WWE Money in the Bank 2016 Live Blog

So to start the live blog, I'd like to address an extremely embarrassing and unfortunate coincidence. A few days ago I needed something to post for that day (still somehow keeping up with our post-per-day minimum almost two and a half years later) but I was at work that day and leaving directly from work to go to a concert in Oakland (John Carpenter LIVE!!! My god), so wasn't going to be able to write anything new. So I scoured my drafts for something and found several Jerry Lawler reviews that I had written 3+ years ago. I read them through, they seemed quality, so I posted a couple. The next day - to my horror - I went on PWO for the first time in a couple days and immediately saw a thread about Jerry Lawler being suspended indefinitely under accusations of domestic violence, news that would have been broken BEFORE I posted those reviews. Yeesh. So I just want to make it clear that I WAS NOT taking any sort of stance, no silent support for Lawler, nothing weird. I was just "lucky" enough to post something about him the same day as the news came out. I could have posted those damn reviews any day over the last three years, but I just happened to need content on the day THAT news breaks. Good grief. So, if for some reason anybody out there was icked out by my poorly timed Lawler post - and to be clear not one person to my knowledge has accused me of doing anything untoward - but if for some reason there is a reader out there who thought I was being gross, please know that it was just an unfortunate coincidence.

ER: I just received a text alert from WWE stating "The greatest Money in the Bank event in history starts NOW!" WOW!! The greatest PPV on the greatest night in the history of our great sport!?!? How can I afford to NOT watch and write about this!?

1. The Golden Truth vs. Breezango

ER: Breezango are working an extreme sunburning gimmick, playing up that they got roasted earlier while tanning their bods. This leads to Goldust amusingly working a chop heavy style while Breeze and Fandango scream. Goldust throws some amazing chops all throughout so it works, and for speaking for all the people who have ever lobstered themselves, you get it. The match wasn't much beyond that sadly. Goldust got to be the hot tag, which is nice since he's easily the best hot tag in the fed, but I wish I could just see an actual 8+ minute match between these teams.

2. Lucha Dragons vs. Dudley Boyz

ER: "Game of Thrones isn't the only show with flying dragons!" Ugh, Mauro's had that line in the can for weeks I assume. There are also ads on the bottom of the screen FOR the Money in the Bank PPV. How many people who subscribe to the Network, who happen to be watching the network LIVE at 4:47 PM on a Sunday, wouldn't know they are about to see Money in the Bank? There was a production person in the back who was paid to put these graphics up on the bottom of the screen. The only way they could be watching this match was if they clicked the large "Watch WWE Money in the Bank LIVE NOW" button on the homepage. These teams don't seem to gel very well, and the Dragons seem to be holding back on their flying offense. Everything is landing super soft. Bubba is still good but has lost a step, but he's doing a good job of trying to make up for any ability loss with an increase in shit talking. It works. But yeah the match as a whole really doesn't. The heat segments aren't compelling, the comebacks are light. There were a couple decent individual moments, but this was a throwaway pre-show match for certain.

3. Enzo & Cass vs. The Vaudevillains vs. Luke Gallows & Karl Anderson vs. The New Day

ER: Love the new waistcoat/vest/pocket watch entrance gear on the Villains. Entrances take a full 9 minutes for everybody so I magically leap forward in time. Anderson and Gallows have to wait almost that long as Enzo and Kofi set up dual crossbodies off the top. There's an annoying segment where Kofi and Enzo do a tug of war, each trying to tag out to their partners. So just a long segment of two guys just not fighting each other, while holding hands. Neat. Things "break down" just 4 minutes in, despite next to nothing happening. Kofi is really sandbagging the Villains. Anderson seems to be the only one who understands that it's a one pinfall finish, as he tries to tag guys whenever they get close. Kofi and English were fighting right next to Enzo and Cass and they just stood there thumbing their butts. Can't win the match from the apron, doodz. Cass and Enzo go on a run and Gallows looks late on a save, plus the ref did a bad double clutch count. Looked bad. They wisely have English take most of the finishers, as that guy is really good at taking offense. The last two minutes of this got good as WWE multiman structure is usually good at handling those big finisher trading runs, but this really wasn't that good for the time allotted.

ER: I really liked Owens during the MITB promo, even though they were just going for yuks instead of actually building to much of a match. "Perro means dog? You know Spanish now?" "No, I just learned that word because [Alberto Del Rio] always calls people that."

4. Baron Corbin vs. Dolph Ziggler

ER: When did the "super wet hair" scourge start sweeping through WWE? When did that start being a thing? Was it HHH? Is he the Wet Hair Mary? Did he start demanding everybody with hair just dunk their heads under a sink pre-match? Even Flair has been horribly sporting this look for years now, which only adds to his incredible melting man look. Let's all get together and try to pinpoint this wet hair outbreak. Corbin's work looks really good in this. I like his measured straight rights, even if the crowd is chanting boring at him. Did I miss something with Ziggler? Why is he wearing what appears to be an actual HBK outfit from 1996? That's weird, right? I get guys wearing their influences on their sleeves, but just dressing exactly the same? How is that even allowed? Ziggler takes a hot shot really great, really looked like his neck snapped across that rope. Also really like Corbin being a step ahead and countering all of Ziggler's offense, tossing him off from the famouser, blocking the follow up superkick. Oh god Ziggler is even stomping to set up sweet chin music? What the fuck did I miss? What a fucking dork. Corbin plants him with a nasty spinning back suplex, really twisting him right into the ground. I'm really starting to love all of Corbin's running punches, and I liked the superkick reversal off Corbin's finisher. I think Corbin might be quite good, but it's tough to tell since I've only ever seen him against Ziggler and even though I ended up liking this match, it's a match-up I'm already tired of.

