WWE Extreme Rules 9/26/21 Live Blog

Peacock is concurrently broadcasting the commentary of every single language they have right now, so watching and reviewing this PPV live certainly feels like a dubious way to spend my Sunday evening. 

Liv Morgan vs. Carmella

ER: This was a fun way to open the live show, a spirited match that went for more drama than these openers usually aim for. Carmella is quietly having a really nice year and is operating from a real natural character, leaning into a nicely balanced annoying heel role. Liv has been pretty aimless for a couple years now, and I'm not really in love with her current style. She used to be one of the women (along with Mandy Rose) who I kept seeing in strong house show performances without having any TV matches as good. Morgan doesn't feel anywhere near the person who was gluing together good house show tags, but now someone doing some bad indy offense with off rhythm timing. It's an offense that doesn't work with someone bad at taking offense, but Carmella is good at taking this dumb yet complicated offense. There are some hard strikes and kicks, and Morgan maintains a good enough 2:1 ratio of nice folding bumps to every off-timed flat back bump. The Liv win was a real surprise. Carmella has been the way more interesting TV character, and this feels like the weakest Liv work we've gotten. 

AJ Styles/Bobby Lashley/Omos vs. Big E/Kofi Kingston/Xavier Woods

ER: Quality trios with a big Bobby Lashley threaded throughout, kind of taking away from Big E's recent title win even with Big E getting the win here. Lashley looked like a dynamic traffic director, usually the role Styles inhabits in a match like this. New Day split the ring time well with Kofi playing the most effective babyface. Styles was a cool guy asshole and Lashley had some explosive stuff, hitting big on his spears and shoulder tackles. Omos was integrated well and is still good at playing into his big moments. This felt a bit more like a house show match than a big stops pulled out PPV match, but house show style always gives a high floor to a match like this. Lashley's big spear to Styles looked good, and I liked Big E instantly capitalizing on it. Weird to see the new champ E in this kind of opener though. 

Street Profits vs. The Usos

ER: Very good tag that didn't quite hit the heights it could have, but hit all the notes of the strong match you assumed they would have. I think Jey has had a real breakout year over the past calendar year, while I think Jimmy's return has been welcome I think Jey pulled ahead of him as a worker in the latter's time away. Montez Ford has also been on a tear this year, really standing out as a unique high flying babyface in a promotion with several prominent versions of that. He gets great height on offense and defense, and here he has some real standout moments. Ford hits a huge tope con giro over the ringpost, and eats knees painfully on a sky high frog splash. Dawkins came in hot on his hot tag and both Usos really fell into and threw the ropes for his impact. Crowd got more vocally involved in the match the longer it went, which is a good sign they were doing the right things. The crowd responded big to the extended nearfall home stretch, which is what you'd want in a long title match. I thought the build to the home stretch was a bit more interesting and felt more organic. Still, very good tag match. 

Charlotte vs. Alexa Bliss

ER: This is a real battle of disappointing 2021s. Both could use a strong performance in a big singles match. Bliss has been trapped for too long in a gimmick that is antithetical to good wrestling matches. Charlotte has been working with an attitude that I'm not sure anyone understands. I personally don't understand what the chip on her shoulder is supposed to be, but she comes off like a real asshole because of it. And in a match like this, where her being an asshole is supposed to be the focus, it works best. She does not make any sense to me as a babyface, and this match was a much better use of who she is right now. She still badly apes offense, with her doing fewer bad Flair knife edge chops and more difficult timing Andrade offense. She's at her best when she is taking surprising bumps for Bliss, and I think her cocky heel facials after getting knocked on her ass are one of her best features. Bliss feels a little off timing wise, but it also feels like she has consistently barely seen the inside of a ring for too long. This was the weakest match on the show so far, but it was one of the better Charlotte matches of the year. I have no comment on anything that may have happened to Alexa Bliss after the match, as I turned it to the 49ers game. 

Sheamus vs. Jeff Hardy vs. Damian Priest

ER: This was pretty dull for the most part, but they saved their good fireworks for the final two minutes. Going out on a high note earns a match a lot of forgiveness for what came before earlier. Because again, a lot of this was dull. Hardy figured out early the best way to work this, which was to let Sheamus and Priest work a one on one brawl that he stayed would mostly stay out of, then fly in with a dropkick or plancha when neither was paying attention. It was some of Hardy's best offense in months. But then, once Hardy went on a long run against Sheamus, he looked as lethargic and completely washed as I've ever seen him. He entered in fits and starts, with perhaps the best entrance being his swanton that landed heavy on Priest's back (while he was pinning Sheamus). The move chain finish lifted this out of the realm of total disappointment, but this was a drier match than it should have been. Then again, the build for this match was probably the weakest of any match on the card, so that couldn't have helped. 

Bianca Belair vs. Becky Lynch

ER: I love Becky's striped tube sock hear, but don't love the horse hair. And the match was about on the level of the Carmella match earlier, but went on too long to only to end with Sasha running in and elbowing Lynch. I'm happy to have Sasha back, but I'm not quite feeling the motivations within the Bianca/Sasha/Becky program. This had some cool Bianca strength spots, like a great high arcing fallaway slam, a press slam that Lynch managed to reverse, and a big Backlund spot where she stood to her feet with Lynch sitting on her shoulder. Lynch threw her forearms with her whole body and has some nice looking suplexes. Both have a couple of nice suplexes, actually, with Bianca hitting a nice delayed vertical. Looking back with knowledge this was going to end with a Sasha run-in, I wish they would have worked a more go go pace, and it made some spot placement seem odd. I didn't like when Bianca was raining down on Becky with hard corner elbows, the crowd was counting along with them, and Lynch just escapes out the bottom to yank Belair's braid. I always like Belair's hair getting integrated into things, but hated Lynch shrugging off Belair's best strikes of the match like she hadn't taken eight straight. The eventual triple threat match/es we're going to get won't be as good as any combination of straight singles matches they can run, but I Believe In Sasha. 

Roman Reigns vs. Finn Balor 

ER: We finally get rid of The Fiend and now we just have to deal with the Rasta Demon whose special powers I do not understand. Head of the Table Roman has been my least favorite iteration of Roman Reigns. I do not like the slow paced main event epics, nor do I like the meandering weapon brawls. This was a lot of meandering weapons brawl with some stunt falls peppered in, and it never grabbed me. Luckily for them, it grabbed the crowd and seemed to keep their interest. Roman has been on a hot streak and has worked some tight TV matches, and his biggest hand to hand stuff here looked great. I loved his strikes, and his spear was skeleton damaging. Balor took some big falls through tables and took a big tackle through the ring barricade. It was a lot of damage, but I forgot that the Demon has super powers and is the Undertaker/Fiend. He is able to fully shrug off every bit of pain that Roman put him through...but sadly the Demon's kryptonite turns out to be ring ropes. Lightning crashes, the top rope breaks, the Demon is put down by and unexpected fall. This felt like it was really really dumb. Pretty sure this was dumb. 

