WRESTLEMANIA 35 LIVE BLOG! 4/7/19

Buddy Murphy vs. Tony Nese

ER: I was surprised at how much I was liking this early, until they got to their beyond stupid slappy Riverdance routine. Before that we got Murphy getting busted open with an errant shot, a couple hard punches, and more of the Buddy that I liked in NXT before 205. At a certain point I did find it amusing that they were doing big nearfalls and last second feet on the ropes spots, and death sell -> sprint superkick stuff in the pre-show opening, but who cares, it's Mania and these guys are in a packed stadium. Do it. The overly rehearsed strike stuff is just so garbage, impossible to look at it and not laugh, and it was really a major turning point of the match. When you choose that kind of dance wank as a major part of the match, you deserve to be laughed at. I did think some of the big things looked good, both suplexes into buckles were nasty and the Nese 450 landed flush, but I wish they would have continued the direction of the first few minutes of the match, instead they went where I thought they would go.

Women's Battle Royal

ER: Good to see they're really doubling down and sticking with the uterus/Fallopian tube trophy. They had a year to get rid of it, and either they kept it on purpose, or just forgot what the trophy was and only took it out of storage when the announce the battle royal a week ago and went "Oh right, the ovaries." And this was an awesome battle royal. This was paced out nicely, had fun moments, some good eliminations, kept eliminations brisk without doing one of those lame as hell 3 minute ones they've done before, this was an easy battle royal thumbs up from me. It's also impressive that we have so many women who are barely 5', and only Dana Brooke's (or that woman who stole Dana Brooke's identity) elimination looked silly. Asuka had a couple cool legsweep eliminations, I liked the Mandy Rose/Mickie battle on the apron (even though I wanted either of them to win), Maria had awesome show curls, Candace had a cool elimination, Lana has a cool new cut and great Wonder Woman outfit, really I liked all of this. Battle royals should be such a simple thing. They're a real wrestling joy for me but a bad one can be just as bad as anything. This was brisk but not short, people paired off well, a simple concept done well.

The Revival vs. Curt Hawkins/Zach Ryder

ER: I didn't follow how Hawkins and Ryder actually got this match (seems like a match at a single digit Mania that would have been a 3 minute squash for Revival), but I don't mind seeing weird matches at Mania. At the end of the night I'm more likely to like this match that several other things on the card. It's funny to think that these guys were teaming together over a decade ago in WWE. Who had Hawkins and Ryder on a roster for over a decade? I say that as a positive. It's great to have guys like that making money for life. And this match ruled!! This was an excellent little tag match that unexpectedly gets a perfect amount of time and really kept getting great crowd reactions all through. Curt Hawkins turned in a real good underdog babyface performance and the fans really wanted to see him win down the home stretch. That was pretty surprising to me as Revival have been internet favorites for a few years now and finally look to be rising up the card, so you get a kind of interesting crowd vibe of internet favorites vs. hometown guys. Revival are really good at cutting off a ring and all of that was compelling, from their killer Demolition Decapitation to Dawson simply shoving Hawkins into the ropes to punch him on the recoil (shaking out his fist after, naturally), all their cutoffs worked like fire. The breakdown to the match was an awesome car crash, with Wilder hitting a tornado DDT on the floor, Dawson dropping a brainbuster, all nasty stuff. I wasn't actually expecting Hawkins to break the streak here, assumed Revival would be champs for awhile, but it's great to see him get the moment at Mania. This was like the best version of a WCW syndicated tag gem, totally delivered.

Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal

ER: This was a GREAT battle royal!!! It had everything you would need from a battle royal, some big eliminations, fun twists, nice pairings, and a great finish. Everybody was trying to outbump each other on eliminations (all of Lucha House Party took appropriately large spills), EC3 splatted, Andrade eliminated himself and Apollo Crews with a great rana, No Way Jose is now apparently a cyberpunk raver from Strange Days, even Braun (looking lean and mean as hell) took a sick bump to the floor by way of ringpost introduction. You had a few big guys in there throwing down for big moments, and cameras caught Luke Harper staring a hole through Braun while looking past several other guys. All of which built to a nutso spot where Harper gets booted off the apron while suplexing Ali, and takes a bump that could have destroyed both men, leaping backwards and landing on his feet before completing the suplex, sending Ali flying fast face first into the table (barely getting his hand up). My god what an elimination. I also got to see the pairing I most wanted, my two neckless singlet boys Otis and Rhyno going at it. Everybody worked this real aggressive, and it all actually came down to a super effective comedy segment. A comedy segment in wrestling that was actually funny? I thought Jost and Che did a great job. Jost came out sporting a new Odell Beckham Jr. Browns jersey, they both had Team SNL leggings, really all of these TV comedy guys who have been in big WWE moments have totally understood how to work their personality. I laughed when Che tried to grab hands with Jost on the LONG walk to the ring, and the look on Jost's face as he pulls away. Jost calling Braun "Brock" was one of the funnier WWE comedy moments I can remember and their eliminations were ballsy and a great visual, with Braun launching Jost into a forced plancha...but DAMN did they do a great job of making it look like Jost could actually eliminate Braun. I mean it looked like something they might actually do. Every part of this match was handled excellently, one of their best battle royals in ages. Loved it.

Brock Lesnar vs. Seth Rollins

ER: They wisely put a bunch of pinks and purples on the entrance screens for Brock, which distracts from how pink and purple he is. This match has essentially the same structure as Brock/Balor, and was good, though not as effective. There were nice twists and turns in the former match, this match really didn't have any extra twists, and Rollins didn't execute the turning point ball punch as well as we've seen Bryan do it. So in a vacuum I liked this a lot, but coming after the Bryan and Balor matches it doesn't feel as special. But we get Brock absolutely destroying Rollins to start the match, attacking with tough strikes, splatting him with F5, tossing him hard into the barricade and ring, literally bouncing him across an announce table like he was skipping stones, tossing him over the top to the floor, all looking brutal. Before the bell even rings Rollins has major welts on his back. Suplex City was fun and gave us more good angles of Rollins' welts, and Brock was super game bouncing his forehead hard off the mat on every single curbstomp, but I'm just going to need a LOT more to beat Brock. Finn suitably increased how hard he hit his offense, and while Rollins bumped like a freaking man the whole match, I didn't buy Brock being felled by a few stomps. The best part of the stomps was Lesnar taking them, and Lesnar selling them like they were something that *should* put him down. Lesnar is one of our best sellers, I just wanted more of it.

AJ Styles vs. Randy Orton

ER: This weirdly feels like a match we've seen a ton, even though I don't think we've actually seen it that much. All of this was professional while being completely uninteresting to me. Neither guy looked bad, everything looked fine, just wasn't the vibe I wanted and it felt more dull than it should have felt. There were maybe a couple more slow moments and I guess the fans just absolutely not wanting that. I wasn't wanting whatever they were doing either. It didn't feel like anyone was working up to any moment, even though they didn't really make missteps.

Usos vs. Cesaro/Sheamus vs. Shinsuke Nakamura/Rusev vs. Ricochet/Aleister Black

ER: Black is wearing his Necronomicon vest that looks tremendous. And this match was a nice tasty snack; nothing significant, but a nice palette cleanser after fans kinda died off during the previous match. Cesaro showed off his Chikara skills by helping Ricochet shine, Sheamus looks like an absolute monster especially when he folds Ricochet on a brogue kick. Nakamura works with some actual energy, Usos bump big, Black looks like a guy who is going to be a major roster star, we get the 630, it's fun. This felt like an inconsequential Smackdown match, and that's just fine.

I see neon green shirt fan wore a dark shirt to the HOF ceremony. I like how he honors the sanctimony of the gala. Acts bored front row center on every other show, but the HOF is something sacred.

Falls Count Anywhere: Shane McMahon vs. The Miz

ER: Shane starts the match with some cardio, a bold move for a man who always looks like he's about to have a heart attack at a softball game. And I really wasn't expecting this one to be match of the night so far, but here we are. Shane always has that "Dad, look at me!" kid on a diving board personality in his matches, and that works even better as a heel for me. He absolutely beats the shit out of Miz here, shies away from doing his stupid fast punches that always look risible, instead focusing on short measured shots that landed hard. He was really socking Miz in the kidneys and the cheek, threw a couple hard kicks right at Miz' jaw, even smacking him with a mule kick. The Miz Dad involvement was really well done, Shane still stiffed him too, and it opened right up into a great Miz comeback. Once Miz takes over though Shane's shots become sparse and the bumps become big, Shane taking some of his most impressive pratfalls, Miz jumping him over the barricade, tossing him into railings and on the floor, Shane gets kicked off a structure and hits the back of his head on a railing, gets tossed off a ramp onto a golf cart to the floor (a really nasty high bump that he either lost control of or was stupid enough to plan it that way). Really all the big bumps felt like something went vaguely wrong, in the best way. I loved Shane splatting on the SCF, and the mammoth vertical suplex felt like an appropriately stupid Shane spot to potentially end his life. This was an excellent overdelivery.

Sasha Banks/Bayley vs. Nia Jax/Tamina vs. The Iiconics vs. Natalya/Beth Phoenix

ER: Well this is kinda dull. Natalya and Phoenix are just dragging this pace down, really not a team I'm interested in seeing. This whole thing was desert dry. Nia and Tamina disappeared for half of it after Nia got run into the steps, and the other teams couldn't match the excitement level that would have come from Nia being in it. The rest of them worked very same-y and Nia in her brief participation made things much more exciting. I think the Iiconics make the most sense with the belts, and while they still stink in the ring I've really been enjoying their promos and mannerisms lately. Them getting chased is way more interesting than the other options. The match was nothing to see though.

Daniel Bryan vs. Kofi Kingston

ER: Nuts to think that for seemingly years people filled their diapers online about how Bryan needed to be champion at Mania, and now those people are all dying for Bryan to lose the World title at Mania. I wouldn't have guessed ANYone would ever be higher than Bryan in the internet's eyes, but if I did I certainly wouldn't have bet on Kofi Kingston to be that guy. Nobody was clamoring for a Kofi Kingston World Title run 4 months ago. Nobody was demanding a main event singles run from Kofi. These people don't know what they want. I've been a big fan of Rowan's metal band shirt selection, saw him sporting Kreator a week ago. So him crossing over into horror films is a nice move. George A. Romero now has a WrestleMania reference under his belt. And this was good! We expected this to be good. Bryan is a main event megastar. I've seen him in matches where he knew exactly what to do in front of 70 fans, and here he is an absolute master at working in front of 70,000 fans. This had a feeling like it was going to be Kofi's big moment, and you could see what an awesome hand Bryan had in that. Excellent pacing and build, with big moments playing big. Kofi had a couple cool nearfalls off of flash roll ups, Bryan had a couple cool reversals into the Yes Lock, Kofi leaned into all of Bryan's crisp offense, Bryan snapped off some sharp kicks, and fans kept getting more and more into Kofi the longer this went. They really got as much time as they could have possibly wanted to give Kofi a gigantic moment, and Kofi kicking out of the big knee and hitting his best ever Trouble in Paradise (look at how manly Bryan is running face first into that thing) to win the title did it. This was clearly the moment the fans wanted (that they didn't want 4 months ago) and I'm sure giving them the moment will slow down the nitpicking and bitching and use of the phrase "shoved down our throats".

