, in this situation. I think this match probably would have worked really well with a stadium of people living and dying with it, and I wish I could have seen that version. This was just a longer Goldberg/Braun, and Brock can have a much better match than that.


Well this show was nowhere close to Night 1, and without THE FIEND match - of all things - it would have been one of the weakest cards of the past couples years. But the stupid Firefly FunHouse put a big smile on my face, and left me on the other side feeling positive about all of it. We endured whatever that Edge/Randy Orton match was, we slayed that dragon together. We experienced that shit together, and it was maybe the most united I've ever seen wrestling fans. And in 10 years, if one person tries to nostalgia gif us with "You know what match never got respect but was actually great" posts, that person will get collectively shouted down and humiliated by every person who lived through that in real time.

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WWE Big 3: Lorcan, Gallagher, Gulak 11/24-11/30

Smackdown 11/29

Drew Gulak vs. Mustafa Ali

ER: "A rivalry that really heated up when Drew Gulak did a PowerPoint presentation on Twitter" is something that's going to sound just as stupid to future generations as it does now, yes? This match goes maybe 3 minutes - pretty dumb on a 2 hour show with only 4 matches - but is fairly meaty for the short runtime. Gulak is back to shaved head and is sporting some cool as boots, and he aims to make the most of his ring time (and the way things have been going this might be all the ring time he gets this month). Gulak looked sharp in control, backed Ali with hard chops, worked a nice single leg crab, and hit a wicked one arm powerbomb when Ali jumped to the middle buckle (he really flung him too, really great). Gulak made Ali's kicks look like a million bucks, and the match had an actual good use of a superkick that made for a plausible nearfall even just 2 minutes in. Sub-3 minutes is almost always going to be unfulfilling, but Gulak made the most of his time.

205 Live 11/29

Jack Gallagher vs. Angel Garza

ER: 14 minutes of Gallagher on my TV on a Saturday morning is just not something I'm going to complain about, but I am really not a fan of the way Garza transitioned to comeback throughout the match. The bones of a killer match were there, with Garza working over Gallagher's stomach and Gallagher being the one to try to keep him at bay with cool strikes. You don't see a lot of stomach work, but Garza was clearly targetting Jack's stomach, setting up a big dropkick to the gut in the corner, dropkicking him again in the stomach on a missed Gallagher crossbody, and in maybe the coolest moment of the match breaking out a slingshot gutbuster. Gallagher hasn't been done many favors with the way he's been portrayed. He's the guy they use as a heel or face depending on what's convenient that week, and throwing a pasty British guy into the ring for almost 15 minutes in Alabama is the kind of thing that has been leading crowds to root for matches to end. Gallagher is diligent and eventually wins them over, but it is not easy. And I think part of that is because almost all of Garza's comebacks are structured to come immediately after taking a big move from Gallagher. This was the worst use of the Gallagher standing thrust headbutt (he has a nice one early in the match where he rains it down on Garza while trapping him in the corner), and he lays that headbutt in, causing Garza to bounce off the ropes and hit a superkick. Obviously that is one of the worst trends in go go go wrestling, where a guy can take a move that has always been used for a nearfall, but this time the momentum from getting headbutted really hard makes him bounce off ropes and throw a kick. Maybe there's a way to make a spot like that work. I'm sure Finlay could find a way to make it work. But I don't think I've seen it work. Gallagher does win the people over when he kicks Garza in the face on a corner dropkick and begins landing stiff windmill punches. The windmill punches were hitting hard enough and landing quick enough and overwhelming Garza enough that the folks in Birmingham couldn't help but make a little noise. But Gallagher got crippled by another lazy transition: Late in the match Gallagher leaps onto Garza and tries dragging him down with a guillotine choke, shifting weight, gradually seeming like it could work...but Garza just gets choked for awhile and then hits the wing clipper. Oh. The layout only seemed to work to the match's detriment, and the worst version of a 50-50 match is where one guy responds to a big move immediately with a big move. This had the chance to eclipse their better, shorter match from a couple weeks ago, but alas.

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WWE Big 3: Lorcan, Gallagher, Gulak 11/10-11/16 + Bonus 2019 Gulak

205 Live 11/15/19

Jack Gallagher vs. Angel Garza

ER: This was super fun, two guys determined to do what they do in spite of a shitty crowd who iced them the whole damn match (when they weren't chanting for CM Punk). We started with cool mat stuff, both guys twisting ankles, Gallagher stomping the back of Garza's knees, Garza getting a nice ankle pick, and a great spinning headscissors countered into a hard facebuster by Garza. Garza broke out a bunch of cool stuff, like a big hotshot gourdbuster. Gallagher took all of Garza's offense well, got big height on a flapjack and ate that kick to the stomach on the way down. Gallagher is crafty enough to get a real nice nearfall off a small package, both guys really good at making pinfalls count and make it look like they're actually trying to pin someone down; Gallagher would grind an elbow, Garza got the final pin on a very high cradle, it just adds to the feel of a match. Gallagher worked in his awesome headbutt in a great spot, blasting Garza after flipping out of a powerbomb, but it was all admittedly frustrating just how cold the crowd was being. I appreciate that they were confident enough to work their match in a vacuum, but they deserved better.