This was not a very Extreme show, which was probably a blessing in disguise. I wasn't really in the mood to see ladder matches or whatever else they could have done. The show ended on a down note but had a strong first 2/3. The final two matches were intentionally overshadowed by match ending angles. Extreme Rules started with a good head of steam but ended too flatly to recommend as a show. 

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The Horror Show at WWE Extreme Rules 7/19/20

ER: I am very interested in both women's title matches, and probably not anything else! I do have a perverse interest in how they're going to pull off the eyeball gimmick without making kids hate wrestling.


Kevin Owens vs. Murphy

ER: This was given more time than a typical pre-show match, but I liked the first half of the match a lot more than the second half. The first half was based around Owens throwing stiff strikes, hard shoulderblocks, big clotheslines, and I'd much rather see that. I get less interested by the time we have a too long fight on the top rope and the big nearfalls feel too performative. The best parts were always Owens shaking Murphy with elbows and crushing him with a cannonball, but I was less interested in seeing them have a Murphy match. It played better than a lot of that stuff, so Owens kept the floor high. A spirited and plenty hot opener, just not my preferred heat.

Tables Match: New Day (Big E/Kofi Kingston) vs. Cesaro/Shinsuke Nakamura

ER: This was a big moments match with plenty of cool big moments. Even on moments where the set up was longer than needed, the spot wound up paying off. I liked Nakamura's logical work around the tables, saw him smartly position them a couple of times, liked how he shoved one out of the way when rolling to the floor. I loved the spot where Kingston flew to the ground and smacked face first into a table, held there like a wall by Cesaro and Nakamura. Big E's spear through the ropes to Cesaro looked as spectacular as ever, and we should celebrate that he is still doing that spot. The final table spot looked crazy, Kofi getting drilled through those tables by Cesaro is something that would have played for two years in an ECW intro. Nobody will think about this spot after a couple weeks, but it looked crazy in the moment. The spots with the tables, in the tables match, were good! So this was fine.

Nikki Cross vs. Bayley

ER: I was excited for this one and really liked the how they started it. I bought into the idea that Nikki could pull off a flash upset. Nikki was getting smart quick roll-ups and landing heavy on several straight crossbodies for nearfalls was really engaging. I like Nikki's way of not rolling through crossbodies, but actually treating it like a potential finisher by landing hard. Her crossbody off the apron to the floor was really great, and I liked Bayley being kept on the ropes. They had a couple of fun fights in the ring skirt, and I'll always react to those. But the problem is that Nikki Cross is not good in a lot of ways. It can take her forever to get into position to deliver something, which makes disbelief suspension a lot more difficult, especially since we were supposed to believe that she had the capability of surprising Bayley. She doesn't get the reactions she could on offense because she doesn't seem to know how to peak things. She has been working a vest unzip/vest removal spot for over a year now, and it's like she never quite knows how to use a proper strap removal spot within a match. She makes it look like she's just removing a piece of clothing that got in the way. This match was one I was excited for on paper, but it kind of just wound up exposing Nikki's singles match weaknesses. I'm still into the Sasha/Bayley act, and that kept the bulk of this strong.

Seth Rollins vs. Rey Mysterio

ER: I'm...not really sure how I feel about this one? It's a weird gross idea that feels hard to pull off, while also feeling like something that nobody ever asked for. Trying to stab someone in the eye is a great way to end an I Quit match, but a match where the sole focus will be on pulling out an eye? I don't know who was asking for that. I'd also be willing to bet that someone on the writing team got the idea from watching Fulci's Zombie rather than from watching Magnum/Tully. The thing is, for a match with an insane advertised conclusion, Rey busts his ass to make this work, and Rollins comes along with him. Rey was really great at inserting Rey spots in the middle of eye spots, and he takes some wild bumps to make this match feel even more dangerous. The apron falcon arrow was sick, and he was so good at working spots around turnbuckles and ring steps. Rollins was no slouch, and I liked his ringpost shoulder bump among other things, but Rey is just too good. Trying to gouge someone's eye out on the corner of a ring step is gross stuff, and Rey plays the fear of it really well. He does great with a kendo stick jammed into the corner, really going after that Fulci eye gouge where the gap between eyeball and wood slowly closes (needed more sharp jagged splintery bits). This finish is what the finish was advertised as being. Part of me thinks "Hey that owns!" It looked disgusting and Rollins throwing up after is the kind of apex to the Grand Guignol shit they have been trying to pull off in little ways. But another part of me still just finds the stip odd and unnecessary. Plus, this is a fed that chose to only use Pirata Morgan twice and was uninterested in bringing back old and crazy PCO. I'm not sure I can trust them to know how to properly book pirate Rey.

Asuka vs. Sasha Banks

ER: This was a really great match with a monumentally stupid finish. It's pretty deflating to work through such appealing match with fine drama and an exciting build, and then completely undercut every part of it with a finish that hasn't flown in 25 years. Having a ref get taken out of commission, to be replaced by a heel wearing a ref shirt, is an idea that Vince Russo buried and resuscitated hundreds of times, a man who never learned the lessons of Pet Sematary. Just a weak an unexplainable finish to be doing in 2020. But the rest was great! Sasha has been my favorite to watch weekly these past several months, and I think her and Bayley are doing a great job essentially running television. I'd much rather see them doing what they're doing, than seeing Charlotte clogging up main events. Sasha bumped huge here and really made this feel special. She flew to the floor on a charge and flew again after getting knocked off the apron by a hip attack. She kept building her bumps to mean more the deeper we got, and the way she flew into Asuka's Germans took this to another level. Sasha can come off clumsy on big bumps, but I think she's gotten so much better at body control over the years. These suplexes looked like they really folded her in half, but going back and watching them you can see her land on her back and shoulders and fold in a way that looks like she just got dumped directly on her neck. A safer bump that looks career shortening is a smart move, and it looked killer. Sasha's comebacks were good, and the Banks Statements was used really effectively. It's a great finisher that plays even better with a flexible opponent, and Asuka was really good at making it matter as she scrambled to the ropes. Both of their kicks looked good, I loved Asuka turning a Banks top rope arm drag into a nasty knee lift to the chin, I was really loving all of this. But that finish is a real deflator.