Somewhere, the Outsiders are about to sexually assault Colin Jost and Michael Che.

Rey Mysterio vs. Samoa Joe

ER: Wow, what a drag. This is the first time these two have ever met in a singles match. This could have been a legit show stealer. 1 minute matches with guys like this feels like a specific fuck you to Rey for reasons I don't care about. I was really excited for this one.

Drew McIntyre vs. Roman Reigns

ER: This was a good enough for a Roman return singles match, but didn't really set out to do a ton to make it interesting. This was worked more like a reintroduction of Reigns, which really isn't necessary, plus he was only gone for 5 months or so. This was a decent enough TV match, but isn't something I'm going to remember in a week.

Batista vs. HHH

ER: This feels weirdly late to get a Fury Road entrance, but maybe 4 years is early for WWE timing. They could have inducted Sid into the HOF and then had him as Lord Humungus during HHH's entrance. I'm bummed that LA Park vs. Rush was a match that didn't happen at Mania (originally the reason Phil and I got the idea to go to Mania), so these 50 year old brawlers will have to make up for me not seeing park throw ring steps off of Rush's head. Batista takes a hard bump into the guardrail and into the steps, HHH bounces a tool box off his head, and if they work this match like LA Park vs. LA Park then it will be my favorite match of the year. And clamping Batista's hand in channellock pliers and stomping on his hand is definitely something that can get us there. And that sentence already looks stupid one second after typing it, because in the meantime HHH ripped Batista's nose ring straight out of his face. The cameras filmed it like someone in a torture porn movie getting their teeth removed against their will. Batista is now a certified recognizable movie star who is trusted with good-size roles in expensive movies. And here he is proving himself to a bunch of ghouls in that only in wrestling way that David Arquette was and still is. Batista is bumping hard including a backdrop bump on a table that didn't budge an inch, and a spear through the next one. They're moving slower than a Park match, but they're getting up for the sick old man spots and I dig it. This loses steam at the end. Both guys are old and did cool stuff, old and slow is fine with me as long as the spots mean something. Batista bomb still looks great and for an old guy dumb bump match this delivered better than expected. Part-timer old dude millionaire geek show is such a weird only in wrestling thing.

Kurt Angle vs. Baron Corbin

ER: Kurt Angle is kind of more of a bummer to me than the weird inspirational story they're projecting this as. I guess it's a happy story that while he may be still permanently near death, it's not as blatantly public as it was a decade ago. When he was constantly on camera pilled out and getting into weird public altercations, how his body would turn purple during matches and it was scary as hell. He can't reverse what he's done to his body, but I guess seeing his eyes looking somewhat normal is a relative going out strong moment. Don't care about seeing him and Corbin, don't care enough about Corbin to be bothered either way by his winning or losing. Hopefully this is the retirement Kurt wanted and we don't see him falling off a ladder to the floor on "Joey Ryan Presents Not Just the Tip, Beyond Balls Deep" in a few years.

Bobby Lashley vs. Finn Balor

ER: We are beyond balls deep into the part of the Mania card that I have zero interest in. Finn is doing his big event blackface, which doesn't seem as blatant on a show with Tony Nese, Drake Younger, and HHH. This is a match up I don't care about, plus it already feels like I have 2x my way through it on several episodes of Smackdown. [We've gotten 5 singles matches and 9 other matches opposite each other in the last 5 months. Jesus] This was at least kept brief and the big moments looked good. Lashley's spear to the floor was nuts, Finn giving him a powerbomb was cool, and the coup de grace looked like arguably Finn's best ever. That means something.

Ronda Rousey vs. Charlotte vs. Becky Lynch

ER: ARE THEY PAYING OFF THE HELICOPTERS THROUGHOUT THE SHOW WITH CHARLOTTE LANDING AT THE STADIUM IN ONE!? It will never approach the level of badass that Ric landing on the field to face Ricky Morton was, but they did a good enough reboot of that, complete with red carpet exit. Did kinda just make me want to go back and watch the original entrance though. Robe doms was a nice touch though. Charlotte couldn't have handled the entrance any cooler. Joan Jett missed her chance to be wearing a Sonya Deville shirt (also forgot to ask if this was the first time that Deville publicly displayed on a show? If so that's pretty cool). This match starts out pretty hot with Ronda doing some of her more insane bumping, and she's always been someone who took risks. We get one of the best spots of the night when Ronda had Charlotte in a hanging armbar, then got dropkicked to the floor by Lynch and got knocked almost vertically by the apron. Ronda was taking cool bumps all through this, and at a certain point it was sadly all that was entertaining to me. It felt a little sluggish down the stretch as the match kind of needed those wild Ronda bumps to keep it going. I don't think the Charlotte stuff was as compelling and Becky kept doing that same stupid grimace the whole damn match. Ronda gets tandem hiptossed through a set up table and Becky whips herself face first right into the table and then has to do her grimace face right after for a showdown. The finish really came out of nowhere and looked bad. It was a match that started hot and hit a point where it kept petering out every minute it kept going.

ER: This was mostly a tale of two show halves. Or it could be it's a long show and I've seen a ton of wrestling the past several days, and 8 straight hours might wear on me a bit. But I think it's more that the 1st half of the show was way more fun to me then the sloggy 2nd half. I still think that show had a lot of fun stuff on it, and I enjoyed it more than I thought I would (I was not very excited by the on paper card). I liked the overall presentation and regret nothing.

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2019 Ongoing MOTY List: Ronda vs. Bayley

4. Ronda Rousey vs. Bayley WWE Raw 1/28

ER: Sorry nerds, Ronda is Ric Flair. She's just breezing into town and making every single challenger look like they have a shot, and I literally want to see Ronda against every single woman on the roster (save Tamina, because one's statements and desires can only go so far) as she'll be able to step right in and the opponent steps up and it's exciting as all hell. Ronda just cruises in, works a leg injury, and gets Bayley her biggest reaction in who knows how long. Ronda aims to finish out of the gates and Bayley does some nice damage early, which we assume is just a couple flurries before Ronda crushes her. But soon Bayley jumps all over an awkward Ronda landing and targets that leg, and suddenly Bayley looks like she has a shot at the title. I loved Bayley's leg work, big dragon screw, stomping on Ronda's leg as she twists it, and the best: catching a Ronda kick and dropping straight down with it over her shoulder and into a kneebar. It looked like Ronda's leg was gonna snap at the knee when Bayley dropped down. Ronda is someone who is going to pay constant attention to an injury, someone already so impossibly good at small detail work. Even when she leaps up to the ropes she's still wobbly on one leg. Bayley is dominating but always in danger, as Ronda in close range can still grab an arm and land shots, but Bayley is fearless and tosses Ronda with the Bayley to Belly into the barricade. Bayley kicks Ronda's ass so much that I start wondering if this is a non-title match, or if Bayley is actually going to get the title in a move that would confuse and or tickle everyone. All the nearfalls were really convincing, and seeing Bayley land a big elbow and roll into the Banks Statement was a really cool bit of friendship on display, after what Sasha went through last night. But again, Ronda is ALWAYS right in it, and snapping a sudden rolling armbar off the top was bound to happen. This was awesome. Bayley looked like more of a threat and got bigger reactions than at any other point on the main brand, and I really just want to see Ronda pair off against everyone and hope the run never ends.

PAS: I believe the story behind this match was that rather than script it out and practice it, they basically let it be called in the ring (I might be Scott Keithing this, but I do remember hearing it). The big knock on Ronda was that she needed rehearsal, but if she can pull off something this good on the fly she is pretty undeniable. Shocked at how credible she made Bayley look, Bayley has been marginalized for years, and even at her peak worked as an underdog, not a tough shooter, but in this match she is putting on brutal kneebars, and I actually bought that she might tap an Olympic Judoka. Eric hit most of the big moments of this match, but there were a lot of little cool moments too, I loved how Bayley was working the knee, and both her and Ronda simultaneously realized that she had given up her back and they had a cool scramble. Ronda can plausibly finish a match at any moment and it really adds to the match. Great finish, that rolling armbar is a great spot and a match ender for sure.


2019 MOTY MASTER LIST

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WWE TLC 12/16/18 Late Blog

Late to the show as we had a fun day seeing Emmet Otter's Jug Band Christmas at a local theater and getting pizza, getting me in a righteous Christmas mood. There are a few matches I'm into on this card (really all the women's matches have potential, even the Natalya one) and it should be fun overall. Afterward I'll watch Silent Night, Deadly Night 3.

 Cedric Alexander vs. Buddy Murphy

ER: This was a mostly fun cruiserweight opener that hits some fun flippy vibes, and it's amusing that we opened a 8 hour PPV with a big apron bump that gets blown off a minute later. It's silly, guys. But I liked Murphy a lot here, loved the great kneelift counter to Cedric's bottom rope cutter, thought he bumped really impressively for Cedric's offense (especially that big backwards bump into the barricade off Alexander's nice dropkick to the floor). I did think it went too long and thought going to the apron spot was unnecessary. Even though Murphy recovered what I thought was too quickly, I like that he immediately took the lumbar check but had his foot over the ropes. Rope escapes are an underutilized way to avoid big move kickouts, so I thought that worked to the match's favor. Overall it was good cruiser action, Murphy delivered on some of the hype I've seen from him this year, and Cedric is at least consistent.

Ladder Match: Elias vs. Bobby Lashley

ER: This didn't do a whole lot for me, felt like a poor ladder match that would get cut from a Coliseum Video. This was really dull and we also have a guitar hanging above the ring, and apparently the winner gets to use the ladder as a weapon. But then when Elias gets the guitar the bell just rings, so he won the match just by getting the guitar. So...why would it matter that he gets to use it as a weapon? This felt not only boring but rushed, there was a big bump but not a lot of interest. Majorly disappointing as Elias has been delivering as a character, but nothing about this match delivered.