5. Charlotte & Dana Brooke vs. Becky Lynch & Natalya

ER: I really liked Charlotte's knees/cravate combo on Natalya, but there is really not much to care about in this match. Becky's hot tag offense doesn't look that good. After seeing her a few times I still can't get any sort of read on Brooke. She seems good at doing lackey type stuff, bitchily making saves for Charlotte, but nothing has stood out about her wrestling ability. Lynch doesn't do a lot for me either. Brooke does make me laugh postmatch by yelling "I'm the greatest protege ever!!" That's awesome. Oh and hey Nattie turned on Lynch, meaning there are......is Lynch the only babyface in the division? Paige is a face, right? I think? Nattie's forearm to the back of Lynch's head was probably the best looking thing in the match. This was a bunch of nothing.

6. Sheamus vs. Apollo Crews

ER: Crews doesn't do a lot for me but Sheamus is good enough to get something out of him, and they oddly seem like a good match for each other. I really really dug all the violent opening headlock takeovers, they all looked so good. Crews throws a nice tight elbow that knocks Sheamus to the floor and Sheamus snags him off the apron and hits a backbreaker. And I am into this. Sheamus knows how to work a compelling headlock as he keeps shifting his weight and position to build for Crews' comeback. Sheamus is really good bumping all around for Crews' lariats, and then takes a wild bump to the floor off a belly to belly. Holy cow then Crews hits an awesome moonsault off the apron to the floor, that really couldn't have hit any better than it did. Man I am into this match. Crowd appears to not give any one of their fucks about it, but they're busting ass in there. It's really quiet though. Can't blame them though as Sheamus really has been an afterthought for some time. Which is too bad, as Sheamus is awesome. OOF, lame as hell finish with Crews just getting a roll up while Sheamus argued pinfalls. Man that is a lame finish. Shame as I was into the whole thing, up until that.

7. AJ Styles vs. John Cena

ER: Cole on commentary also calls this "The greatest Money in the Bank event in history!" What is the actual justification for using this exact phrasing. It's a weird thing to say about a show before it happens, and then again before it's over. Is there a kayfabe reason? Like are they acting like the matches on this card are the biggest ever when compared to past MITB? Or is it just hyperbolic horseshit? Cena looks smaller, which is good. He was looking freakish for awhile there. And this is really good so far. I loved Styles punching him when Cena waved his palm, and Cena selling that punch was great. On the floor AJ gets tossed into the steps but ably leaps over them and then casually rolls back into the ring and man Styles is playing this up so great. Styles pacing in this match is perfect, and then AJ gets launched by a backdrop. But the structure kinda falls apart after that backdrop. And then Styles hits a plancha where...I didn't really know what was supposed to hit whom. It looked like AJ changed his momentum to purposely not hit Cena, but then Cena sold it. Styles does crash and burn spectacularly on a missed dive afterwards though. Boy the pace I enjoyed so much at the start of the match sure has turned quite methodical. Cena is working like he's hurt, not in selling injuries, but just in a way that feels like he's not fully healthy. We have hit the part of the match where finishers are hit followed by lots of lying around. Styles catches knees on a 450, which is probably because he waited 90 seconds to hit it after Cena kicked out of the Styles Clash. And more lying around. I'm all for selling, but they're not laying this thing out in a very interesting way.  A ref bump was not something I was personally hoping for, either. Club interferes, puts AJ on top for the win. At least AJ won? I'm sure they will have several matches so I understand not doing a good finish in the first match, but the final 5-7 minutes of this were just really boring to me. It felt like they were going for drama that they hadn't earned. The long lying around selling followed by getting up and running around felt like the worst terceras of the worst CMLL main events. Both of these guys are good, and I'm sure they have a real good match in them. This started out like that match, but it wasn't that match by the end.

8. Money in the Bank Match: Chris Jericho vs. Cesaro vs. Sami Zayn vs. Alberto Del Rio vs. Kevin Owens vs. Dean Ambrose

ER: Jericho is doing some of the more interesting character stuff than at any time over the last several years, but his ringwork has gotten so lousy, and he hasn't adapted his style in the least, that it makes me just hope he decides to stop wrestling. He just looks so slow and bad in there. There are some big moves to start, but also notice that everybody taking the big moves is REALLY bad at occupying themselves while waiting to take a move. Jericho just stands there holding a ladder forever while waiting for Cesaro to hit his senton off the apron, 4 guys just stand at ringside patiently waiting for Zayn to hit a flip dive, they just aren't even pretending they're doing anything other than waiting to get hit. Cesaro hits running uppercuts on everybody and Sami Zayn has been gone for like 5 minutes. Owens too. Ah, now Owens comes in a hits cannonballs on everybody, and then Cesaro takes a nasty running face first bump into a ladder set up in the corner.  I'm not sure what possibly kept Zayn hurt for so many minutes, because when he reappears he is a house of fire. But pretty soon we're back to 4 guys disappeared and selling injuries off camera. Man you expect that kind of stuff in these but it seems really bad here. But holy cow Cesaro jumping from the ladder into a springboard uppercut looked amazing. We do get plenty of big moves into ladders, but the layout with guys just waiting around doing nothing until it's their turn to do a stunt is just out of control. I get it, shit hurts. But the way they're playing it you can literally predict who's turn it is to come in and take their turn to do something painful.  I've only missed one of my guesses so far. We take a preposterously long time to set up all 6 guys fighting while standing on ladders. ADR takes a flat out lunatic bump off a falling ladder, trying to land feet first on the top and basically doing a split legged moonsault to himself. We get many minutes of guys failing to climb well, until Ambrose climbs better than them to win! Well, this stunk.