Dolph Ziggler vs. Drew McIntyre

ER: I thought this was really good. There isn't much in WWE I am less interested in than 2020 Dolph Ziggler matches, and yet this was a great title match that made great use of an intentionally lopsided stipulation. The stip (No DQ for Ziggler) made him more interesting. Ziggler throwing chairs at someone's knee in between taking painful throws over the announce table and into hard ringside objects he set up is just going to be way better than a typical Ziggler match. Ziggler was great at turning his normally athletic bumps into actually painful bumps, and Drew was wrecking him with glee. Ziggler took a great bump into the ringpost on the floor, ate several sick belly to belly suplexes in and out of ring (a cool fast on in the ring and a wild one into/over the announce table), and my favorite was probably McIntyre's awesome vertical suplex on the floor that really splatted Ziggler. Ziggler's cut off spots were strong, and I really got into the stip of him being able to cheat to stifle any momentum. The table spot was big, and they parsed out the nearfalls to keep the excitement strong. The finish was good too, and I'm unsure if that's because it's an actual good finish or that many of the other finishes have been bad enough that a competent finish feels like visionary genius. I wouldn't have guessed this would be the strongest match of the show, but it was and that's part of the fun.

Swamp Fight

ER: WWE is aiming, or more likely only capable of reaching, for deep cut straight to Netflix horror and those movies that used to be on the bottom row of Redbox kiosks. They need to surprise us by giving us a cinematic match that is based on Portrait of a Lady on Fire. We all saw the Matt Hardy stuff several years ago and I can't get too excited these days about a weekend Friday the 13th project.


ER: The show underwhelmed and underdelivered, but Asuka/Banks gave us a really good 15 minutes and McIntyre/Ziggler was an unexpectedly strong showing. Rey had a great performance in a weird situation, and other than the Swamp Fight the floor was high. But the show also felt a lot longer than it actually was. And that kind of speaks to the weirdness of this show. A show with a strong men's title match, a strong women's match, and a great Rey performance feels like a show I'd leave behind fondly. And yet we're here.

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2019 Ongoing MOTY List: Cesaro vs. Black

25. Cesaro vs. Aleister Black WWE Extreme Rules 7/14

ER: This was really damn cool and played like a really fun Big Mouth Loud undercard match. It got time but not too much, and saw Black slowly breaking down Cesaro with kicks to all parts of the body, throwing combos early in the match that set up other combos later in the match. The finish played directly into that with Black throwing a sharp kick to the inner thigh and then going for a high right kick, Cesaro leans in to block the high right and then gets his right temple dented in by Black Mass. Black kicked at shins and inner thighs throughout, and Cesaro was really good at selling cumulative damage in his legs, falling on a lift late in the match in a not overdone way. Cesaro still did plenty of cool Cesaro stuff, dug that big springing uppercut and snug cravate, loved the way he would try to counter Black's kicks, just a cool pairing. Black feels like a guy who could really get over if given the kind of exposure Cesaro got.

PAS: Really nifty match, with some cool counter wrestling which actually looked violent instead of swing dancing. I love strength highspots, and the spot where Cesaro caught the double knees and powered him into a press lifter was one of my favorite strength highspots in years. Loved how Black would cut him down with kicks, which Cesaro sold great, Black's combos are really cool and he has really learned to land them with more spice since his Tommy End days, he really looked like he dimmed Cesaro's lights with the big knee, and that final spin kick was right on the jaw. Great match up, enjoyed this a ton.


2019 MOTY MASTER LIST

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WWE Big 3: Lorcan, Gallagher, Gulak 7/13-7/20

EVOLVE 131 7/13

Drew Gulak vs. Matt Riddle

ER: Gulak gets Catch Point druids!!! As a match I think this underperformed and never felt like anything new. This felt like kind of a greatest hits collection from both guys without some of the drama that their best matches have. It felt like a slightly sanitized version of a match they would have had a couple years ago. The good news is that I happen to love the greatest hits from these two. We get a pair of cool belly to belly superplexes (Riddle getting the worst of it), both guys throw hard shots to the body (which were weirdly maybe my favorite thing about this), big Riddle senton, both throw hard uppercuts, Gulak always cutting in for single legs, it's them doing things that I like to watch them do. But this kind of felt like the recent run of 205 Live main events, where good workers are given 20 minutes to do their thing and it doesn't totally live up to the time. There were obviously hot stretches of this, and the Riddle corkscrew senton into Gulak's rear naked choke felt like a cool spot to end things. They didn't end it there, with Riddle simply picking Gulak up and hitting Bro Derek that didn't look finisher worthy. It really just looked like Gulak taking a heavier than normal slam, didn't read as a piledriver at all. This match was going to have a high floor - both guys are great - but it felt like we only bumped our head against their ceiling a couple times.

PAS: I liked this more then Eric (he has been grumpy lately). Greatest hits from these guys are pretty great, and it sort of makes sense to run a match like that when EVOLVE debuts on the network. I really enjoyed how Gulak used space in this match, always looking to keep close, grabbing for limbs, throwing body shots, negating Riddle's size advantage by grinding on him. Riddle is more explosive and I liked how Gulak tried to limit that explosiveness. I agree about the finish, that Gulak rear naked choke would have been perfect, and the Riddle finish was the weakest thing about the match, but lots of this was really great. Riddle seems to have tightened up his strikes and moved away from New Japan overkill since coming to the WWE, and both things are welcome additions. Loved all the Catch Point stuff in this match, and now that this is WWE canon Gulak really should bring Catch Point back on 205 Live: Oney Lorcan, Cameron Grimes and Chad Gable would make a pretty rad Catch Point.