Alicia Fox/Jinder Mahal vs. Carmella/R-Truth

ER: This was pretty sloppy, pretty messy, and it was worked as if it were main eventing an indy charity show. That charity show vibe worked to its advantage even if some of the execution was ugly.  We got some comedy breaks, Carmella and Truth doing a dance break when Jinder and Fox bumped to the floor, the Singh brothers getting involved and getting their culture mocked before getting tossed to the floor, Fox and Truth attempting to stumble their way through physical jokes about Fox's large hat, it all felt very crowd pleasing support the troops charity show. The work as I said was often messy, but since pristine execution wasn't really the vibe of the match it didn't affect things the same way as it would have if Murphy/Alexander had been even 1/4 as sloppy. I wouldn't expect a ton from Truth or Jinder (though I liked their early match sequence where Truth hit a crossbody for a pin and followed it up with two surprise nearfall inside cradles), but Fox has always been a favorite of mine and Carmella had been looking better so I was hoping for better showings from them. Still this was fine for what it was and kinda funny that this was what was chosen to open the actual card.

New Day vs. Usos vs. Sheamus/Cesaro

ER: Matches between these teams always have a decently high floor, but never seem quite as good as they should be, and they're almost always worked like nothing at all matters until we get to the boom boom boom finish sprint. You know those sprints, where several guys leap into superkicks as if their only plan was to get kicked in the face. Plus Woods/Kingston is easily the weakest version of New Day so we don't get any great power battles between Big E/Cesaro. But we still had some fun spots and the guys involved always work with an energy that the live crowds respond to, and that counts for a lot. I liked Sheamus hitting Woods with the brogue kick as he was bouncing in off the bottom rope (two cool reverses of that spot tonight) and Kofi's trust fall off the top onto everyone looked cool. But damn for all the times we've gotten this combination of guys going against each other, you'd think we would have more of their matches on our MOTY lists.

TLC Match: Baron Corbin vs. Braun Strowman

ER: It's a No DQ match so Gable, Angle, Crews and others just beat down Corbin so Corbin is removed from authority on Raw. But since I always fast forward through those kind of storylines I didn't actually have any horse in the game. I have no clue how Corbin has been as a leader, no clue what he had done to make him lame or whatever we were supposed to think, so I was way more interested in just seeing these two have an actual match. Corbin's best stuff has come in stips matches and the two could have done something cool. But I assume the crowd would have chosen this match over an actual match. And now I assume Vince will be back on Raw tomorrow specifically to say that Raw has sucked without him.

Tables Match: Natalya vs. Ruby Riott

ER: Nobody wants to see a Natalya featured story match, but I'm optimistic about this one as the Riott Squad has really shone when given the opportunity. And a couple minutes in we get the spot of the show so far when Riott is on the apron and Natalya runs to kick her off through a table set up on the floor, and Liv Morgan pushes her out of the way and takes a crazy backwards bump herself, right through the table. It looked great and snapped me into it. Natalya is a little clunky with some stuff, not really connecting when dropkicking a table into Sarah Logan, but the Squad is providing nice smoke and mirrors to this when Logan also goes through a table. There's some silly and kind of welcome melodramatics when Riott rubs Natalya's face onto a table they brought out with a picture of Natalya dead dad on it. Anvil coming out and interfering on behalf of his daughter is going to fuck people up BAD. Nice moment where Natalya gets Riott up in an electric chair but Riott manages to knock over the table should would have gone through, but Natalya drops her hard anyway. We get a wayyyy too long moment where Natalya pulls out a table with a full size Riott picture on it (but how is that a burn, is it some unwritten table code that going through a table with your picture on it somehow stings more? I'm not seeing how it's more humiliating). And once Natalya pulls out her dad's old ring jacket (Jesus how does that fit her so well? When was the slender Anvil period?) and does bad fake cry face you kind of know how the rest of the match was gonna go so I just wanted it over with. Natalya takes an eternity setting up the finishing spots but the powerbomb on Riott off the turnbuckles through the table looked good at least. I wish Natalya as the pushed winner of feuds wasn't a thing. This really could have been a big moment for Riott and a great heel moment for her to still win and leave Natalya crying. Natalya handling the entire Riott Squad all by herself is just wayyyy too much.

Drew McIntyre vs. Finn Balor

ER: McIntyre was so good on his post WWE indy run and I don't think he's been in anything that interested me since coming back. This one isn't going to be it. Balor is the pits and hits some absolutely comical offense in this one, it was embarrassing seeing Drew have to bump around for it. Balor's flying forearms couldn't crack an egg and his slingblade might be the worst version of any of the bad versions of that move. The best moments were McIntyre catching Balor with power spots, a big overhead belly to belly that launched him across the ring, a big back breaker, big air raid crash off the middle rope ("If he hits this it's over!" Graves says, which always guarantees we're getting a kickout). Ziggler interferes so the babyface can get a win which makes a lot of sense, but at least the big double foot stomp off the top looked really good. If Balor has to win, at least the move he won with looked better than the rest of his stuff. Last couple matches really felt like the wrong people won.

Chair Match: Rey Mysterio vs. Randy Orton

ER: Mysterio is decked out like a mini version of CMLL's Nitro (friend their live thinks he's doing an LA Park thing, and he does kinda have the gloves for it), and I'm down for this match. I weirdly liked Orton/Rey from Smackdown the most out of our WWE return Mysterio matches, they have good chemistry and haven't gotten stale even though they've worked matches dating back almost 15 years. Chairs are set all around ringside and there are a ton of them so it looks cool, looks like we could get some real mayhem. Neither guy skimps on shots in between chair moments, so it's cool when you don't see them just standing around, you get nice kicks, nice elbows, snug work in between the chair violence. We get a couple absolute banger chair spots, Rey slides belly first on a chair landing on Orton on the floor, and Rey crashes and burns on a Thesz press off the apron, crashing through a chair seat. Orton takes a headscissors that sends him into a chair in the corner, but rebounds with a nice snap powerslam to catch Rey. Graves starts talking about Randy Orton with a bunch of facts that make him sound like a sociopath date rapist, like "Orton is so good at luring people into a false sense of security" or "It's eerie how calm Orton remains while inflicting violence". So that needs to be workshopped a bit. Orton is always fun with Rey, knows how much of a bully to be with Rey's body, little actions like Rey climbing to the top and Orton just yanking his ankle with a snap of the wrist. The finish takes a little long to set up, with Orton lining up several opened chairs, but the finish itself was unique and cool: Orton tries to hit the RKO on the chairs, Rey stops it with a kick and hits a weird leg drag headscissors to send Orton face first into a chair, then hits a victory roll to a seated Orton. This was pretty easily the best match of the show so far,

Nia Jax vs. Ronda Rousey

ER: This was the match I was most excited about on paper, both have consistently delivered on the big stage this year. And I thought this was good but not as good as their best stuff. Ronda gets more confident literally every match at this point, but here I thought she maybe tried too much new stuff. Practically every weird bit of offense she pulls out winds up looking great, so I get the temptation to keep breaking out new stuff. This maybe felt a bit too much like new move exhibition in spots, even if her stuff is always cool. Nia is really big and wears it well, but I love how Ronda bounces off of her and how Nia tumbles. Ronda starts with peppered in strikes which is a way she's never really started a match, and you knew it was a matter of time before Nia caught her. When she eventually does with a big sit out powerbomb it's a cool moment, great looking bomb. Ronda has some cool reversals, a rana out of another powerbomb attempt, and I liked her fun super hang time superman punch. Nia breaks outs some stuff I love, her elbowdrop might be the best on the roster right now and is somehow weirdly the most Stan Hansen elbow on the roster; plus, she always hits and misses her legdrops with authority, and her miss was a good one. Ronda always has at least one nutty bump in a match it seems, and here there's an awesome moment where Nia smashes her arm into the ringpost (even though that didn't really seem to go anywhere). We get some awesome monkey bars spots as Ronda slips out of a cool vertical suplex into a standing rear naked and climbs all over Nia's body, and Ronda hits one of the finest crossbodies to the floor, Nia taking it with an awesome catch. The finish stretch was good though not quite as exciting as past big Ronda matches, not as dynamic of a build, but some great Ronda trash talking as she kisses Nia's fist before locking on the armbar. I really wouldn't mind if these two had more matches.

AJ Styles vs. Daniel Bryan

ER: These guys are both clearly great wrestlers, but I kinda want to see Bryan against someone else at this point. This is the 4th AJ/Bryan singles match we've gotten since Bryan came back, and they've all been fun but I'm a fan of new match ups. I was much more excited for the Mustafa Ali match this past week. I have no doubt this will be good, it's just a good thing that I've seen a lot. They've fought in WWE this year almost as much as they fought in 5 years together working the same indies. Match is kind of weird as it's slow and worked deliberately (which I dig) but the announcers keep talking about how "emotionally" each man is presenting himself. "Look at the emotion Styles is showing" as Styles is throwing a chop, "Bryan showing a lot of emotion here" as Bryan throws a kick to the liver. An announcer I don't know paints Bryan as questionable because "he never wants to have a fun time". I don't understand any of these motivations. But the boys are taking their time and it starts to pay off, Bryan working this slow mocking style with ramped up stiffness makes for some damn good Bryan. Bryan is practically acting like Naoya Ogawa as he runs into the corner to hit multiple hard dropkicks, Styles knocks Bryan silly with a lariat, Bryan hits the nastiest spot of the show when he grabs Styles in a cravate and hits a bunch of sharp knees to the side of the head before throwing him by the neck. Bryan is throwing his kicks harder than normal and working cool slapping body shots, like Bryan is just trying to work a 90s Japan shoot fight gimmick. They do a couple things down the stretch I don't like, the head kick countered with a head kick feels way too indy epic. But they do a bunch of cool stuff around Styles wrenching Bryan's ankle, hitting a fast and violent dragon screw, wrapping it around the ringpost, working a super visually effective half crab and the great calf crusher, all of that stuff was awesome. On the floor we get some cool gymnastics with Styles leaping the barricade into the timekeeper's station and blasts Bryan with a hard elbow when he comes rushing in. Finish even feels like a tribute to Bryan working PWG, getting the win with a small package battle. Needed him getting dizzy doing an airplane spin and dizzily dropkicking the turnbuckle. This was a really hard hitting match, paced in a cool deliberate style that gave it a cool fight feel. We've gotten three really good ones right in a row.

Dean Ambrose vs. Seth Rollins

ER: Oh no what's happening my WWE Network is skipping at 5x speed through this entire match oh no what is going on?