9. Rusev vs. Titus O'neil

ER: Lana's faces while standing behind Rusev are the best. And Rusev and Titus smack into each other really hard to start, and Rusev gets tossed into the barricade. Before long Rusev is smothering him in the ring while trash talking Titus's kids. Rusev throws a lot of really good knees. Rusev's high kick and superkick both look great, Titus looks like he's scared of tearing a lat most times he does a move. And WOW Rusev won clean in the middle on Father's Day in front of Titus's kids!! Holy cow, they brought in his kids to watch their dad lose!! That's vicious shit right there. Happy Fathers Day!!! Rusev couldn't have looked much stronger in victory. He mostly steamrolled Titus here. Back down the card you go, O'Neill. Shouldn't have touched Vince that one time.

10. Seth Rollins vs. Roman Reigns

ER: According to chants, Roman apparently can't wrestle. Which not coincidentally sounds like the feeble screams of hundreds of micropenises. This was worked a little slower than I was hoping for, and I'm still confused who is supposed to be booed and who isn't. Rollins has some pretty light offense here, but there are some nice sequences. Loved Reigns backdropping Rollins, Rollins landing on his feet, but then getting blasted by a Superman punch. Rollins countering a spear with a kneelift was nice too. Rollins is really working as gutsy babyface returning from a knee injury, and the whole announce crew is selling it as such. Except for Byron Saxton, who I swear is just most useless fucking body. The whole PPV all he did was occasionally loudly say somebody's name when it was quiet. It would go quiet and then in an over-annunciated speech you would just hear. "ROMAN...REIGNS." Saxton is such a fucking zero. Those spots where they fight endlessly on the turnbuckles really don't look good. I'm honestly pretty bored during this one. It just feels way too long. Certain sequences feel repeated. Some stuff is looking really impressive, like Reigns brutal missed spear into the rail. The brawling has looked pretty sloppy. The fighting on the knees spot was pretty flimsy, especially after watching Black Terry do an expert version of the same moment earlier in the day. They went out and tried to have an epic war, and there was a lot that worked. I think they should have consolidated things a bit, maybe trimmed like 25% of the match, got to some things quicker. But I do actually like how they handled the ending, as I definitely didn't expect Roman to lose. It seems like such an anti-WWE move to give a guy like Rollins the title after being laid up for 7 months. The Money in the Bank stip does nothing at all for me, but I like that Ambrose immediately cashed it in, as then I won't have to see any stupid months and months of suitcase teases, and a guy dorkily carrying around said suitcase. And it makes the main event scene more interesting than it otherwise would have been with a Reigns win. Maybe I'll have second thoughts after thinking about it for a bit, but this seems like a neat way to freshen things up a bit. And maybe Ambrose will start looking better now that he's away from Jericho, and into actual important programs.

ER: So, I didn't like the PPV. A lot of it was boring. The two big singles matches fell flat with me, and the ladder match was a bunch of guys killing themselves in a stupidly laid out bad spotfest. And the undercard matches weren't really put in a position to succeed. There were individuals I liked, but nothing at all that I really liked. BUT, I'm oddly optimistic about things going forward, as even though I didn't care for the overall matches I'm excited for a Styles/Cena rematch, excited for the various Shield clashes, excited to see different stuff from Corbin and Rusev, so it's an odd feeling to not really enjoy much of what I just watched, while being interested in what's to come. So I guess I couldn't call it a failure.

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WWE TLC 2015 Live Blog

1. Sasha Banks vs. Becky Lynch

ER: They start with this ugly, endless sketch where Team BAD sing a terrible, cringeworthy 12 Days of Christmas rendition that....I'm not sure what was supposed to be accomplished. Was it to get Banks booed in her hometown? Who is the heel in this though? You have a hometown heel who the crowd wants to cheer, who then is forced to do an unfunny and unprepared segment to start the match, and the crowd is then just left quiet. I love the early armwork and loved Becky's ankle pick on a Banks leap frog. We hit the Banks transition and Lawler says that Banks has controlled the whole match, even though literally the exact opposite thing has happened the whole match. The facials Banks makes in between moves is great. She knows how to shit talk and make great cocky faces. I love when she shit talks mid-move and it blows up on her, like slapping Lynch and talking shit leading to her getting blasted with an elbow. Her crossface submission looks good and I liked Lynch fighting up out of it, with Banks trying to stomp the backs of her knees. Match as a whole didn't do a whole lot for me as I didn't care much about Lynch's comebacks.