Extreme Rules 7/14

Drew Gulak vs. Tony Nese

ER: Early on we get a "Let's Go Gulak" chant which is an awesome surprise. If Gulak actually starts to get over the same way Bryan got over earlier in the decade, how great will that be?? This is kind of what anybody could have expected going in: Gulak looked great, Nese did not, but Nese tried some things that worked in a stupid risk taking way. Nese has that "hey Evan Karagias is getting better" vibe to him, but he doesn't actually have babyface charisma. He does things that some fans should find cool, but Gulak is the one getting the reactions here. YES, obviously this is being held right in Gulak's stomping grounds, but that isn't a guarantee to get a great reaction and he got them throughout. Nese did a wild moonsault the the floor, hitting Gulak who was tied up in the ropes over the apron; it didn't really work, but I like him going for stupid stuff. He also overshoots a 450 and slams those knees right into Gulak's ribs, throws him messily into the corner with a german suplex, basically the nastiest parts of Nese's attack were kind of accidents. Gulak threw great kicks, and I think his reactions are going to keep getting louder, and they'll eventually babyface him. Early in the match Gulak hit an awesome diving clothesline off the apron (hard to make diving clotheslines look good) and his folding powerbomb looked great and would make a fine finisher, but I love the old school style of his spinning back suplex. Gulak is here baby!

PAS: I thought Nese was pretty terrible, for a guy I have had to watch a bunch due to this project he is one of my least favorite guys to watch in the world (I have excised most wrestlers I can't stand). He was in full dance fight mode in this especially early, and I agree with Eric that most of the good looking stuff he did seemed like a botch. Gulak looked great and I dug Philly getting behind him. Really simple wrestling, especially while matched up with a flipster like Nese, big lariat will always be cooler then a cartwheel. Happy that he won, hopefully he puts Nese in his rear view mirror and matches up with some of the cooler smaller guys in different parts of the fed. I am not a Shane Strickland guy, but it is cool that Gulak is mixing it up outside of the 205 live roster.

205 Live 7/16

48. Jack Gallagher vs. Chad Gable

ER: We got a great 10 minute sprint between these two a month ago with nary a mention of it since. Without a warning they bring us back into that feud and continue in the unexpected recent tradition of letting the 205 Live main event fly past the 15 minute mark. This felt like the 2019 indy version of their fantastic first match. I thought their shorter match was tighter and laid out in a more interesting way, and thought this one turned more into a shocked-by-nearfalls finisher trade-off that their first match didn't really attempt. I think both guys have the material to go this length, but I think dynamite short bursts keep their style stronger. The first match was two unknowns exploding off each other, while this match integrated learned behavior and the longer runtime perhaps made more sense because now both men were wrestling more cautious around each other. They were known quantities at this point, and neither wanted to rush into a mistake. The crowd couldn't care about those plans as we got several attempts at BORING chants through the first third of this, which is an odd thing to come up with right after watching a Mike Kanellis match.

I didn't think this was as focused as their first match, as both guys spent a long time looking for openings, Gallagher working a short arm scissors (which may have been done so Gable could show off his 0.7 Backlund strength), Gable working the arm, working the leg with a dragon screw, and while I like how these guys flow it was also hard to shake that we were just getting some limb work to pad time before we got to the match proper. And sure enough, by the time Gallagher planted a dropkick firmly on the chest and then hit his delayed vertical suplex, people were more on board with the match. I think some of the learned behavior benefitted the match, and other stuff felt a little out of place or inorganic. My favorite moment of that was Gable catching Gallagher over his shoulder in the corner off a dodged dropkick and then swinging him back down into a DDT. One of the announcers even said "I've never seen Gable do that before!" and that's really important, as it wasn't Gallagher just doing a dropkick he never does so that he's in position for Gable's over shoulder DDT. This was Gable scouting Gallagher's corner dropkick and turning it against him. I like Gable rolling Gallagher into the ring after the German on the floor (last time Gallagher got counted out after taking it), but Gable also had to pretend he didn't really get hit with Gallagher's tope to do the spot. That's part of the inorganic feeling I was talking about. Even Gallagher's great headbutt spot is done in a 2019 indy way, with Gable hitting a koppo kick that sends Gallagher bouncing upside down in the ropes and back into the headbutt. I don't think these guys need to drift into "I hit you which causes you to swing around and hit me which causes me to swing back around into an..." wrestling, they've shown they have more interesting ways to get to those moments. The closing stretch had some great moments (Gable reversing a belly to back superplex into a hard landing on Jack, and Jack landing high and hard on the Chaos Theory suplex), but it felt like two really talented guys inputting their skills into a match style I don't love. I'm going to like Gallagher doing it more than others, but more pieces of this than I expected didn't really work for me.

PAS: I liked this more then Eric did. Gable really unloaded a ton of great offense early, awesome armdrags, killer koppo kick, some big throws. Really overwhelmed Gallagher, the short arm scissors reversal was more of that domination, I am an enormous fan of the short arm scissors reversal and these were two cool guys to pull off that move. I did like how Gallagher was able to use his craft to get some advantages, his reversal out of the ankle lock was really slick grappling, and I thought the hammer fists after were great looking. I also thought his big end of the match offensive explosion was nasty, with Gable's moonsault landing on an upkick, and an incredible dropkick in the corner. I did think it got a little indy in the end, but these are a pair of guys with awesome looking stuff for a this is awesome section.


2019 MOTY MASTER LIST

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WWE Extreme Rules 7/14/19 Blog

Jeeeez these things start earlier and earlier. Are 4 PM starts the norm now? They always catch me off guard. I dig Beth Phoenix's new haircut, though it feels like they're doing that thing where they make her look like Renee Young, as they made Michael Cole look like Todd Pettengill.

Shinsuke Nakamura vs. Finn Balor

ER: Feels like there will be people upset that these two are on the pre-show, in a title match no less, but these are not concerns that I share. I prefer when the pre-show matches are guys who typically wind up on 205 Live or Main Event, as it plays like a fun 8 minute try out match at that point and they usually deliver. This just feels like a couple of established guys slumming it. I'm pretty certain that every single strike Balor threw landed about 6" to the side of Nakamura. Pele kick? Somewhere over Shinsuke's shoulder. Kick from the apron? somewhere past Shinsuke's head. Balor's cut off double stomp looked good, and Nakamura's two finishing shots looked good (knee to the back of the head looked great and then kinshasa was a good follow up), but I didn't really expect them to change the title in such a vanilla match. This felt like the touring 6 minute match these two would have around the circuit, felt very going through the motions.