TLC Match: Asuka vs. Charlotte vs. Becky Lynch

ER: This was kind of a tale of two matches for me, sometimes switching back and forth between those two matches. It was a violent match, but also a match that took too long and looked too unnatural in endless spot set up. The former was great, the latter was tired. But it was worth sitting through the latter to get to the former. We got some great nastiness, Lynch splashed Charlotte through the announce table, except the table didn't really give so we actually got Lynch's body basically bouncing off Charlotte's ribs. And I flipped out when Charlotte hit a spear on Asuka that sent them crashing through the ringside barricade. That's a spot that was done with such conviction that it would have worked great no matter what happened to the wall. The way the wall buckled on impact looked really cool, and if it hadn't budged I think Charlotte would have compressed all her vertebrae with the speed she was charging. Charlotte also hit a big moonsault to the floor that kinda dropped Lynch and Asuka like she was doing a wild reverse DDT, and did a dumb-as-Jeff Hardy senton through Lynch on a table. Guh. While I didn't love all the work and thought the stipulation actually got in the way of them just beating ass, they worked the match like they honestly didn't like each other and that added a lot to the vibe. It needed that, and they knew it. The finish totally works and I'm happy to see Asuka back with the belt. She's taken the backseat to some super emerging women over the last year (since her big Rumble win a year ago you have Ronda debuting, Becky moving to the next level, Charlotte being a wildly resurgent heel, Bliss stepping into her heel role, Nia delivering in big matches) so I like moving her back to more spotlight with the title, while Charlotte and Lynch didn't get knocked down a peg at all. They can all continue to fight and it'll continue getting over, which is awesome. I thought this was a step below some of their other stuff together, but it was still a great way to cap a PPV.

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2018 Ongoing MOTY List: Charlotte vs. Rousey

4. Charlotte vs. Ronda Rousey WWE Survivor Series 11/18

ER: I think we were all excited about Becky/Ronda, and really at this point I'm excited for any Ronda. But I don't think anyone was expecting what we ended up getting here. Ronda is nice and tenacious to start and I love her relentlessly going after Charlotte, even jumping right back in after the ref separates them, constantly going after that arm. Ronda's greatest strength may very well be her bumps, she's a crazy bumped whose specialty is flying face first into things. You saw her excellent ringpost bumps in the Nikki match, and here Charlotte gets an opening when Ronda flies fast face first into the bottom buckle, really looked nasty. Ronda gets a busted mouth and Charlotte begins taking over. I really dug Charlotte kicking out Rousey's leg when she was on the top, even though I was dying to know what Rousey was going to do off the top. I'm going to need a Steiner 450 from Ronda. The rolling armbar off the top is a cool spot I hope doesn't start getting overused. Ronda is so great at building drama, great at selling (look at how she stood up with that rolling fireman's carry, look at the emotion she showed) and I don't think anybody has made Charlotte's spear look that great. That spear looked so nasty and Rousey's kickout was so great that I fully bought that finishing the match. Ronda is good at paying service to the work Charlotte has done to the leg, without being obvious and hammy about it, really feels like she has a grasp on complicated selling, moreso than many in WWE. I normally think Charlotte's chops look a little flimsy, but here I loved her firing out of the corner with them. Ronda getting a chest full of bruises only helped with that visual. We get the DQ finish, which is disappointing, but I like that they at least went with a full beatdown and not just a one move DQ. Charlotte beats her with a kendo stick and Ronda takes a great bump into the ring steps, and this is the first time in...I can't even remember, that the kendo stick actually looked like a dangerous weapon. Charlotte looked like a crazed psycho beating Ronda to death with a broom handle, and it took a DQ and made it a moment instead of a way out. I think it's undeniable that this is the best Charlotte has looked in ages, and it's not a coincidence it came against Ronda. Rousey is legit at this point, she's arguably the best salesman in the fed, right up with the best bumpers, and has strong offense. It's pretty shocking how great she is, this quick.

PAS: Tremendous stuff, Ronda is unimpeachable at this point, shocked at how good she has gotten in such a short time. In her first year she has had the best match of Nikki Bella's career, Nia's career, Alexa Bliss's career, Charlotte's career, Helmsley's career and Kurt Angle's career.  Loved the early scrambles in here, felt wild and completely different from your normal opening to a wrestling match. Ronda has incredible body control and she throws out some crazy stuff in the middle of a normal wrestling exchange, her judo arm flip counter of the figure four attempt into a somersault fireman's lift was wacky awesome shit. It actually reminded me of the kind of carny lunacy Ryuki Ueyama and Dokonjonosuke Mishima used to whip out in U-Style, pro-wrestling turned 15 degrees to the side with something unique and different. Ronda went face first into the turnbuckle like it was Holly Holm's fist and we get some real gritty violence. Charlotte is throwing here, she opens up a cut in Ronda's mouth with an elbow, throws some Flair vs. Garvin chops rather then her usual Flair vs. Sting chops, and lays in some big boots. Between this match, Meiko vs. Mercedes, Nia Jax potatoes and a lot of the Shayna matches it appears that WWE Joshi is moving into its Yumiko Hotta phase and I am all for it. Charlotte leaned into her size to narrow the credibility gap and it really worked. Ronda stomping around the ring talking shit only to get wasted by a spear was a great moment. I also loved Ronda mangling Charlotte's arm in the ropes, eleading Charlotte to realize it wasn't her day and wasting Ronda with some Sandman on Mikey Whipwreck level cane shots. It felt a little like they just grafted Becky's character on Charlotte, but I sort of like the idea of all the current WWE Women having to get super extra to keep up with what Ronda brings.


2018 MOTY MASTER LIST

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WWE Survivor Series 2018 Live Blog

New Day/Luke Gallows & Karl Anderson/The Colons/Sanity/The Usos vs. The Revival/Lucha House Party/The Ascension/The B-Team/Bobby Roode & Chad Gable

ER: Can I get an over/under on how many times we'll hear "Brand Supremacy" spoken on commentary tonight? I don't think we're ever going to get an actual "good" version of this type of match again. It seems impossible to have a bad version of a match with this many people, yet now you always just get a bunch of super quick eliminations, no strategy, and still somehow get people lying in holds even though there are nearly a dozen guys who are fresh. There are a ton of guys who get eliminated after taking moves that would never finish a match normally, so we clear out a bunch of guys and cut to Revival, Gable/Roode, New Day, and Usos. We do get an extremely fun trainwreck spot, dives from everyone, awesome spear to the floor from Big E, Big E tossing Wilder with great overhead belly to belly suplexes, Gable getting backdropped to the floor, a huge suplex to the floor, just a fun extended crash segment. I wasn't expecting things to come down to Revival/Usos, but I'm happy the Revival are there. I was hoping they'd get to have more of a tag match once they were alone, but it went straight into a finisher stretch. The stuff looked cool, like Revival connecting on the Power Plex, and we got some nice saves to amp things up, and it was fine. This could have been really good, but it wasn't bad at all, and that's something. Some of these teams were total non-factors, Ascension was limited to basically Viktor locking Kingston in a headlock, Sanity was gone with I think only Dane getting in the match, and you end up with a 90 minute pre-show and this match still feeling incredibly rushed.

Carmella/Naomi/Mandy Rose/Sonya Deville/Asuka vs. Mickie James/Tamina/Nia Jax/Sasha Banks/Bayley

ER: Love the huge heat Nia is getting, haven' really heard anything like that, and her blowing and dusting off her knuckles is THE BEST. Becky vs. Nia is gonna be DOPE. Right off the bat Naomi and Tamina get eliminated, and while I'm not happy with Naomi being out so early, I'll accept the sacrifice to get Tamina out of this thing. I dug the extended Rose/James section, James getting a cool heel hook reversal and Rose working a nice abdominal stretch. And before long Mickie is practically running this for Raw, working through Asuka and Sonya Deville, and they've oddly fallen into the trap this match of having all the heels be the ones taking heat. We're also getting an odd amount of partners making zero attempts to save a member from their team. Is there some rule against breaking up a pin? People are just getting eliminated left and right, a member of their team always ready to replace them but rarely ready to save them. This makes no sense. None of this feels like it has any kind of team make-up to it. But things get pretty hot once it's down to Nia/Bayley and Asuka/Deville. Nia milks heat when she comes in but takes a big bump to the floor, eating an Asuka kick after a missed charge. They do, however, their best to suck that heat out of the arena by having Deville and Bayley counted out. It was all supposed to come down to Nia, but they've taken a ton of uninteresting ways to get there. Neither of these "traditional" matches felt mapped out well at all. Still, it was smart to make Asuka the final survivor on SD as she's felt a bit too much a part of the crowd lately, it was good having her fight back against Nia and Sasha, and I like how Asuka matches up with both. I thought the end stretch was handled well, liked a lot of the Sasha/Asuka stuff, Sasha took a wild German suplex, and thought it was smart for Nia to throw Sasha to the wolves to then be able to wreck Asuka. The match didn't add up to a whole lot, really both elimination matches have been pretty mindless, but they're moving ahead perfectly with Nia. Nia/Becky is going to be fire, and Nia/Asuka until we get that match should rule.

Seth Rollins vs. Shinsuke Nakamura

ER: Everybody always looks like such a goon when they're forced to wear their brand colors. Nakamura looks like he's wearing a blue version of Green Man, and Rollins - who doesn't really need help looking dorky - isn't helped by his half/half Rawlins shirt. And the layout of this match is not something that's going to make me like this match, as we get a long slow Nakamura control to build to some lousy Rollins FIRE offense. Those topes look bad, dude. We get some nice kicks followed by a silly slap fight, then some more Rollins silliness with a buckle bomb and that beyond dumb superplex/Falcon Arrow. And it's all very serious, people. This match is definitely as uninteresting as I feared it would be. They gave it an effort but this constant back and forth with kickouts replacing actual drama just doesn't do it for me. I'm sure if Graves calls it an incredible match-up a few more times, I might come around. This felt like a lot of motion for what we got. This PPV is still turn-aroundable, but my enthusiasm is waning.

The Bar vs. AOP

ER: Does Drake Maverick always look like a smoked orange peel, or is the color on my TV all wonky? This tag match is perfectly good wrestling although it never went up to "next level" and felt about as good as something you'd typically see on weekly TV. I've not been too impressed with AOP, but like some of their clumsy power spots. It was pretty uneventful and we soon realize that the whole match was basically a set piece to have Drake Maverick pee his pants after getting scared by Big Show. Oh wow. Oh wow that's lame. Big Show was literally only out there to build to a pissed pants spot. This ain't good.