205 Live 3/12/19

Drew Gulak vs. Tony Nese

ER: This was from that cursed part of 2019 where WWE was giving Tony Nese 18 minutes a week to smear Nese all over our screens. And this is a lot of Gulak getting dominated by Nese. Now Gulak is a guy who can work fun comebacks in brief flashes, so he was able to add some strength there. But it's not worth the tradeoff of Nese controlling a long match. It also didn't help that the match didn't pick up until about 9 minutes in, and fans aren't going to be into Tony nese working holds. Gulak's peppering in comebacks were easily the reason to watch this match, as he clearly looked like the guy who should be focused on. He threw a couple nice lariats, and I liked his use of his reverse momentum sunset flip, thought it made for a smart nearfall placement. But this just made me resentful that they stuck a bunch of guys with Tony Nese for so much of the year. Tony Nese even pointed to the WrestleMania sign a couple times. Yuck.

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WWE Big 3: Lorcan, Gallagher, Gulak 10/20-10/26

NXT 10/23/19

Jack Gallagher vs. Angel Garza

ER: This was a fun style clash, even though Gallagher is seemingly the only cruiserweight they don't allow to work long singles and tag matches. Tony Nese is out here getting 15 minutes and Gallagher fights to go past 5. This does not go past 5, but it has a ton of stuff you won't see in anyone else's match and that's why we value the Gentleman! He has a nice set of offense but doesn't use it all in every match. You'd think most guys would be trying to fit as much of their offense as possible into their monthly 4 minutes, but I've never seen Gallagher do the same combination of his signature stuff in any match. He always approaches things fresh, and that's a big reason I look forward to seeing him every time. They do a real cool timing spot where Garza starts removing his tearaways, Gallagher interrupts him but Garza pulls away and leaves his pants in Gallagher's hands the way a lizard would escape from a cat, and by the time Gallagher looks back up he's getting dropkicked in the face. They do a series of rolling crucifixes which is a variation I haven't really seen, and they made it looks so trippy and giddy that it felt right out of a fun Rollerball Rocco match. We get a cool sequence where Gallagher bumps big to the floor and rolls back in shaken, but recovers in time to hit his big headbutt. His headbutt is one of those moves that doesn't show up in all of his matches, and I like the ways he brings it back. I would have liked this to be twice as long, but this was fun as hell.


205 Live 10/25/19

Oney Lorcan vs. Lio Rush

ER: This was not as exhilarating as Rush's comeback match against Lorcan, but it's clear that these two are a great match for each other. They make ideal dance partners, and when you combine that with both guys having fun offense that they always execute well. Rush has a bunch of bouncy complicated moves that could potentially leave opponents looking dumb while waiting around it, but he has a cool Rey Mysterio way of getting guys logically into position for illogical offense. His bottom rope bouncing cutter should be silly, but it always looks cool. He and Lorcan each take turns pinballing across the ring: Rush takes a running knee to the gut, Lorcan gets hit with a torpedo of a suicide dive, Rush gets snapped in half by Lorcan's awesome blockbuster, and I just love the way these two take the other's offense. They're giving Rush some pretty decisive wins, and I would have liked to see a little more of Lorcan here - I would have liked to see more match period - but that Rush frog splash lands so hard that it definitely should have gotten the 3.


Smackdown 10/25/19

Drew Gulak vs. Kalisto

ER: Well this move to Smackdown has not been great for Gulak. This is a fun match while it lasts, but just when it looked like Gulak was about to break out some mean offense, Braun interrupts and allows Kalisto to finish him. Then Braun powerslams Gulak pretty unceremoniously. I would take Gulak teaming with Tony Nese for 15 minute matches over this. Having to see some associated Nese is better than this.