Tony Nese vs. Drew Gulak

ER: Early on we get a "Let's Go Gulak" chant which is an awesome surprise. If Gulak actually starts to get over the same way Bryan got over earlier in the decade, how great will that be?? This is kind of what anybody could have expected going in: Gulak looked great, Nese did not, but Nese tried some things that worked in a stupid risk taking way. Nese has that "hey Evan Karagias is getting better" vibe to him, but he doesn't actually have babyface charisma. He does things that some fans should find cool, but Gulak is the one getting the reactions here. YES, obviously this is being held right in Gulak's stomping grounds, but that isn't a guarantee to get a great reaction and he got them throughout. Nese did a wild moonsault to the floor, hitting Gulak who was tied up in the ropes over the apron; it didn't really work, but I like him going for stupid stuff. He also overshoots a 450 and slams those knees right into Gulak's ribs, throws him messily into the corner with a german suplex, basically the nastiest parts of Nese's attack were kind of accidents. Gulak threw great kicks, and I think his reactions are going to keep getting louder, and they'll eventually babyface him. Early in the match Gulak hit an awesome diving clothesline off the apron (hard to make diving clotheslines look good) and his folding powerbomb looked great and would make a fine finisher, but I love the old school style of his spinning back suplex. Gulak is here baby!

No Holds Barred: Shane McMahon/Drew McIntyre vs. Roman Reigns/Undertaker

ER: Starting off the show with this one! And you know what? I thought it was awesome. I was hooked in throughout, feeling it the whole time. The NHB stip is mostly wasted as this was worked about as straight as you can work a tag match (until 12+ minutes in), but they worked a damn successful tag formula. The key was Shane actually treated the way Shane *should* be treated in the ring. Shane is never portrayed as an equal, he comes in with his stupid little punches, and then gets absolutely manhandled. That's what should be happening. Undertaker never once treated him seriously, which thank fucking god. Reigns was throwing big uppercuts to Shane, and Undertaker is full crazy old man. I gotta respect the guy. He got dropped his head by Goldberg not even a couple months ago and here he is, breaking out the greatest hits, dropping a big leg on the apron, throwing big boots, looking like The Undertaker. McIntyre hits a huge overhead belly to belly on Roman and he gets a cool showdown with Taker (McIntyre appeared to be taller than Taker at this point), but a lot of this was Roman and Taker working over Shane, and it was great. The turning point of the match was really well done, with Shane making a low bridge to send Roman bumping big over the top. Elias comes out to officially make use of the NHB and interfere, and we get two big Shane spots, putting Taker through an announce table with an elbow, then hitting the coast to coast in the ring. But I think those are the way Shane should be getting offense in, doing your long set up car crashes when you have two actual guys holding down your opponent. This was a smart way to set up Shane moments. The finish stretch is really well laid out, with Taker making his sit up comeback on Shane, but then DREW getting to pop up behind Taker. The camera clearly set up the shot, but it played as a great wrestling visual, something they should get video package use out of. I didn't see Roman's cut off spear coming (and the cameras didn't show it well at all), but I thought this wrapped up really cool. I wasn't expecting to be into this one going in, but I loved the formula and layout worked to perfection, thought it was fun bell to bell. And my god they said "Big Dog" literally a dozen times. Absurd.

The Revival vs. The Usos

ER: This was the match on the card I was most excited about, and they obviously had a good one. What was odd is that the crowd did not care at ALL. I wouldn't think the Taker appearance and match would kill them dead that easily, but it was eerily silent through most of this match. And this match should have gotten a great reaction! This was an exciting tag match! The Revival are a finely tuned machine, love how the set up their double teams, love their shtick, love their pace. They are good foils for Uso offense, scramble out of the way on superkicks and lean in when they need to, always good at stooging into place. We got a couple tandem Usos dives that sprawled out impressively, leading to a cool long section of Revival cutting off the ring. Dawson looked like he was having a ball the whole match, guy is so good. I kept waiting for people to get into it, but they couldn't care less. There weren't a ton of twists, but these teams match up so well you don't really need them, and I thought the finish was satisfying. This was classic tag wrestling, which has been getting great reactions for decades. No idea why the crowd would be so bored so soon. Watch this on mute and it would probably come off like a classic.

Cesaro vs. Aleister Black

ER: This was really damn cool and played like a really fun Big Mouth Loud undercard match. It got time but not too much, and saw Black slowly breaking down Cesaro with kicks to all parts of the body, throwing combos early in the match that set up other combos later in the match. The finish played directly into that with Black throwing a sharp kick to the inner thigh and then going for a high right kick, Cesaro leans in to block the high right and then gets his right temple dented in by Black Mass. Black kicked at shins and inner thighs throughout, and Cesaro was really good at selling cumulative damage in his legs, falling on a lift late in the match in a not overdone way. Cesaro still did plenty of cool Cesaro stuff, dug that big springing uppercut and snug cravate, loved the way he would try to counter Black's kicks, just a cool pairing. Black feels like a guy who could really get over if given the kind of exposure Cesaro got.

Nikki Cross/Alexa Bliss vs. Bayley

ER: I really don't get this kind of handicap match. Bayley doesn't have the kind of offense that can control two people, and nobody wants to see two people just cut off a ring by themselves. Of anything on the card, I am least excited for this. I can't imagine the crowd being won back with a handicap match, either. And this was about as lame as I was expecting. It wasn't long, but it felt too long. None of the spots where Bayley did tandem offense to Bliss/Cross looked good (at one point Bliss basically had to put herself in a headlock), and I couldn't get too into Bliss/Cross teeing off on Bayley because I still don't really understand the Bliss/Cross relationship. There were nice moments: Cross does the Finlay ring skirt trap well, and Bliss threw a nasty dropkick to Bayley while she was trapped in the skirt; Bliss's double knees to the stomach both landed hard (really stuck those moonsault knees), and Bliss hit hard on Bayley's knees doing the twisting moonsault. I just couldn't get into the result of this match. It wasn't going somewhere I was interested in seeing. My overall interested in the women's division has sunk like a rock in a lake these past few months.

Last Man Standing: Bobby Lashley vs. Braun Strowman

ER: We're in Philadelphia, and these guys set out to have a big ECW crowd brawl match, and it was better than a lot of ECW crowd brawling. Fans gave it some obligatory ECW chant (which certainly wasn't a guarantee given how quiet they've been) but two big dudes crashing through walls and taking prop bumps was enough to rouse them. They avoided the "walking and holding heads" kind of ECW brawl, and kept this more about big spills. Braun suplexed Lashley into a merch set up but not through a table, he just vertical suplexed him into a wall and let Lashley fall. Lashley speared him through the ring barricade, both fell over announce tables, they fell into concrete steps, a real nice brawl that could have been next level if they were allowed to bleed. We built to a huge moment where Lashley sprang up to beat a 10 count, leaped up and over the barricade to chase Braun, but then got tossed into the alt. language commentary pit. Lashley's bump into the pit was great, could have been a great capper to a cool match really. They wind up finish with some climbing up to a big mysterious crash pad location, with big comical black plastic gates and a big black box on the lower level that nobody noticed before. The Braun powerslam through it looks cool, and Braun crashes through the front of the box to emerge standing, but I thought it all felt too set up and phony to be effective. Braun sidestepping Lashley into the pit came off more organic.