Mustafa Ali vs. Buddy Murphy

ER: This starts really good, Ali snaps off a nice rana and Murphy shoots out to the floor (much smoother than Anderson's clunky take of a rana in our first match), but Ali is crazy and gets shoved off the buckles by Murphy and flies backwards into the barricade. The replays really made it look like he flew far. Murphy also launches him to the floor after blocking another move, leading to another massive Ali bump to the floor. Murphy follows with a big tope con hilo, and Ali sells that back in the ring by hitting a superkick and reverse rana. He also makes bug eye faces when Murphy kicks out of things. Ali is clearly one of those guys who does some things I like, and then proceeds to wrestle like all of those indy guys I'm already tired of. Each man is both completely dead while also completely able to break out a sunset flip powerbomb or any other Modern Indy Offense at a moment's notice. They did things to make me care about the match early, but they quickly turned this into the same match I've seen from dozens of wrestlers in dozens of feds this year. Murphy catching Ali with a knee off the ropes at the finish looked great, and really was cool enough to be the finish. BUT, it didn't involve one or both guys flipping, so it could not finish this match. Crowd was into this and they seemed pretty dead after that tag match, so they get some credit for that.

Bobby Lashley/Finn Balor/Dolph Ziggler/Drew McIntyre/Braun Strowman vs. The Miz/Jeff Hardy/Samoa Joe/Rey Mysterio/Shane McMahon

ER: So who was the agent for these matches? Did we really need every one of these matches to start with an immediate elimination? This is bad, man. This whole concept works better when you have teams who actually want to team together; having in-fighting while also fighting with another team of in-fighters just makes for a big mess of spots. And some of the mess of spots is good! Nobody needs Shane wrestler cosplaying with armdrags, but watching him do a really stupid stunt through a table is welcome. It's wild how Mysterio has barely been back and just feels like some guy. That said, it's hilarious how easily he dispatches with Balor. You'll be shocked to know that according to Cole and Graves, that this match - just like every match that we've seen so far tonight - is ALSO an incredible match. It's just literally impossible to believe how incredible this night of wrestling has been. Everything is incredible! I'm in silent awe, like an immigrant seeing the Statue of Liberty for the first time. I can't care too much about Shane eliminating Ziggler, but it's amusing watching Lashley throw him with huge suplexes. And I dug Shane, red faced, tired getting urged to the top rope by Miz, needing to hit that coast to coast, and getting hammered out of the sky by Braun. Really just having Braun smash through everybody is the most fun this can get, and I sickly love that this comes down to Shane McMahon heroically having to stand against 3 men. We didn't get enough of Shane fighting valiantly and he went down pretty easy to Braun, whole match wound up being pretty flat. The elimination matches have all felt like set-up matches to get to bigger matches - which is totally cool - but weird to spend an actual PPV setting up matches that feel more important than the PPV. And is Braun vs. Corbin something that people want to see? This had some strong showings throughout, Miz was good as active team leader, Rey turned in a typically good Rey multiman performance, they integrated Shane about as well as possible. This is most likely the best match on the show so far, though that's not a very esteemed title.

Charlotte vs. Ronda Rousey

ER: I guess Rousey is going for geisha makeup? It...doesn't not work, I guess. I don't get why else you'd be doing the white pancake makeup if not for a geisha look, but her wrestling has been so strong that the only place she really needs to be reined in is at Sephora. Ronda is nice and tenacious to start and I love her relentlessly going after Charlotte, even jumping right back in after the ref separates them, constantly going after that arm. Ronda's greatest strength may very well be her bumps, she's a crazy bumped whose specialty is flying face first into things. You saw her excellent ringpost bumps in the Nikki match, and here Charlotte gets an opening when Ronda flies fast face first into the bottom buckle, really looked nasty. Ronda gets a busted mouth and Charlotte begins taking over. I really dug Charlotte kicking out Rousey's leg when she was on the top, even though I was dying to know what Rousey was going to do off the top. I'm going to need a Steiner 450 from Ronda. The rolling armbar off the top is a cool spot I hope doesn't start getting overused. Ronda is so great at building drama, great at selling (look at how she stood up with that rolling fireman's carry, look at the emotion she showed) and I don't think anybody has made Charlotte's spear look that great. That spear looked so nasty and Rousey's kickout was so great that I fully bought that finishing the match. Ronda is good at paying service to the work Charlotte has done to the leg, without being obvious and hammy about it, really feels like she has a grasp on complicated selling, moreso than many in WWE. I normally think Charlotte's chops look a little flimsy, but here I loved her firing out of the corner with them. Ronda getting a chest full of bruises only helped with that visual. We get the DQ finish, which is disappointing, but I like that they at least went with a full beatdown and not just a one move DQ. Charlotte beats her with a kendo stick and Ronda takes a great bump into the ring steps. It continues the trend of this PPV being used to set up actual important matches, but I thought this match ruled. I think it's undeniable that this is the best Charlotte has looked in ages, and it's not a coincidence it came against Ronda. Rousey is legit at this point, she's arguably the best salesman in the fed, right up with the best bumpers, and has strong offense. It's pretty shocking how good she is, so quick. This blew away anything else on the show, by a mile.

Daniel Bryan vs. Brock Lesnar

ER: Well. This completely owned. This is one that I imagine most wrestling fans have been interested in seeing for a long time now. I didn't think we'd ever get this match, and it feels weird that we finally get it. And they take things slow, circling, Bryan mocking Brock, and it feels like Brock is going to wreck him once they make contact with each other. Bryan throws a hard kick but Brock walks through it and wings a lariat at the side of Bryan's head. It's going to be that kind of match. Suplex City comes early, with Brock mocking the chants, and then throwing some ungodly suplexes to Bryan, really sending Bryan crashing in all sorts of ragdoll ways. This goes on for awhile, and the longer it goes the more it genuinely seems like Brock is going to completely steamroll Bryan. He's done that before, and it looked like he was doing it again. But just as the extended Brock thrashing was starting to feel a bit too long, the match gets flipped, when the match gets flipped things get great. Bryan gets F5'd into the ref, which slows it down and allows Bryan to land on his feet, then he punts Brock in the balls behind the fallen ref's back, and they turn a massive ballshot into a fantastic nearfall, like a elementary school playground version of David & Goliath. We get this awesome run of Bryan slipping out of Brock's grasp and Brock getting tricked into a bunch of big bumps (and Brock big bumps are unlike any other), and Bryan laces into Brock with an absolute BEATING. Bryan is throwing stiff kick to the ribs of the grounded Lesnar, then Bryan grabs Brock's arms and starts stomping the hell out of Brock's face. We get a moment I don't think I've EVER seen, as the cameras show BRYAN'S BOOT MARK imprinted on Brock's freaking face!!! This is next level. The stretch run is just killer. Brock gets his leg worked over, gets it wrapped around a ringpost, but is still capable of catching Bryan, and we get an awesome Lesnar moment where he catches a sprinting Bryan up on his shoulders and coming *this* close to an F5, but Lesnar's knee buckles and drops Bryan right down into an awesome Yes Lock. Brock's tap teasing was engaging as all hell throughout, totally looked like they could have given Bryan a plausible win over the beast, and Bryan looked like he was going to flat out knock Lesnar out once he started clonking him with the sickest crossface strikes. Holy shit. Bryan hung with Brock and it was glorious, but Brock eventually smashed him after Bryan looked as good against him than anyone. I really loved this one, thought they knocked it out of the park.


ER: I really wasn't digging this PPV, was chalking it up as a major weekend loss as I didn't really like the TakeOver either. And then WRESTLING GOD RONDA ROUSEY showed that she's an instant great, and Brock Bryan gave me exactly what my lizard wrestling brain wanted to see. Can't help but recommend this PPV after those last two matches put me in a great wrestling mood. All of that last hour owned.

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2018 Ongoing MOTY List: Ronda vs. Nikki

14. Nikki Bella vs. Ronda Rousey WWE Evolution 10/28

ER: Now this totally owned. I thought the layout was super smart, the use of Brie was smart, and Ronda's selling was awesome. Match starts with Ronda completely toying Nikki, showing her several ways that she can toss her ass over elbow and break her arm, repeatedly letting her get up after having her likely beat. And as you're wondering if this is just going to be a total Ronda mauling, Ronda eats two of the best shots to the ringpost you've seen, I mean full Lawler, just fantastic looking post shots on the floor (and another great one inside the ring) and the spends the rest of the match shaking off the cobwebs. Ronda made those post shots so important, not just by making them look as great as they did, but really treating them as a big deal throughout the match. I had just watched a match with several potential big moments that could have been treated this way, that were moved on from pretty easily. Seeing Ronda taking the postings so seriously, and really turning in an impressively evolving sell throughout the rest of the match, was a real treat to watch. Nikki takes over and Ronda feels like she's in it but also struggling to stay focused, working like she got her bell totally rung and went spaghetti legged and was now fighting from behind. The Bellas throw her around ringside, into the barricade, Nikki hits her big kick off the buckles and locks in an abdominal stretch, Ronda misses a huge crossbody when it looks like she was possibly turning it around, all of it was handled really well and turned what could have feasibly been a 3 minute match into an exciting 15 minute match, great turns and build. Brie finally gets hers when Ronda rolls through an ankle pick into a fireman's carry (and I LOVED how she did it, playing up her dizziness and looking fully unsure if it would work, relying on muscle memory, awesome spot), and when Brie has to reach too far over the ropes to stop it, Ronda uses that leverage to her advantage and also drags Brie in to dispose of them both. Brie gets tossed over the announce table and we get an awesome nearfall as Ronda takes a nasty Alabama Slam and the Rack Attack; easily could have seen the match ending there. But Nikki goes up and Ronda rolls through shakily (which, seeing as how she was selling during that rolling fireman's carry, easily could have been more of the same selling paying off those postings) and yanks that arm. I thought this was completely awesome, a really terrifically laid out match, and a killer main event. I cannot imagine this match being better than what they gave us.

PAS: I agree that this was stellar. I didn't pay much attention to Women's wrestling during the Bellas era, so I was very impressed that Nikki Bella could pull off something this good. Ronda provided most of the sizzle, but Nikki was right there with a nice portion of the steak. Her pushup taunt leg scissors, and abdominal stretch looked great and I dug all of the the double teams with Brie. I loved all of Ronda's early taunting, she has some of the best looking judo takedowns in wrestling history, total examples of elite skill with a wildness and athleticism to them. I totally freak out every time she throws one. I agree with Eric talking up those post shots, Ronda is totally reckless throwing her face into the post, she ended up with scratches and bruises which made her look like she had been in a domestic dispute or a brawl with an alley cat. I loved cocky shit talking Ronda making her comeback only to get caught in a near fall, and that roll through off the top into an armbar was incredible looking. Ronda is a total must watch at this point and a great choice as the face of the non-terror-state propaganda shows.