2. Tag Title Ladder Match: The New Day vs. Lucha Dragons vs. Usos

ER: This starts off immediately fun with guys taking bumps to the floor, and Kofi and Kalisto doing stereo springboards onto either side of a set-up ladder. Dragons hit sloppyish moonsaults to the floor, and Usos do a stereo dive into all guys, while the guys on the floor shield themselves with a ladder. Somehow diving into a ladder doesn't hurt the Usos, it only hurts the guys taking the dive. Big E and Kofi trap an Uso in a ladder in the corner, and do all sorts of violent chokes and strikes to him, capped with a Kofi running dropkick. The other Uso gets suplexed onto the same ladder. Kalisto hits a nice bombs away over a ladder, and Sin Cara does a nice cattle branding with a ladder, then does a balls out nuts swanton to the floor onto a ladder with both Usos underneath. Daaaaamn. Oh shit, Kalisto climbs the ladder with Big E under it, and E starts fucking BENCH PRESSING the ladder while Kalisto climbs, so the ladder is tilting and at a 45 degree angle while Kalisto bails and flies into the Usos. Crazy visual when they cut to the wide shot to see E lifting that ladder. Kalisto does a 450 onto the Usos under a ladder, after being vaulted into it by a Sin Cara monkey flip. Jeez. And then he tops is all by hitting his sliced bread finisher off the top of one ladder, through another ladder set up horizontally. And then Sin Cara hits a springboard swanton. Lucha Dragons could get over huge after this match. An Uso hits a frog splash from the top through a ladder with E underneath. Aww shit Xavier throws his trombone at Kalisto!! Damn he really tossed that thing at him hard. Fun crazy match. Could be a star making performance from Kalisto if they choose to follow up on it (har har har). Not only were his spots crazy, but he did a good job of making his set up strikes and everything looked good. His punches while balancing on a ladder were especially impressive, and when those look good then doing your crazy finisher off the top of the ladder is just going to mean more.

3. Rusev vs. Ryback

ER: I love a big hoss match, but for much of this it felt like they were trying to do spots where two big lugs crash into each other, but they weren't making those spots look very impressive. I get how to huge dudes trying and blocking each other's suplexes could look cool, but it just looked like two guys taking turns hopping into place. The stuff that looked best (Rusev's chokes) got deemphasized quick, in favor of "Ryback agility spots" like his middle buckle dropkick and his crossbody. The Ryback agility spots seemed way too out of place in this, and Rusev came out of this looking bad. We had a match where Ryback took 80% of the action, then Rusev only permanently goes ahead by Ryback getting stalled by Lana AGAIN, and then Rusev hitting his nice superkick. Lana is fucking great at her part, but man they did Rusev no favors here. But really they've been doing Rusev no favors for almost a year now.

4. Chair Match: Jack Swagger vs. Alberto Del Rio

ER: Boy a chair match seems impossible to pull off under their PG rules. Feels like a match that has a chance to be violent, but is hard to make look violent to the fans unless the guys just actually get hurt. I can appreciate how nice Del Rio does worked shots to the stomach and throat, but fans like hearing and seeing big meaty thwacks. Swagger taking a chair to the throat off a Vader Bomb attempt looked great and was almost missed by the cameras. Del Rio throws about a dozen chairs on Swagger's body, and Swagger terribly sells this by acting as if he were unconscious. He doesn't even flinch for ANY of the chair throws. Just lies there, breathing heavily, getting chairs thrown at his body. Give me a little writhing, a little AGGGGGGHHH, I don't care if it's cartoonish, make me actually think you're getting hit with fucking chairs, because DUDE, you're getting hit with fucking chairs. It doesn't matter as a minute later Swagger is back in the ring hitting Del Rio with chairs. Del Rio returns the favor by being in the Patriot Lock for an eternity and immediately not giving a shit about it once he's out of it. Man this blows. Swagger has taken nothing but chairs to the body, so naturally keeps trying to do his Swagger Bomb with his battered body. ADR at least set up the corner stomp spot nicely by trapping Swagger in the corner and beating the shit out of him. The visual of Swagger getting stomped into chairs looked good. ADR immediately sells his ankle for the first time right when the match ends. Little of this meant anything to me.

5. Elimination Tables Match: Wyatt Family

ER: So they're doing individual eliminations, which means we should be getting a bunch of bodies through tables here. I thought Rhyno looked really good in the Raw multiman, and he and Strowman looked like they were lacing into each other. Harper and Bubba were throwing big blows too. Once things spill to the floor and table spots start getting set up, the match gets pretty boring. There were a couple decent individual moments, like Dreamer and Bubba going nuts on Strowman with kendo sticks, and then burying him under tables. Harper looks really good throughout, and his big man tope putting Dreamer through a table looked good. Bubba setting up the lighter fluid spot gets the crowd to actually make noise, and then in a hilarious fuck you Harper hits a nasty superkick to Bubba's throat and Strowman puts him through the table before it's lit. So the Wyatts ran through Team ECW, which is what should have happened, but the match wasn't very good.

6. Kevin Owens vs. Dean Ambrose

ER: Owens controls a lot of the start, but he's good at it, good at standing on Dean's throat and tossing on a snug side headlock, nice back elbow, then also flies into Dean's back elbow and gets rocked over the top with a lariat. I loved Owens scouting the Ambrose 360 lariat and catching him, then tossing him into the barricade with a fallaway slam. These two seem like they match up well on paper, but none of their matches have worked for me. You think Owens is a nasty asskicker, and Ambrose is a scrambly babyface with great comebacks, but nothing ever gels to make their matches against each other memorable. Both guys can have better matches against inferior opponents, than against each other. I like the rana out of the powerbomb finish, but the build within their matches just does nothing for me. Both men do spots, but none of the moves each guy takes ever causes either man trouble when trying to hit offense, it just feels like filling time.