Big E/Xavier Woods vs. Heavy Machinery vs. Daniel Bryan/Erick Rowan

ER: This was really fun, as you'd expect a match with these guys to be. Otis vs. Bryan is a pairing I really like, and I love how Otis and Tucker work together. The match is filled with cool spots: Rowan's big crossbody on the floor into Bryan's knee off the apron, Otis tossing Bryan into a Tucker belly to belly, Bryan sinking in the LeBell Lock and subsequently tying off all of E's limbs as he would reach for the ropes, E hits his best-in-wrestling standing splash and kills Bryan with the spear to the floor, Otis makes me laugh the whole time with his apron work, Tucker hits a wild plancha to the floor, Otis corgi leaps off the apron, tons of really great stuff. I didn't want to see New Day win the belts. I'm kind of sick of New Day constantly being in the title scene, really felt like this should have been Heavy Machinery's first title win. New Day don't need the belts, they'll be as over as they can possibly be just doing whatever they do. Of the three options, I would have much rather seen Bryan/Rowan retain, or HM win.

AJ Styles vs. Ricochet

ER: This did very little for me. Both guys do cool things, but it all felt pretty empty. Ricochet is obviously a freak athlete but doing silly things like a shooting star clothesline don't really help him. He's more interesting when he's throwing his whole body into attacks (and his springboard to the floor onto Gallows looked good), his big springboard shooting star looked good, but this whole thing was so dry. The middle rope Styles Clash was cool, and the interference while lame was actually well done (Anderson getting kicked from the apron into the ring was a cool moment), but this did next to nothing for me.

Kevin Owens vs. Dolph Ziggler

ER: God bless these men.

Samoa Joe vs. Kofi Kingston

ER: I thought Joe was really awesome here, bullying Kingston around the ring and throwing hard kicks to bully him into corners to attack with fists, then trip him to the ground with kicks. He had a legsweep to Kofi's shins that was so killer. Joe looked like enough of a killer that I immediately wanted this to be a dominant Joe victory. Kofi's reign just means I have to see more Kofi Kingston matches, and the prospect of more Joe matches is way more interesting. I thought Joe crushed Kofi here and this was my favorite Joe performance in some time. Kofi tries to get cute with him at one point and Joe hits a mean uranage. I wanted this to be one of those shocking beatings of a champ, for Joe to walk in and just steamroll Kofi and win the title. Something like that would make a rematch more interesting for me, Kofi going in completely unprepared for Joe, something like that. I thought Joe's beating was strong enough that it was going to make Kofi's inevitable comeback look a little silly, as I've never liked Kofi's offense and don't think it's something that looks great against a guy like Joe. Still, I thought this match delivered overall, just not quite what I wanted it to.

Baron Corbin/Lacey Evans vs. Seth Rollins/Becky Lynch

ER: This was mostly pretty dull, and filled with people I don't really care about. Lynch hasn't been interesting at all, really making her brief period as THE most interesting thing seem like a distant or false memory. First thing I notice her do here is miss a stomach kick by a foot, so she's not exactly inspiring me. It's just a bad sign when there are 4 people in the match and Baron Corbin is the one I like best. Lacey was probably the most interesting during the dull parts of the match, she had the most interesting personality at least. I didn't care about much of this, but the big table spot was genuinely spectacular. Becky just crushes Lacey with a senton/legdrop, Rollins blows up Corbin and a table with a long distance splash. But the finish was legitimately great, a super great finish to something I didn't care about: Baron Corbin absolutely kills Lynch with the end of days. It was really great within the context of the match, as they'd made a big deal the whole damn time about the women staying separate from the men. Corbin annihilates Lynch and it's the first interaction of the match, played so well. And with that, Rollins actually has the most interesting moment of the past calendar year. I thought him snapping and just wasting Corbin with kendo stick shots, chairshots, and three curb stomps was the most actual interesting character he's shown in god knows how long. A heel going too far and immediately being on the business end of a babyface's justified sadistic revenge. It's a great kind of 80s babyface comeback, with the dickhead heel suddenly backpedaling because the babyface was pushed too far. I wouldn't think Rollins could pull that off, but he did, and he did it well. Corbin gets good marks for making the curb stomps look good.

And then BROCK comes out and destroys Rollins! Brock as champ is SO MUCH MORE interesting to me so thank god. I'd much rather see people coming at Brock, Brock defending is something I like (I think more than most people), so hell yeah bring on the challengers to BROCK! I liked how the cash in was handled and do not care how it made Rollins look.

I thought this was a good show that went too damn long. 3 hours is fine for most PPV. 4 hours + a couple matches before that 4 hours is too much. Even if the wrestling is mostly good. But the show had good performances top to bottom. The Graveyard Dogs overdelivered, Revival had their good match, Cesaro/Black stood out as a cool style on this card, tag trios delivered, Braun and Lashley had a good brawl, and the final match ended strong. That's a good show! I just wished it were shorter.

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WWE Extreme Rules 2018 "Safely Behind Live" Blog

ER: So we gotta get this thing over and done with before Sharp Objects comes on, as Rachel can really only be expected to put up with so much. These were not demands verbally stated by her, these were just things mentally understood and recognized by me.

Sin Cara vs. Andrade Cien Almas

ER: Nice to see Almas running it back on the opening opening dark match of the PPV while the "WWE Universe is still filing in", according to Graves. Was the result of the Smackdown match earlier this week at all in question? There's a problem that Almas takes offense very well, which leads to him giving more offense to guys like Caras, who he really should be running through. The Smackdown match was super fun, but it was also supposed to be a showcase for Almas (to get him ready for pre-show matches I suppose?), so it can Almas doing every big piece of his offense to impress the crowd, but also working a competitive match, so it came off like him having to pull out all the stops to beat Sin Cara. They do a little bit of playing off their Smackdown match, which I was hoping for (even though the crack 7 man announce team doesn't seem to know they wrestled each other on Smackdown), like Almas throwing Cara into the barricade on a dive (nasty spot to happen so early in a match) and Caras slip out the back on the double stomp to the apron. Almas took all the lucha stuff really nicely, took arm drags smooth, bumped generously to the floor, saved that headscissors spot, etc. Cara ate his more impactful offense nicely, so everything they did looked really good, and they bounce off each other nicely, but at the same time the match didn't have a lot of teeth. I did like Almas depriving the fans of a dive spot and instead doing my favorite couple pose in wrestling, with Vega. But this felt like something that was crafted to be a showcase for each guy, separately.