2018 MOTY MASTER LIST

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WWE Evolution 10/28/18

ER: Nita Strauss and Lizzy Hale start us off with some shredding, which is a cool touch, but I am already a bit worried that every single woman who is on this show is going to be called a trailblazer and a groundbreaker. Which is fine. But it feels like they say this about everyone, which makes them come off more like them talking about how inspirational it was for someone in a wheelchair getting pushed over the finish line of a marathon.

Trish Stratus/Lita vs. Mickie James/Alicia Fox

ER: Lita and Trish are Team MOB here, Mesh OverBoard. I know a little about fashion, and it's weird for Lita to want her outfit to have an intentional whale tail. Bliss/Fox/James definitely smoke them with their Queen of Hearts attire. And a lot of this is really James and Fox doing an excellent job at setting up offense for two non-active wrestlers. They're both really great at stooging; Fox has been the women's division bumping MVP for a couple years now at least, and James has had one of her absolute strongest wrestling years ever, and I think her contribution in getting Ronda over has been really undersold. Here James handled a 2 count kickout as well as some of these great Meiko kickouts we've seen in the MYC. I really thought they were giving Trish and Lita a quick feel good win do go a different way after Bliss was no longer involved. After a fairly one-sided run of offense, Lita misses the ALMOST GED STUDENT OF THE SKY moonsault to allow our favorites to finally control. I wish James and Fox got more control though, as it was good but still made them feel way inferior to two women who aren't going to be around much. Lita and Trish wrapped things up way too neatly, the end stretch could have used a couple more momentum shifts, and with Bliss on the floor there was no need to have Trish and Lita be so dominant, overcoming essentially three women with very little trouble. Fans were into seeing Trish and Lita, so if the point of the match was to give them a strong showing leading to a double comeback, then it was a huge success. I'm pretty sure they aren't planning on that though.

ER: Just noticed Beth's Bull Nakano shirt and I want it.

Battle Royal

ER: Big battle royal with practically every single WWE women's wrestler returning. We get Molly Holly, but throw in Layla and Bull Nakano and this PPV gets 10 stars for me. Molly still looks exactly the same. And I loved Iiconics telling the old timers that they were going to throw them over the top rope and back into obscurity. It's also funny how Tamina is lumped in with the present since she's just been around for almost a decade, and was in WWE longer than most of the women in "the past". Who actually would want Tamina on their side, though, is the predicament. Carmella is dressed up as an all time great GLOW worker, love the gear. Torrie Wilson takes an unexpectedly big bump off the apron from a Mandy Rose knee, and Rose eliminates Deville too. If Rose gets the win here this will be the best. They are really desperately trying to Make Tamina a Thing. She won't ever be a thing. There is literally nothing they can do that will make people interested in seeing Tamina. She is 40 years old and she has been doing this for a decade. I totally forgot about Zelina and liked the stuff with her at the finish, LOVED Nia's huge press slam to eliminate her, chucking her far into Tamina on the floor. They were giving Moon some big moments and when she eliminated Asuka I really thought she'd be winning, but am excited to see Nia back in the title scene.

Toni Storm vs. Io Shirai

ER: This was about the level of match I was expecting from these two, and just makes me more annoyed that we didn't get Meiko/Ripley. This was fine enough, and you could tell both busted ass and wanted to have a really good final, and they were able to pull out some tricks that nobody got to use in the regular tournament. Shirai hit a moonsault to the floor, and Storm gave her a German suplex on the apron, don't think we got a top rope to floor or apron spot in the 8 MYC episodes. So if so I liked that they mapped things out to be that way. They didn't do anything wrong here, really, only it was a structure that I'm really bored with, as it was basically the structure of a lot of 2018 wrestling: we're in a war, a finisher gets kicked out of to a shocked face reaction, both have moments where they can barely get to their feet but are up on offense a moment later, there's a strike exchange in the middle (and Shirai just doesn't have very good strikes. Dawn Marie had better strikes. Shirai's might be closing in on heel Torrie Wilson. She's probably above face Torrie Wilson), a big move hits knees; it all looked pretty good, it all just felt way too familiar. I do agree with them that Storm has potential to be a big star, so I fully get why she was season 2 champ.

The Riott Squad vs. Natalya/Sasha Banks/Bayley

ER: While watching this Rachel shows off her gamer dork knowledge and says that Liv Morgan should go as (Liv) Morgana from Super Puzzle Fighter II, saying she already has the pink hair and just needs a black bodysuit. She says this will solidify the 30-and-Up nerd fan category, which I told her is the last category of fan these girls would want obsessing over them. Those are the guys who would show up to her house with a knife concealed inside a teddy bear. This match was also decent enough, and was getting great reactions from the crowd, but just felt like a longer than normal Raw match, and there were some pretty rough spots like Sasha barely tumbling to the floor with a flip dive, or a really dumb spot where Natalya puts the Sharpshooter on Morgan and Logan at the same time, even though Logan alone is larger than Natalya. Plus this show feels a little too intentionally feel good, 4 straight face victories and everyone having this weepy overly smiley ugly cry finishes for all of them, every face acting like they simultaneously won the Hunger Games and also were retiring from wrestling after the match. It's all a bit thick. However, Rachel thinks that a lot of the emotion the girls are showing post-match is genuine. She makes a lot of sense in her defense of why, and it genuinely feels like she's gee, Riott Squad really feel like a team they should run with, Riott has been impossible to ignore the last 6 months, they're just wasting so much time keeping Natalya inexpicably strong. Everyone knows she's the biggest heel on Total Divas, because she is awful but thinks she's the nice one. The Squad could be a way bigger deal than they are. Natalya  cannot. I liked the Squad launching Sasha into the barricade, liked Bayley's fast tope con hilo at the finish, but I wanted something very different from this.

Shayna Baszler vs. Kairi Sane

ER: This was a nice tough fight that went longer than I thought it would, but also made really good use of its time. It does require you to think that Sane could stand and strike with Baszler in an exchange, which is a bit much, but I think that while small Sane is still really good when she's using her body as a weapon, so it makes up for the overall size difference. Shayna dominated for much of this, but Sane never really felt out of it. Sane was valiantly getting beaten down, while getting in some stuff, but it felt like Baszler was always dominant. Baszler ran her into the steps, then we get several different nasty Baszler knee strikes, a cool as hell gutwrench slam, starts working over Sane's arm including a nasty stomp. Shayna handled the Sane strike exchange portion well, threw a kick at the arm to end an exchange, but ate a nice spinning backfist from Sane. I do really like Sane as cannonball, and she's convincing on a suplex, and we go into some bigger spots. Shayna drops her arm first over the top rope to the floor, Sane winds up hitting a hard crossbody to the floor, really smashing into Shayna, Sane takes a big bump into the crowd right into Shayna's squad. We get a big interference portion that I think they make work, timing it well enough and making it fit in. We get a really tight nearfall that fooled me, with Shayna locking in a tight rear naked choke and Sane rolling through like the Bret Hart/Austin finish. I could buy Shayna losing with that and it wouldn't make me upset. But Jessamyn Duke sneaks in a shot just behind the ref's back and immediately allows Baszler to lock in the clutch again. Both rear naked sequences were handled really well, by both parties. Baszler made it look like something that should finish a match, and Sane looking like a person getting choked out. I really liked this one.

PAS: Really great performance by Baszler. I don't think Sane is particularly good,  she is a stylistic daughter of Manami Toyota without Toyota's otherworldly athleticism. She can take a good beating though, and Baszler delivers one. That arm work was so vicious, that Sane should almost be out six months with surgery, rather then delivering offensive moves (the selling issues were what damaged their last NXT match, it wasn't as bad here, but still present). I just loved the way Shayna would manipulate the arm, the set up for the stomp on the elbow looked almost as painful as the stomp itself. The move where she hung her over the top rope by the arm was so violent looking, and I loved the mock salute afterwards. Some of Sane's offense looked ok, the plancha was nice, and I love a good backfist (and like an OK one, and this was OK). Finish angle sets up some cool stuff, although both Shafir and Duke have the same horse girl straightened long hair and thus are hard to tell apart, one should get a different haircut unless they are going to do Killer Bees tag spots. Still I am excited for a distaff Makai Club running shit.

Last Man Standing: Charlotte vs. Becky Lynch

ER: You know, I've never been a major fan of either, although Lynch has really won me over since the turn, and I really like how both of them are playing their face/heel dynamics. Charlotte is playing it up perfectly smug, cold bitch straight-facing those boos, snottily bouncing off the ropes to steal a little thunder from Lynch's name being announced. Lynch, the champ, holding up that belt knowing she's going to get cheered? I'm into it, and they have immediately got me into this match without locking up. They know exactly what they're doing. And this sauce has some heat to it. Both of them look downright pissed when the other comes out ahead and it is simmering fire.

But overall I thought the match was pretty so so. I thought it was overly sloppy, had an abundance of time stand still moments (and not just during prop set up moments), had some glaringly bad ref involvement, had weapon shots that looked piddly, and jacked a big moment from literally the last Last Man Standing match in WWE (and didn't do it anywhere close to as effectively). However, the reactions they got for nearly everything was tremendous. The crowd was extremely invested in this from beginning to end. There were some pretty nasty spills and the intensity was a plus at times, but for every intentional nasty spill (like Becky taking a back suplex into a big pile of chairs) there was something that looked bad, like Charlotte overshooting a moonsault and knocking over a table leading to Lynch landing right on top of her, and then both selling because neither knew what to do. We got a too long segment of Lynch lying perfectly still while Charlotte could do a convoluted figure 4 set up with Lynch's leg for a stretch of leg work that doesn't really go anywhere interesting. We got Lynch absolutely burying Charlotte through a table with a huge legdrop, but then we get a total repeat of Ciampa burying Gargano in anything he can do keep him from getting up, except Becky gently lays down several things on top of Charlotte and we get an odd ref count as Charlotte inevitably gets up before 10. I remember Ciampa wasting Gargano with these weapons as he buried him in them, and  this was just Becky tipping over a chair onto Charlotte and then placing things on her the way someone might see how many flip flops they could put on their sleeping cat to get the best Instagram picture. We get the cliché reaction of Becky being terrified when Charlotte feebly stands up from the rubble, and Becky eats a spear really nicely, but Charlotte fights back with a bunch of weak looking cane shots and middling chops (I've said before that it's a shame she's forced to cosplay her dad as she's really clunky with a lot of her Flair cosplay offense). The fans were still fully along, and I'll give them credit for that, and I was happy Lynch kept that title and Charlotte really flew through that table to the floor...but this whole thing I thought was decent enough, but underwhelming in a lot of ways. It's possible I missed some nuance, but I was pretty stunned to see some of the hype that was being thrown on this, as I thought there was just too much awkwardness to ignore.