7. Paige vs. Charlotte

ER: So I also don't get who is the heel here. Charlotte is a face acting like a heel who will do anything to win, and Paige is acting like a heel who should be a face. Sounds like another combination that will equal a quiet crowd. And jesus do they still think toting her father around with her is hoping Charlotte get over? They've been doing it for fucking months now. Flair gets a reaction, but it just acts as a constant visual reminder that Charlotte needs a LOT of help getting over, like they're afraid of her reaction if not with her father. But the reaction WITH her father is hardly there. They are still desperately constantly saying Flair is her father, she learned from the best, because her father is Flair, she's just like her father, who's 16 time world champion Ric Flair, blah blah blah. It's not making a difference. Charlotte aping Flair spots is just brutal. Charlotte seems like a natural heel, but the Flair spots are just so bad.

8. TLC World Title Match: Sheamus vs. Roman Reigns

ER: Boston crowd immediately distracted with Cena chants. Reigns' mounted elbows looked really good. Sheamus gently tosses a ladder into Reigns. Reigns feebly bumps into the barricade. Both guys are moving startingly slow for the first minute of the match. Sheamus takes a nice backdrop bump over the barrier because Sheamus always takes big bumps. And match starts to get good when it's based around Sheamus taking wild bumps. He sprawls through tables and set-up chairs and tables set up on chairs. He gets a big scrape on his arm and the deep red looks cool against his pale skin. Sheamus always bruises up well. Chair shots start looking more nasty, Reigns throws some nice rights, Sheamus hits an awesome lariat after luring Reigns in to do the apron dropkick. Sheamus does a huge White Noise through a table and Roman ends up grabbing Sheamus' foot getting back in the ring. Sheamus does this great look of disgust at Reigns. All of Reigns' punches and strikes look good in this. His superman punches have been on point. Sheamus takes a couple crazy moves onto and through ladders. One to the floor was sick. Reigns takes a super ill-advised bump off the ladder into the ropes, reaching his leg out for the ropes for some reason, like he was actively trying to tear an ACL. But then Reigns runs up the ladder with a superman punch that sends Sheamus flying off the ladder into a table. That looked great. ADR and Rusev run in. Rusev sells the superman punch really great, dropping to his knees and face planting. Match itself was really good and violent. Reigns flops again when faced with obstacles, but both men matched up really nicely. It's the kind of thing that works better in a vacuum, as the crazy violent spots come at the end of a night filled with crazy violent spots. Everybody wanted their spots to look violent, and while I think the ones in this match were more violent than most of the others on the show, it still feels silly to have to think "was that the best or the 6th best table spot we've seen tonight?" HHH comes out and leans about as far out of the superman punch as possible. Reigns threw like 6 superman punches in the match itself, and they all looked great and everybody went face first into them. So leave it to HHH to bump 3 feet early when it's his turn. Stephanie always seems to be making the wrong faces, like she doesn't understand actual human emotion. Roman throws some more nice rights and HHH takes a powerbomb into an announce table. The long build up of HHH being helped up by tons of officials while Reigns walks away, into Reigns sprinting back to spear him was awesome. Sheamus has been selling for like 8 minutes.

So, I liked the tag team ladder match and the main event. That's two more matches than I liked on the last PPV so there's an easy step-up. Still didn't feel like a great show, possibly didn't feel like a good show. I'm almost always left feeling like a specific match should have been better. That's a feeling that's been with me for months now concerning WWE, seems like every match should just be better. Sometimes it feels like the fed is actively working to have the matches not be better. Is this just me?

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WWE Survivor Series 2015 Live(ish) Blog

So I basically have not been watching any WWE television. If I remember something is on then I'll flip over to the channel, see if anything catches my eye. The product is not doing a whole lot for me right now. I'm going into this not knowing literally any of the matches on the card. That sounds like a terrible idea.

1. Traditional Survivor Series Match: The Miz, Bo Dallas, Stardust & The Ascension vs. Neville, The Dudley Boyz, Titus O'Neill & Goldust

ER: Kind of hilarious that we get a "traditional" Survivor Series match on the pre-show of Survivor Series. Can't have this Survivor Series shit getting in the way of Survivor Series. And woof that is one dogshit 5 man team right there. I mean good lord. The team name should be "The 5 guys Eric would switch channels to avoid". I mean come on. I'm watching you BLIND Survivor Series, and this is what you immediately do to me!? But I cannot skip it, because they had to throw Goldust into the thing. And he was the 10th guy announced. If it had been pretty much 90% of the rest of the roster, it would have been skippable. But I gotta watch any and all Goldust. And he immediately eliminates Viktor with his gorgeous powerslam. I'm not too broken up about that. Titus' corner strikes on Konnor look really good. Konnor's jumping elbowdrop on Ray looked pillowy soft and terrible. Neville gets a fun flurry against Stardust and then gets pinned by a bulldog. We're going into dumbshit quick pin mode. This is mostly awful. Cody punches Goldust in the ear and things get better. Bo Dallas has a shitty chinlock. Match ends awhile later. Nothing to see here. Goldust looked good. None of the eliminations had any build or meant anything. This is clearly a horrible idea of mine.

Byron Allen (?) says that match reminded him of all the Survivor Series matches from when he was a kid. Yeah. There's zero chance this match reminded anybody of anything.