Tables Match: New Day vs. Sanity

ER: Interesting that there's a tables match on the pre-show, as I don't remember many "extreme" matches on the main card when I looked at it earlier this week. We did get a really good Cara/Corbin chairs match on a pre-show before. Perhaps this upcoming PPV is going to be more about the extreme enforcement of rules? That kinda sounds more appealing to me. And this whole match doesn't really work. Everybody in it kind of works equal, which isn't very interesting when you have guys like E and Dain in there. A tornado style match should in theory lead to more chaos and a nasty brawling atmosphere, but instead they opt to do doopy double and triple team spots that require a lot of waiting around and unsatisfying payoffs. That powerbomb/double stomp was very much not worth it. I also prefer past tables matches that I've seen, where the tables were just already set up on the floor, as we get a bit much unnecessary table set up. We just don't get a lot of meat in this match, and it would have been far more interesting seeing them all fight in a normal trios than what we ended up getting. There were a couple nice "going through a table" teases, but this whole thing kind of neutered everyone. Underwhelming.

Matt Hardy/Bray Wyatt vs. Bo Dallas/Curtis Axel

ER: This match feels more pre-show than the two pre-show matches, but I can't deny that I'm digging it more than the two pre-show matches. The B Team are working like a perfectly fine Rougeaus, with stalling bullshit, sneaky shots (loved Dallas kicking Hardy in the head on the apron) and crowd baiting stuff when the cameras might not even be on them (caught Dallas blowing a snot rocket from the apron on the edge of my screen). Wyatt works my favorite performance of his in who knows when with nasty things that like cut-off headbutt on Axel, or stomping fingers when Axel is getting to his feet, but also some nice little selling moments. When Axel was stomping his gut in the corner, Bray did this really nice sell getting back to his feet, pulling up on the top rope the way a guy with a sore as hell core would, even holding his belly while he stepped to the apron after tagging Hardy in. Axel has nice stomps, but I loved Wyatt's dedication at bringing attention to them. I do think the ending was a bit sudden, which made this feel kind of like the first half of a really good match, but I really enjoyed what we got.

Finn Balor vs. Baron Corbin

ER: I do not care much at all about this much, but I definitely think Corbin's look is a step up. I still can't believe we ever get hair matches when balding dudes opt to shave their head. I'll be there within a few years I'm sure, and I'm definitely going to challenge someone before it happens. You just know  Killian Dain is going to show up on some random Smackdown with a shaved head and it'll be a huge waste. Viktor, too. Imagine the month of promos building up an inevitable "must be forced to finally shave head" match between Corbin and Viktor? I don't think Balor has enough strumph behind his offense to look very good against Corbin, and I don't think Corbin is good enough to make a match with Balor compelling. Corbin is at least wrestling aggressively, throwing decent corner lariats, and running after Balor; and I like how Balor is getting caught and punished every time he goes up top, but the finish doesn't do any favors for anybody. I was just getting into the story of Corbin cutting off all attempts at Balor getting ahead, and we get just a small package finish. I have nothing invested in these two, but I don't see how it helps either.

Also, Rachel came into the room during the end of the match and asked "Wait, when did Corbin lose a hair match?" See?? She gets this whole stupid wrestling thing.

Asuka vs. Carmella

ER: The concept of a wimpy manager locked in a shark cage over the ring is a wrestling concept completely foreign to Rachel. When was the first instance of this stip? Anyway, the match is fun and I like that Ellsworth is like me in any stealth video game, having the ability to get active at the very worst time. Drop a chain in front of the ref and escape the cage while Carmella is indisposed? That's exactly me rushing out into the middle of four converging guards in a Metal Gear game. I don't know why Ellsworth's legs are done up like a Steven Tyler microphone stand, but I love how it lead to him being hooked and upside down on the bottom side of the cage. Great visual spot they set up. I was VERY surprised by the finish, and again felt like we got robbed of a second half of match, like we just got the first half and then skipped to the finish. I've gotten that same damn feeling in all three main card matches. Carmella took a nice bump into the railing, our trusty Extreme Rules ring crew is fun getting kicked around by Asuka, love how quickly he bumped to the floor for her. I've really been enjoying Carmella as a character, so I like that she keeps finding ways to get the upset against Asuka, but it feels - again - like we got robbed of half a match.

Jeff Hardy vs. Shinsuke Nakamura

ER: I am ENTIRELY OKAY with how this played out, mainly because these are two guys I was not excited about seeing in a singles match on a Sunday night. Low blow and a really nice Kinshasa? Yes, please. Randy Orton returns (I hadn't actually noticed that he'd been away) and makes me happy that I typically watch these "behind", as I'm able to magically skip ahead to the next match. I did look like Orton came back as a heel, by attacking Hardy, but I bet it's going to turn out that he's just a lame lone wolf. If I'm going to watch Orton, it should be as a heel, because, well, watch Orton for 5 seconds.

Cage Match: Braun Strowman vs. Kevin Owens

ER: This starts nice and hot, with both guys taking big bumps into the cage. I liked Braun running face first into the cage on a missed avalanche, and all the early-seeming finishes tonight in every single other match made me totally buy into Owens winning with the frog splash in 2 minutes. Owens is really good at those rolling cage bumps, getting repeatedly tossed into the cage and rolling down the side to the apron. Graves puts it over by saying it's like having a cheese grater run over your body, which works. Braun is missing all the stuff that's supposed to miss with nice violence; both of his missed avalanches looked rib breaking. I liked the stuff around the handcuffs, liked the caught chokeslam, liked the inevitable cuffs breaking spot, and was blown away by how damn quickly Braun ran up the top of the cage. It did highlight the only glaringly stupid thing of the match, which is Owens' two instances of ultra slow movement. His slow crawling to the cage door earlier was eye rolling, and his slow cage climb was lame. But Braun running up to the damn top of the cage in near record time (especially if we divide it into weight classes for comparison sake) and throwing Owens off the top were a couple of nice match ending moments. Owens took a hell of a dive there. I AM going to sound like a broken record here, but this also seemed to end way early. Normally I'm not one to be begging for matches to be longer, but this isn't all even a match length problem. Instead, everyone just seems to be working the wrong match for their allotted time. They've all started at least promising, they've just all had record skip stops to the finish. I wonder how long it's been since we've had a big table bump off the top of a cage?