Nikki Bella vs. Ronda Rousey

ER: Now this totally owned. I thought the layout was super smart, the use of Brie was smart, and Ronda's selling was awesome. Match starts with Ronda completely toying Nikki, showing her several ways that she can toss her ass over elbow and break her arm, repeatedly letting her get up after having her likely beat. And as you're wondering if this is just going to be a total Ronda mauling, Ronda eats two of the best shots to the ringpost you've seen, I mean full Lawler, just fantastic looking post shots on the floor (and another great one inside the ring) and the spends the rest of the match shaking off the cobwebs. Ronda made those post shots so important, not just by making them look as great as they did, but really treating them as a big deal throughout the match. I had just watched a match with several potential big moments that could have been treated this way, that were moved on from pretty easily. Seeing Ronda taking the postings so seriously, and really turning in an impressively evolving sell throughout the rest of the match, was a real treat to watch. Nikki takes over and Ronda feels like she's in it but also struggling to stay focused, working like she got her bell totally rung and went spaghetti legged and was now fighting from behind. The Bellas throw her around ringside, into the barricade, Nikki hits her big kick off the buckles and locks in an abdominal stretch, Ronda misses a huge crossbody when it looks like she was possibly turning it around, all of it was handled really well and turned what could have feasibly been a 3 minute match into an exciting 15 minute match, great turns and build. Brie finally gets hers when Ronda rolls through an ankle pick into a fireman's carry (and I LOVED how she did it, playing up her dizziness and looking fully unsure if it would work, relying on muscle memory, awesome spot), and when Brie has to reach too far over the ropes to stop it, Ronda uses that leverage to her advantage and also drags Brie in to dispose of them both. Brie gets tossed over the announce table and we get an awesome nearfall as Ronda takes a nasty Alabama Slam and the Rack Attack; easily could have seen the match ending there. But Nikki goes up and Ronda rolls through shakily (which, seeing as how she was selling during that rolling fireman's carry, easily could have been more of the same selling paying off those postings) and yanks that arm. I thought this was completely awesome, a really terrifically laid out match, and a killer main event. I cannot imagine this match being better than what they gave us.

ER: A fun, fresh PVV, if a little overrated. But I liked the concept and it was nice not having to write up a Rollins or Ziggler match. Nikki/Ronda was white hot fire, far exceeded my already high expectations, and we dug Baszler/Sane as well. Both land on our 2018 Ongoing MOTY List.

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Matches from WWE Super Show-Down 10/6/18

Charlotte vs. Becky Lynch

ER: Charlotte's boobs look weirdly inflated, but it's possible that crossing the equator does funny things. Becky is super aggressive in this and it's awesome. She attacks at the bell and kicks at Charlotte's legs, yanks her by the arm from the ring to the floor (great reckless looking tumbling bump from Charlotte) and Becky does a tornado armbar and starts bending at Charlotte's wrist and fingers. Charlotte has a spirited comeback, kneedropping Becky in the back of the leg, hitting a nice high kick, but damn does Charlotte have some of the ugliest chops in wrestling. Her arm looks like a wet noodle, and they look too dismissive. Shame she's probably required to do them. Charlotte hits a nice spear (and Lynch takes a nice spear), and I like the theme of Becky rushing her early and then basically trying to cheat from behind the rest of the way. Charlotte hits knees on a moonsault, and I like Becky cheating to get out of the match with her title. That's probably because I'm sick of Charlotte in the title picture and think she's a horrible babyface. I smiled when Lynch kicked her ass after getting her belt.

Iiconics vs. Asuka/Naomi

ER: I was fully expecting more of a reaction for the Iiconics, but it's clear the crowd either doesn't care about them, or doesn't want to boo Australians, or...look I have no idea what native Australian culture is like. This is short but has some cool stuff in it, Asuka had some nice throws, Naomi did some cool split legged offense and a plancha, Peyton had a ridiculous-but-fun house show only kind of sell off a Naomi kick, stumbling around while Naomi mocked her. WWE has people lose in their home town/country so often that it was weird seeing them win here, not only quickly and cleanly, but over two people who are clearly much higher than them on the hierarchy. Fans respond to the finish, but not much else.

28. Samoa Joe vs. AJ Styles

ER: This feud is pretty dumb, completely stupid to involve family in a fed that doesn't allow blood, just makes the babyfaces look like idiots for going out and working for a MOTY instead of just gouging a fucker's eyes out for hitting on his wife. But I was intrigued by the No DQ/No Count Out stipulation of this one. The stips don't enforce themselves much at all for the first half, which is cool, as the stips just encourage them to work stiff with each other. The opening punch exchange was good, AJ throws some kicks with thump, Joe tosses AJ to the floor and AJ takes an awesome bump on his face, then eats a tope and turns so he flies face first into the barricade, and takes a shot into the steps. Joe is heavier, and really feels like he's landing heavy on everything, to the match's benefit: He rushes in with a hard back elbow and blasts AJ with a high speed falling lariat, AJ comes up with a bloody mouth, and Joe brings the Emerald Frosion out of mothballs for the Australian Misawa fans (they call themselves AMFs). All the striking has been good throughout, both guys peppering in shots in between bigger moves, Joe sneaking in headbutts, AJ mixing up height on his, all effective. When weapons and objects do finally get involved they all have cool, more violent, messy results. Styles goes through a chair on a STO slam, AJ hits an out of control fireman's carry through a table, driving Joe awkwardly through the table. There's nice attention to Joe's leg after, and cool moments like AJ kind of stumbling through a calf crusher application, so Joe attempts to turn it into the Kokina Clutch. I don't know if Joe recognized the application was taking longer than normal and went for it, but the reaction came off logical and more interesting than him lying there waiting. Both guys are turning in ramped up versions on signature offense, with AJ aiming to hit a 450 on Joe's leg, and Joe turning a Kokina Clutch into a sleeper suplex, and I love the moment where Joe suckers AJ in by buckling his knee, suckering AJ into a rolling prawn hold that Joe easily flips into a Kokina Clutch. But also like that he played himself and while he was using his own knee as bait, his knee actually was weakened, leading to an AJ calf crusher. I think this was pretty easily the best match of their unceasing feud.

PAS: I have been slacking on WWE this year, so this is the first Joe vs. AJ match I have seen since TNA days, and I thought this was easily as good as their most lauded matches earlier this century. They really laid into each other, and I loved how even stuff that wasn't clean landed with a thud. At one point Styles just lands a jumping forearm right into Joe's sternum, which looked like it sucked to take. Joe busts up Styles mouth, and while it wasn't a crimson mask, it did add a grittiness to the whole procedure. Joe hit a cracking clothesline which Styles took a big bump on, and crunched him with a great looking powerslam. I loved the knee work, Styles looked like he hurled himself through a table just to make Joe land weird, and Joe yelling to the ref that his knee popped was a great moment. The impact was so strange, that I almost bought a real injury, that is how knee injuries happen, landing awkward and weird with all of your weight. We had a weird heel in peril run, with the valiant heel fighting his way through an injury, while the vicious babyface tried to end his career, totally makes sense with all of the stuff about Joe stalking his family. I liked how Joe can still grab a choke from the ground, but was really unable to hit anything that required weight on his knee. Cool finish too, with all of Joe's tricks running out and getting caught in the calf crusher. I thought this was excellent.

Riott Squad vs. Bella Twins/Ronda Rousey

ER: Riott does something maybe no other worker on the roster does well, and it's a very important thing: Her facials are so strong that she actually comes off like she has a personal problem with her opponents. She looks like she wants to hurt them, and she looks pissed off whenever it doesn't work. All of the Riott Squad has their perks, Live throws underrated kicks and plays great at house shows, Logan comes in off a tag with an awesome running knee, Riott comes in with a low kick to Nikki's back, all of them are good at cutting Nikki off from her crew, and I like how Logan crumbles off Nikki's enziguiri, taking a heel right to the side of her head. Rousey is an absolutely undeniably fun hot tag, and of course everyone deserves credit for getting flipped fast on their tailbones, yanked over by the arm, eating her awesome Samoan drop variation, really all of Ronda's judo offense looks great. Morgan was awesome saving Logan from a sure death Rousey armbar, Morgan flying in towards camera with a hard elbow to the back of the head. I wish we had gotten one more save from the Riott Squad, but the Ronda double armbar finish is a really fun finish for this kind of show. This was worked exactly how I wanted to see it worked, with Brie kept mostly on the apron, Ronda on fire, and the Riott Squad getting to control things. So this easily checked all my boxes for what I was hoping for.

Cedric Alexander vs. Buddy Murphy

ER: You know I liked Buddy Murphy before it was cool (is it cool?), thinking he put up a strong showing at the first NXT show I went to. Amusingly, I have seen approximately zero of his 205 Live run. And indies junior Buddy is just not anywhere as interesting as house show stooge Buddy. I saw this getting talked up as one of the sprints of the year, and while it was a cool moment for Murphy, this thing felt like a couple dozen other uninteresting moves exchanges I've seen over the last couple years. Melodramatic faces, big driver variations, a flip dive hit, a flip dive overshot (the overshot tope con giro is of the UTMOST importance in having one of these matches), an empty strike exchange. Their faces can look spirited, but the matches seem so hollow. This is becoming default style now, and it's feeling like one guy fighting slightly off shadow variations of himself to eternity. However, I do like the hometown win.

ER: Well, I guess we'll never - ever - know if HHH/Taker was worthy of being on our 2018 Ongoing MOTY List, but Joe/AJ is an easy add, easily the best match they've had against each other in WWE.

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2018 Ongoing MOTY List: Rousey vs. Bliss

64. Alexa Bliss vs. Ronda Rousey WWE Hell in a Cell 9/16

ER: I like how Ronda has that "I learned something new since my last match" thing going for her, gives her matches a bit of a vibe where you're not sure what might happen. You don't get people as freshly trained as her in major WWE matches, so she's in a pretty unique spot this year. We get some fun smoke and mirrors stuff with Aleza's crew of Mickie James and Alicia Fox, with them saving her from a beating one moment and getting Bliss thrown at them the next. Their presence is a good equalizer that allows us a believably longer Bliss match against Ronda. Bliss is good in control, I like her putting the MMA queen in a classic arm trapped chinlock and then hitting flashy handstand kneedrops. Ronda had a real nice sell of a rib injury when she tried to throw Bliss, and Bliss is great pushing into Ronda's ribs with her boot. I liked the stuff they worked in the corner, Ronda going for a suplex and Bliss giving body shots, dropping down and eating a shot to the eye from Ronda, but winning the battle by yanking her down from the buckles. Bliss working Ronda's ribs around the ringpost was one of the better spots of the night. Rousey's selling was really good, totally bought in. With Mickie in there you KNOW she's going to take a shot or two from Ronda, it is after all what Mickie was put on Earth to do. Mickie takes a great ringpost bump, getting run down the apron into it by Ronda, so thank you. Bliss is great at exploiting Rousey's rib injury, picking her shots, kicking at her, then taking it too far by smashing Ronda's face with her hand while taunting her. Rousey knew how to play the babyface to the back row by slowly standing up while Bliss feebly holds her by the throat. Bliss's facials throughout this sequence were great. I thought Ronda would steamroll from there, but there was a great final Bliss moment where she caught Rousey with a mule kick on a charge. Ronda came back, but I like that they kept Alexa in it until the very immediate tap. Ronda played her comeback perfectly, hitting this vicious gutwrench powerbomb and milking the final submission to great reaction. I loved this.