2. Roman Reigns vs. Alberto Del Rio

ER: Roman is getting what they call a "Cena reaction". Del Rio looks like a star. He looks like he's in the best cosmetic shape of his career. He looks pretty massive. I didn't realize he was larger than Reigns. Del Rio looks really good throughout this. Dug his hotshot and enziguiri, then he takes a nice thud on a Fuerza bump. Reigns takes a nice ringpost bump. ADR makes me buy his missed double stomp off the top. He did a real great knee buckle stumble sell. JBL tries to make it out like he faked that knee buckle as part of a strategy, but faking a knee injury to take a superman punch sounds like a pretty fucking stupid strategy. I liked ADR in this, and the match got about 14 minutes to do something, but didn't do much for me. They tried to make the stretch run dramatic, but really they just had ADR lock in the armbar a couple times only to have Roman power out. Kinda made all the babbling about a weak shoulder come off as a shrug. Nice individual moments. Pretty unfulfilling as a whole.

3. Dean Ambrose vs. Kevin Owens

ER: There's a fat guy in the crowd clearly telling his woman the back story on every match so far. You can totally tell. He's pointing at each guy and leaning in, you can just picture him saying "alright so this guy beat a guy named Dolph Ziggler. I know, right? I don't know. Yeah it's probably not his real name. But Ambrose. Yeah the skinnier guy. He beat Ziggler. This is a semi-final. There's a whole tournament." And boy this isn't doing a whole helluva lot for me either. And as I type that they start to win me over. Owens hits a mammoth superplex, Dean hits one of his best ever rebound lariats, Ambrose eats a couple nice superkicks, takes a gross slam into an announce table. But the build for these matches has done absolutely nothing for me. Both have come off like guys doing moves with no consequences. I mean jesus even though I thought they looked nasty, in the last minute of the match Dean got slammed into the announce tables, took two superkicks, and then still got the pin.

The SNES commercial for TLC looked really great. The Reigns superman punch animation was perfection.

4. Ryback & The Lucha Dragons & The Usos vs. New Day, Sheamus & King Barrett

ER: Unhip Sheamus made me chuckle saying they were gonna get jiggy on these poseurs. Big E avoiding eye contact with him afterwards was perfect. Woods has an amazing James Brown pompadour with a ducktail mullet. The construction of the whole thing is really impressive. Sadly it will probably all tumble down after one bump. Sheamus takes a couple really great bumps to the floor working Sin Cara: one nice tumbling one landing on his side, and taking an enziguiri and bumping on his knees to the floor. Ouch. Ryback hits one of the ugliest dives ever, but we'll just go A for effort on that one, like when Road Dogg tried to moonsault off a cage. This whole thing is pretty fun. Big E's spear to the floor is such a brutal spot. New Day is probably the best possible use of Kofi ever. He doesn't have to do tons of offense and let Big E carry the load. New Day ditching Sheamus kinda makes sense, and Sheamus works shockingly well with smaller workers. I loved him stomping on Kalisto's hands. Sheamus did about as good a job as possible holding down the fort without a team. This elimination match was a massive step up from the garbage one on the pre show.

5. Paige vs. Charlotte

ER: Charlotte has never impressed me before. Paige has a really great abdominal stretch, pressing down hard on the side of Charlotte's head every time she wrenches it in. Paige also takes a mean electric chair bump onto the apron. Charlotte's rolling headscissors was both goofy and painful looking, so it gets a pass. But it's not as nasty as Paige's surfboard lock or her great knees in the corner. But those were not as nasty as Charlotte's scream and face after hitting a so-so spear. Match overall was pretty decent. Charlotte still doesn't do much for me. I don't think she has much body charisma, and a lot of her offense feels very dependent on somebody leaning way into her offense.

6. Tyler Breeze vs. Dolph Ziggler

ER: Ziggler has an updated look on mid 90s cruising attire Shawn Michaels. Even has those same awful boots. Kenny Omega douche hair + Shawn Michael lube guy at the fisting station gear = profit?  Match itself was decent enough for a completely heatless affair. Both guys did some things that looked cool, also never made me care about the things they were doing. Some of this may be the announce team. The announce team is the ultimate limp dick tonight. They sound rehearsed to say what is happening in front of them, while also not making it important or interesting or dramatic. It's a brutal combo. Breeze bumps into Dolph's stuff well, flying into a dropkick and planting himself on a flapjack. Announcers push this as a HUGE win for Breeze, but really it would have been far more shocking to everybody if Ziggler would have won. That dude loses to everybody, and has been doing so for years.

7. Wyatt Family vs. Undertaker & Kane

ER: Undertaker's slow menacing walk to the ring looks less doomy and more accident victim learning how to walk again. But in the ring he looks spry enough against Harper. Kane takes an awesome bump over the announce table. Cole is desperately trying to push every single Undertaker movement as "ANOTHER CLASSIC #UNDERTAKERSURVIVORSERIESMOMENT!!!" He's beyond insufferable. Braun takes a fine bump through an announce table, Undertaker impresses me by getting Harper up for a Tombstone eventually, and really this was Undertaker going through some greatest hits so Cole could cream his jeans and scream VINTAGE!

8. Dean Ambrose vs. Roman Reigns

ER: This was pretty easily the best match of the night, but that wasn't really saying a whole bunch. I almost always like it when Shield guys match up, and this match was short for them (about 10 minutes) but was worked at a quick 10 minute match pace. I don't care for the spear as a death finisher, but Ambrose is great spilling all around for Reigns, and I liked the kneeling punch exchange. Also thought Ambrose looked badass with his torn shirt from the previous Owens match, made him look like a hero towards the end of an action movie.