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WWE Big 3: Lorcan, Gallagher, Gulak 8/18 - 8/24

205 Live 8/20

Drew Gulak/Ariya Daivari/Angel Garza/Mike Kanellis/Tony Nese vs. Oney Lorcan/Jack Gallagher/Akira Tozawa/Humberto Carrillo/Isaiah Scott

PAS: 205 Live is such a weird show, some random Tuesday they just run a 50 minute 10 man elimination match where they place a ton of focus on a guy who hadn’t even been on the show before. I don’t get it, but I dig it. I am not sure if anyone is watching this show, but this felt like a star making performance for Angel Garza. I was a big Hector Garza fan and Angel really felt like he was channeling his Uncle, just a rudo masterclass, big bumps, great basing for high flyers and some great smarmy cheap shots. I also continue to really enjoy Davari as he is committed to being a wholly unlikeable prick. Gallagher had more of a cameo in this match, I dug the opening spot with him passing out umbrellas for his teammates to do dives, but otherwise he goes out early. We get lots of Lorcan and Gulak including some cool interactions with each other, Lorcan throws maybe the nastiest back elbow I can remember to Gulak, and Gulak snapping and working over Lorcan with the chair was really well done. I also dug both guys apron work, hyping up the rest of their team. This did have a Nese vs. Swerve Scott section which was about as bad as it appears on paper, but mainly this was a super cool idea, and I am glad it exists.

ER: I am fully embracing the weirdness of 205 Live, it's really a show I've come to get excited for again. I've been on quite a rollercoaster with the whole 205 Live run. I loved the first tournament, was excited when it became a weekly show (and we even intended to write up the show every week, but it was uninteresting enough that the idea only lasted 3 episodes), then I didn't watch it at all for like a year (probably some nice gems scattered throughout that first year or so), then began watching scattered looking for the occasional Gulak match, and now here I am back to being excited to see it weekly again. They keep giving guys a different platform and really let them stretch out. I think they let them stretch out too much some of the time, but there's no doubt it's an awesome learning tool and has created some of the coolest matches of the year. Now we get a show long match that's longer than most guys have ever worked on WWE TV.

And I didn't even really love the match. It had some great segments, it had some awful segments, but damn did I love having it on while I ate a late lunch on a Saturday. This played out like a cool wrestling mixtape, something that would interest casual fans, something that would play well at a bar in that way that some bars throw on a weird movie with the sound turned off while the band is playing, or something that would be nice to have on while friends are over and most of the people are more interested in talking than watching wrestling (but like looking up and commenting when a cool spot catches their eye). It's like when NOAH was running those Captain's Fall Elimination matches, and it yielded some classics, and at minimum always yielded a match that was fun to have on in the background. So while I didn't love this, it's something that would be awesome to know is a possibility.

Hell, WWE should just run a 1 hour weekly show called Wrestling Mixtape, and just let whatever combination of guys want to work an hour long match, work that match. Seriously, make 8 spots available for each week's match, and let whatever 8 guys wanted to work the match, work the match. It would be a cool way to get TV time, but with the caveat that you might have to be one of the guys in the match for 45+ minutes. Maybe there are guys on the roster who would want the exposure, but wouldn't want to risk being exposed in a long match. Presumably more than 8 guys would want to sign up, so you'd have a bunch of guys to rotate through and keep the match-ups fresh. WWE's Wrestling Mixtape is an idea I am selling myself on even more the longer I type about it.

And this was a cool wrestling mixtape! It would have been much better if you switched around the order of eliminations (if there's a 50 minute match, I don't want Gallagher or Tozawa going out first when Tony Nese and Isaiah Scott are in there). The Swerve/Nese stuff was as awful as I was expected to be, hot garbage Marvel final battle wrestling. Scott has a lot of ideas, and that's cool, except for a bunch of ideas of his that involve a guy doing something out of the ordinary and then holding position for too long waiting for Scott to splat onto them after breakdancing. His stuff can look pretty, and be innovative, but man do I hate how he sets a lot of it up. But how do you hate a match that's so neat and weird that in only his third TV match with the company, here's Angel Garza working a freaking 50 minute match. They really gave a showcase to the Garza brood - maybe too much of one, as I think Carrillo is still best in briefer sequences - but damn it is great to have practically a clone of Hector Garza on TV. Hector Garza was maybe my favorite TV wrestling in the world around 2006/2007, and that's saying something since Fit Finlay had just made a totally unexpected "I assume booked specifically for Eric Ritz" return to working featured TV matches. Some of his act comes off a bit more rehearsed and doesn't quite have that same insanely charming sparkle that Hector was working with (watching him fall all over women at ringside while bumping is true pro wrestling joy), but the star potential is there. We don't get nearly enough Gallagher (though do get a nice headbutt and the amusing group umbrella spot), but we get typically great stuff from Gulak and Lorcan, and the weirdness of WWE running a 50 minute cruiserweight match kept the smiles easy.

WWE Wrestling Mixtape. Book it.

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