PAS: Rousey is pretty unassailable at this point. She is one of the most interesting wrestlers in the world to watch. The idea of 5 foot nothing Alexa Bliss being credible against a Judo medalist and MMA champ, who outweighs her by 65 pounds is silly, but I liked how they used the rib injury and Bliss's entourage to equalize it a little bit. Bliss is truly world class at bitchy shit talking, and I really dug how her trash talk led to the Ronda hulk up comeback. The mule kick to the ribs cut off ruled too, my favorite Hogan matches were always when he would get the Hulk Up disrupted, and I loved Dundee dropping Lawler during the strap drop in the 1985 match that just showed up, and Bliss's mule kick did a similar thing. I really want them to build up a more credible threat to Ronda, but they have made the best of this feud.


2018 MOTY MASTER LIST

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Ronda Rousey's European Vacation

So Ronda has now had two PPV matches, and they are among my favorite matches of the year. So now I'm thirsty for more. I'm greedy for the verse of Rousey. But there just isn't very much Rousey footage out there yet. WWE did a European tour last month and it looks like half the trios matches with her are online (these are the Vienna and Paris matches, very possible the Switzerland and Italy ones are out there) so I dove in.

Ronda Rousey/Ember Moon/Natalya vs. Mickie James/Ruby Riott/Liv Morgan WWE 5/17/18

ER: An already short match with a big chunk clipped out of the middle. Was the clip 5 seconds? Was it 5 minutes? I'm not sure but we never see Mickie's tag in and don't see her much at all. Even in its 5 minute form the match is plenty of fun. I really liked Liv Morgan as the Ronda antagonizer. Natalya did a long Ronda tag tease while holding Morgan by the hair, reaching out to get Ronda in, and Morgan used it to her advantage to get Natalya out of the way and then taunt Ronda with bad shadowboxing. Morgan also took a big bump to the floor when things were breaking down, a nice little performance and the only one stooging. Moon had a cool legsweep and I liked Natalya's dropkick to Morgan's face after running up her back and head (and Morgan really whipped back on the kick making it look worse than it was). But the big payoff is obviously Ronda, and she came in like the coolest hot tag around. She dumped Riott with a couple of nasty throws that she makes look so effortless, but would probably give me vertigo if I tried taking them. Her final takedown on James was awesome, doesn't even look like she's throwing people in there due to her leverage making them weightless, and she's doing these safe takedowns where the person taking them looks like they have no control over their landing, just an awesome set of throws. I wish this had been twice as long, but it had plenty of rewarding moments.

Ronda Rousey/Ember Moon/Natalya vs. Mickie James/Ruby Riott/Liv Morgan WWE 5/19/18

ER: I love watching these house show matches close together, as it's always cool to see ways they opt to mix it up from prior matches, while also seeing things they opted to keep. This match (the Paris match) is worked very differently from the Vienna match, with a long heat section on Natalya, minimal Liv Morgan involvement, some good near falls off of roll-ups, a couple of fantastic/hammy showcase moments from James, and essentially the same beginning and end. We still start with Ember Moon doing the same nice leg trip and slingshot splash to Riott, and we eventually settle down to Natalya getting beaten down and trying to tag Ronda. There is a great Morgan moment where she cuts off a tag, taunts, then almost gets rolled up for the loss. Mickie was used more prominently here (and she could have been in the last one, but her time got camera phone clipped out), and she soaks it up. Talk about someone who I haven't sought out in years who is now putting out her finest work. James has been on fire in 2018. Here she knocks Ember off the apron with a crescent kick, then flies into Rousey to knock her off. We build to a GREAT house show moment, with Mickie slowly loosening her belt while Natalya is slumped in their corner, and Riott is running and gleefully highstepping the length of the apron, and James whisks that belt out, runs towards Natalya...and the ref catches her by the belt to stop her. Awesome spot. Ronda gets in and runs through approximately the same stuff in the same order as Vienna (this had the addition of a short straight jab to knock Morgan to the floor), but I do think the throws felt bigger in that match. We do get an extra Mickie James bonus roll up, going high on the cradle like she does and making it seem for two seconds that they could feasibly give Mickie James the pinfall win over Ronda Freaking Rousey....but alas, James ends up almost losing that arm moments later. Also, can we just stop recording things in portrait mode? Turn your phone sideways, people.

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2018 Ongoing MOTY List: Ronda vs. Nia

14. Ronda Rousey vs. Nia Jax WWE Money in the Bank 6/17

PAS: I was actually pretty optimistic about Ronda as a pro wrestler, MMA is a pretty great base for wrestling, and folks like Bas Rutten, Shayna Bayzler and Dokonjonsuke Mishima were pretty great from the jump. The ways she is so good are pretty surprising though. I was expecting some cool Judo throws (and we got some awesome ones here), and maybe even some big bumps (and there were those too), but I was blown away by how good she already was at the little things which separate cool wrestlers from great ones. I loved how the match started with Jax overwhelming her with power and size, and how good Ronda was as reacting to that. A big part of the story of the match was conveyed in her facial reactions, she did a great job appearing overwhelmed, and she was awesome when she got her confidence and went to work. I loved her going to the top rope, almost falling off and steeling herself and hitting the bodypress. I think her martial arts experience makes her super compelling at working holds, no one would ever lay in a hold in a Judo contest or MMA fight and she doesn't every stope moving in a wrestling match,  every time she is placed in a hold or applies one she is constantly fighting for an advantage or a counter. Her battle out of the bearhug was one of my favorite spots of the year, and her attacking the arm was full of cool little adjustments. We are high voters on Nia Jax on SC, and this was a hell of a performance from her too, she was great at making everything look violent and I loved her arrogance, this is her sport and she wasn't going to allow an interloper to take her title.  Ronda has such a built in history with the armbar that even a tease of it gets a huge reaction, and I loved how the final fight for it was worked. Of course we can't have good things, and they do a stupid Money in the Bank cash in, and Ronda and Nia have to sell for mini who can barely lift a briefcase. I actually think Alexa can be effective in the ring, but having such a physical, athletically impressive match derailed by someone so tiny and unimposing really was dissonant, are we really supposed to buy Nia being pinned by that splash? Hornswoggle wasn't ending title matches.

ER: Fully agree with Phil here on just how surprised and impressed I am with the ways Rousey has excelled. We've now seen several MMA transitions and they all have the body language and the air of legitimacy, and we've seen some really quick learners (Riddle and Baszler recently, but we can also look at the New Japan Russians from 30 years ago as crossover quick learners). But what I wasn't expecting from Ronda is her being so great with timing, with selling, and most importantly has a range of facial characteristics that I wasn't expecting. There are people who I think are decent wrestlers who have been doing this for many years, who still get that look in their eyes that they're trying their best to remember what's coming next, to think about where they have to be standing, to remember what major note to hit next, and she just comes off so natural. I knew she had potential to be good, I didn't actually think she would be this good, this quick. Her move execution is great, her selling and reactions are great, but I love that she still has the stiffness of a celebrity Raw guest host when she takes offense. She exudes tons of confidence when she's dishing out shots, but there are also moments where she feels like Kevin Federline about to take an FU, and that's awesome. I'm always surprised when I see us as the high vote on Nia. I think people just hate her voice. I don't know, I think she's a great powerhouse who can believably work in drama for smaller opponents. She's a big bumper, but doesn't just fly around doing fast back bumps for anything, instead saving them for big cascading tumbles that open up her vulnerability.

I loved all the offense in this, loved the structure of Nia just powering through painful shots to land big wrestling moves. Ronda's strikes all looked great, loved her punch flurries, and she was so smart about throwing in little things to avoid dead time, like when they were both on the mat close to each other, and Ronda threw a grounded kick to Nia's back. That kind of thing reminds me of when someone wouldn't be too quick getting back to their feet and Finlay would stomp on their fingers. I thought Nia sold the shots well, absorbing at first but later the same shots thrown the same way had a bigger effect. At one point Ronda hit a right to the body that staggered and dropped Nia to a knee, allowing Ronda to leap with a high knee to the jaw. The whole sequence looked great, from both women. Nia's power offense was awesome, a big bear huge (which Coachman idiotically said was great for Ronda to rest during. Why the fuck is this guy here again?), press slams, avalanches, and a couple big Samoan drops, aiming to squish Ronda like a bug. Nia throws one of the favorite legdrops in wrestling, and I liked how the missed legdrop was used to give Ronda an opening here. Ronda is crazy with the punishment she takes, and I noticed myself leaned way forward on the couch while they were fighting on the floor, Ronda awesomely trying a rana before Nia swung her about as violently as you can swing someone into a barricade. I loved the work around the arm, thought Nia was great at showing how desperate she was to keep those hands clasped, loved how she slyly fed Ronda her arm after missing a corner charge, loved the zoom in on her hands slowly getting unclasped (though it would have felt even bigger had I not seen a great version of that exact same thing the night before on NXT), and maybe I'm wrong but as they were fighting through what would have surely been the match finish armbar it looked like Nia was trying to muscle out of it by holding her arms and leaning forward with her weight, trying to break Ronda's grip the way Zampano would break an iron chain across his chest.

I expected a not clean finish, but had less of a problem with Bliss' performance than Phil. She is obviously not as physical as Ronda or Nia, but I thought she was really effective swinging that briefcase, and I didn't see it as her having a hard time lifting it, it felt like she was giving it some weight to pay off the shots. John Cena was always really great at giving the ring steps weight, always losing his footing in a different way when picking them up. That briefcase probably weighs 3 pounds tops, but the way Bliss was throwing her whole body into shots, swinging the edges into Nia's arm and plastering Ronda, really made it feel bigger. I buy the Twisted Bliss finishing, as Nia's focus was solely on her arm, which set up a big DDT before the splash, and no matter how big you are it's going to smart when 100 pounds gets dropped on you.


2018 MOTY MASTER LIST

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