Sheamus cashes in MITB afterwards, and yeah that concept is pretty beyond played out. It's an amusing dick move to cash in on Reigns while Reigns was celebrating in his massive confetti pile Good lord whoever ordered confetti accidentally checked the "case" measurement instead of individual confetti packages, so on the "Confetti Celebration Dial" instead of getting "Tasteful World Title Celebration" we ended up getting "Rip Taylor Just Died Two Days Before Pride Weekend and We Must Celebrate His Memory".

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WWE Elimination Chamber 2015 Live Blog

Been a while since we did one of these, EC is usually my favorite WWE gimmick match, and while I don't know the card outside of Cena/Owens, I'm stoked.

1. Zack Ryder vs. Stardust

ER: This was on the kickoff show, and man I'm glad I rewound to see what I missed. Who could have missed out on a Ryder match!!?? They had a pretty tidy little 6 minute match, didn't make me regret watching it. I don't understand one iota of the Stardust character, but I like Cody as a wrestler more than most people, it would seem. I like the little things he adds to moves, takes a couple extra steps that others don't. For his reverse roll the dice finisher I dug how he pinched Ryder with a nerve hold to make him drop a bit to put him in better position to do the move. Most guys would just awkwardly and cooperatively bend the guy back right out of the gate. Ryder has some decent stuff in this, really liked his dropkick off the apron. Fun little match.

ER: Just saw Macho Mandow and Axelmania for the first time and.....wow. The last thing on my TV with less legs was Oscar Pistorius (take that Pistorius! I knew we'd get some use out of the 2011 Unused Segunda Caida Joke Folder).

2. New Day vs. Los Matadores vs. Lucha Dragons vs. Ascension vs. Cesaro/Kidd vs. Prime Time Players

PAS: Kind of mess, but a fun mess. Loved Cesaros tribute to Nick Gage face wrap, just kind of made me wish Nick Gage was in this match. Rey was always the king of these Elimination Chamber matches, and Kalisto is no Rey, he kept climbing and almost falling. He kind of looked like Homicide when almost fell off a cage on the first Monday TNA show. Really liked the couple of crazy El Torito dives, probably should have left the highspots to him. Match probably could have used Rowan and Harper, they would have been way better then the bush league Ascension (as would the H8 Club, hey WWE sign Nick Gage) in the role of team who cleans house before the main event run. Really liked the New Day v. PTP section, Titus was wrecking people, and the PTP flew around for him. Finish with everyone chopping him down was really cool. Would have loved this back last year when the tag division was really killing it, think about how much better this would have been with Rhodes Brothers, Wyatt Family and Shield.

ER: Out of all the teams that could have started this match I must say that Ascension was right at the bottom of my wishlist. If we started with Cesaro/Kidd opposite the Dragons they could have done some big things. They've been tearing up TV lately. I love Torito standing on top of the Matadores pod, like a little gargoyle. Sin Cara's swanton off the pod was impressive but took forever to set up, and then Kalisto sold on the New Day's pod for days. But we got a wild Cesaro uppercut and superplex out of it at least. I thought the Kalisto spot was awesomely goofy, much better than Homicide literally getting stuck at the top of the TNA mouse trap cage. I was hoping Kalisto would just spider cling to the top of the cage for the whole match. It would have been the greatest twist on the old "Jimmy Hart hiding under the ring during the battle royal". The strength to climb upside down like that is just nuts. Serious question: have there ever been more than 5 black dudes in a WWE ring at once? New Day vs. PTP may have made history, people. It depends how many members the Nation had and if they ever went up against a team featuring Ahmed Johnson. Overall I thought this match was pretty bad, really disjointed. I think New Day looked pretty awful, although most of that was Kofi. I don't think the tag team chamber concept worked very well. It just leaves too many guys in the ring and too much waiting around for spots to happen.

ER: Rusev is apparently out with a broken foot so WHO will replace him in the chamber?! I'm hoping for Savio Vega myself.

3. Nikki Bella vs. Naomi vs. Paige

PAS: This is not the WWE Women's wrestling everyone is talking about right? Awkard mess of a match with a couple of nice potatoes by Nikki Bella, and some really awkward bumps on the head. Kind of reminded me of a IWA-MS rookie match where meth-heads would try puro moves they couldn't do to impress Ian Rotten. Didn't look like something that belonged on a professional stage.

ER: I don't think a 3 way dance is going to make anybody look that good, so I personally wouldn't rush to judge the "new and improved" Divas division. Also, Naomi works much better as a face. She had a great face moveset. Her heel stuff isn't nearly as good, though the Rear View while Nikki had Paige in a fireman's carry was nice. Ending was super awkward with the botched reverse rana and then Nikki just hitting her finish. I've seen all three women look way better, and yeah, 3 ways stink.

4. Kevin Owens vs. John Cena

PAS: Man Cena may be the best indy dream match worker ever. He is really great at putting over the ROH roster. Owens deserves a ton of credit, the trash talking and stiffness really added a ton to the Cena formula, and I loved that crazy throw off the top rope, and his almost package piledriver. It has been a long time since every WWE main event was guys doing their opponents finisher, so those spots were still novel, and fit nicely with what Owens was trying to do. Cena is a master of working his formula, like Flair or Santo or Choshu he can plug someone in, and let them provide the flourishes. I thought there was a decent chance of Owens going over, but clean as a sheet in the middle of ring was a bit of a surprise. Wouldn't think a guy who according to my wife looks like a slightly fitter Kevin Smith, would be the indy guy who would get the full push, but it seems to be working.

ER: I really love matches where Cena works from under, as he's really great at taking moves (that DDT with him bumping it the way Christian used to bump DDTs??) and selling. So him vs. modern indie workers is a pretty satisfying match up since many of these guys have large movesets. It's a trip seeing Cena take all these big indie moves and it's so obvious he would be colossally over in PWG or Evolve. Owens was put in a big spot here as he controlled like 80% of this and always knew what he was doing next, always building to things, and his execution was spot on throughout. Owens going over clean in the middle was awesome and I will always love shocked and said cutaways to fans in the crowd. Steen broke out tons of cool things and I loved Cena's little comebacks: him grabbing Owens' leg when Owens was mocking him with the fistdrop, dropping butt first on Owens from the top, Owens leaning face first into a Cena lariat, and I really really love Cena's springboard stunner. It's kinda goofy, but I think it works and is a good addition to Cena's moveset. It's still wild to see Steen in the ring, still looking like Steen, gym shorts and a sleeveless T, wrestling exactly like Steen. Just not something I thought would happen, and I couldn't be happier that it is. Great showing from both guys here, really every step of the way in the match.

5. Bo Dallas vs. Neville

ER: Boy "Neville" has to be the stupidest example of WWE shortening names to one word. Who would want to buy a shirt that just said "Neville"? And boy this was a dud. Bo Dallas has come back to absolutely no heat, and people did not care to watch him for 8 minutes. Him working his schtick to total silence is uncomfortable, like when a SNL sketch is really dying. Neville obviously has some cool offense but one minute in he's already hitting a chinlock. Dallas took a nice bump to the post, but seemed to gas real early. This was not worthy of being on the PPV. Stardust/Neville would have matched up better, then Dallas could have been relegated to the kickoff show.

6. R Truth vs. Sheamus vs. Ryback vs. Mark Henry vs. Wade Barrett vs. Dolph Ziggler

PAS: Oof what a mess. We had some ok big man brawling and Ziggler bumping, but the match completely fell apart when Sheamus couldn't get out of his pod. You would think veterans would be better at improv-ing. Always happy to see Mark Henry, but he didn't do a ton here. When Sheamus got in he beat on some folks, but this was long off the rails by then. They did some tired Ziggler v. Sheamus counter wrestling, and a Sheamus v. Ryback section, which was really nasty but weirdly paced. I can't ever remember seeing an Elimination chamber this bad.

ER: WHY WAS THIS SO BAD!? I have seen Chamber matches with far worse guys than this, and I believe this was the only chamber matched I've ever actively disliked. God this was boring. That Sheamus stuff was laaaaame. Especially since we've seen guys break out of their pods before, and we've seen pods get broken by guys getting thrown into them. But there's Sheamus, lightly smacking the pod with his palms and begging refs to let him out. Just kick the fucking thing down, man! This whole thing was worked half speed. Watch Ryback feebly pump his arm while the crowd tepidly mumbles "Feed Me More". Everybody lies around, other times people just stand watching each other.  Dolph flew into some stuff the way Dolph can fly into stuff, Henry as the replacement could have been a big moment but he hardly did anything and also spent tons of time just lying on the apron, waiting. A lot of times guys would be lying around selling after not even taking offense. They would do a move to somebody else and then get out of the way, but couldn't think of a better way to get out of the way than lying on the side breathing heavily. Cole says "Sheamus has never won the IC championship, says it's on his bucket list!" and just picturing anybody saying that winning the IC title is on their "bucket list" makes me laugh, but in a sad kinda way. Just imagine Sheamus cutting a promo going down a checklist "Kiss a girl at the top of the Empire State Building", "Tour the Old Bushmills Distillery""Win the IC Championship". Ryback, Sheamus and Henry looked like somebody ground up a bunch of Somas into their protein shakes. Ryback's powerbomb into the ring on Sheamus looked good, but man this really was the worst Chamber match ever.

ER: I'm taking a break before the main to watch Grace Helbig. My spirits need to be lifted in some way.

7. Seth Rollins vs. Dean Ambrose

ER: This Corpus Christi crowd has been silent death almost the whole night. The only thing Corpus is good for is going fishing, and making sure you get yourself seen around town while a shady P.I. back home is murdering your estranged wife and her lover/your bar employee. I wasn't feeling this match BEFORE they went to some throwback Malenko/Guerrero 2 counts (is there any move sequence that needs a retirement more than that?) but they brought me back in with that Ambrose dive and both tumbling over the table. But then they lose me again by doing a stretch where they kept going for pins after each move. We still get some nice moments, like Rollins bumping the rebound lariat, and Ambrose hitting his wild elbow to the floor on Rollins' goons, but this just never gelled for me. I think TV length singles matches just seem to work best for some of these guys. This was maybe my least favorite Ambrose singles match in a year, and I just typed that BEFORE they announced the fucking horrible finish. Oh man. Fuck this show (props to Owens/Cena though, a nice little gem hidden in a massive pile of shit).

PAS: Yeah this wasn't very good, this went the extra 10 minutes that the Owens v. Cena matches avoided. It really felt like those guys were trying to work a PWG match which really sucks when you are just waiting around for the bad finish to happen. I really liked the tope and some of the bumping, but it all felt formless and meaningless. A straight Dusty Finish did make me kind of nostalgic honestly. They should have brought out Tommy Young just for the hell of it.

ER: Hopefully Silicon Valley and Veep continue to deliver tonight, just so something doesn't feel like a massive waste of time for me tonight.

NOTE** Cena/Owens was good enough to nab a spot on our 2015 MOTY list, so I'll just go ahead and link to that:

2015 MOTY MASTER LIST

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