Team Hell No vs. The Bludgeon Brothers

ER: I like this match-up on paper, mainly because Bryan feels like a really fun opponent for both of these lovable cosplay doofs. They've lost so much steam with these bad outfits and silly name, but they're both really good at working scrappy small guys. Bryan knows how to dial it up, and all his kicks on Harper look good, while all of Rowan's offense on him look good. Kane comes out somewhat hilariously in a walking boot, and if there's one thing I was hoping for in a Kane match, it's a match where Kane was working much slower than usual. Harper takes out Kane's good leg with a nice looking kick, and AGAIN I think I'm very not that crazy, as this cuts right past a Bryan FIP section leading to any kind of Kane comeback, and goes right to the finish. Who the hell is agent for this show?? I'm hoping someone is laying out all the first halves, and someone else was supposed to handle all the back end work and just completely procrastinating on it and just cutting straight to the pinfall. Kane goes down, Bryan hits Yes kicks, Rowan hits a spin kick and then we get the pinfall. Is my Network feed just skipping ahead because I'm behind, and I'm not noticing? This is bad.

Roman Reigns vs. Bobby Lashley

ER: Lashley throws a decent suplex early, but I like how they're playing this match with Roman getting a long control segment. Crowd is trying their best to not get into the match and come up with chants, but Roman isn't getting rattled and is instead doing all these great puppy dog eyes looks at the crowd as he continues beating Lashley's ass around the ring. Roman is taking his time and the pacing works for the tone. He breaks the slow pacing just once, to run into a nicely timed and quick Drive-By, and the pacing makes Lashley's comeback look more explosive. Roman does his corner clotheslines with a great smug face, and flies into Lashley's bigger pieces of offense (the huge high rotation powerslam and the big man crossbody). Lashley does have fun offense though, a good powerslam will take you far, and there's something I still like about a big man doing an axehandle. And then Bobby shows was an absolute nut he is by taking a HUGE bump over the top to the floor, getting backdropped past the reach of the ropes and therefore not going over slow. He looked like he reached for them on the replay, but that was a Hamrick level bump right there, done by someone weighing 260. The bump felt and looked even more violent than the Owens bump off the cage, and it felt more shocking because I don't think anyone was expecting it to be that rough. The way these finishes have been coming so unexpectedly, I fully bought into the Superman punch finish, but glad it wasn't the finish. Roman doing a full victory lap to run over Lashley was a nice touch, and getting belly to bellied over an announcer's table was nice punishment, and the finish with Lashley cutting off a Reigns spear with his own short spear, was nice, and I like how Lashley played the finish. It's cool to see guys excited that they won a tough match. This match made Lashley look like an actual guy to watch, which has not happened for him so far this run. This is easily the best match of the night so far.

Extreme Rules: Nia Jax vs. Alexa Bliss

ER: I've really been loving the matches between this whole group, and this one is another that is fun right out of the gate. Alexa goes for weapons right away, gets one kendo stick shot in, leading to Jax catching the next one. And then we get a real amusing Looney Tunes spot with Mickie (arguably greatest 2nd in the WWE the past year, she's been so damn great) grabbing weapons frantically for Bliss, with Nia catching all of them when Bliss tries using them, and throwing them into the ring. It was an awesome way to load the ring up with weapons, actually incorporating the weapons thrown into the ring into actual spots. It lead to actual character moments happening instead of everything coming to a complete stop while someone looks for and then throws a half dozen things into the ring. And the eventual beatdown on Nia is a good one, with Alexa eventually getting to use all those weapons, and Nia herself running into some hard shots (ramming herself into the chair in the corner was especially nasty). Mickie is spectacular on the floor with her swooped over hair and Frankenhooker skirt, and she always takes such a great beating from Rousey. That's kind of a lousy thing to be good at, but I think James has helped keep Rousey's status high so far more than maybe anyone. When James finally gets even more involved, you know it leads to Ronda jumping the rail and dishing out a beating. Mickie flies into the barricade a few times, pelvis first into the apron, and then takes a hard as hell looking Death Valley Driver variation in the ring. I like the ways they attacked Nia, with Alexa hitting her in the kneecaps and thighs with a chair, and the finish looked believable enough. I did want a few more minutes of match, but the match didn't feel as abbreviated as most of the rest of this card. You just give me Rousey/Bliss and Nia/Mickie and I'll be a happy camper.

Rusev vs. AJ Styles

ER: We get a couple big bumps early from each guy here, and I'm happy to see Rusev finally get back towards the top of the card. Styles is good at punching up his offense whenever he's against a bigger guy, and I like that we have two guys with good looking submissions. The Calf Crusher is my favorite sub in WWE, but Rusev makes the clutch look really strong. Offense looks good from both guys, the Styles sliding punched looked knockout worthy, and Rusev's belly to belly on the floor landed with a gross thud. Love the false finishes we get with Rusev kicking Styles in the side of the neck with his always good roundhouse, and Rusev selling that damn Calf Crusher with his leg buckling during the clutch. Love a big man selling a limb injury. Rusev kicking out of the 450 was a big moment, and holy hell did Styles aim to erase Aiden English's face on that baseball slide dropkick. I was hoping for a Rusev win here, but Styles is a good champ and they had a good match.

***Okay, here's the thing, I don't want to watch the Iron Man match. But let's see how my evening goes. If Rachel gets a phone call from her sister or something and I'm left with some extra time, sure, I'll give it a shot. But I don't have time to watch 30 minutes of match that might feel like 60 minutes before Sharp Objects, and don't feel like breaking it up into parts. If I'm watching 30 minutes of guys I don't like, I'm diving all in baby!***

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WWE Extreme Rules 2017 Live Blog

1. Kalisto vs. Apollo Crews

ER: These pre-show matches almost always deliver, which makes sense as they're a combination of low expectations with guys seemingly trying to get noticed. Kalisto hits an Aerostar-esque 450 from the middle rope to the floor, hopping from inside the ring to the rope on the outside, and crashing senton style into the standing Crews. Awesome. And then he follows it up with another springboard and crashes spectacularly when Crews enziguiris him on the way down. Back in there are a couple of slightly mistimed spots, but all is saved when Crews takes a gorgeous tornado DDT and later hits a huge pop up Samoan drop and a flawless standing shooting star. Kalisto kicking Titus off the apron while hitting the Salida del Sol in one motion was a nice touch to the finish.

2. The Miz vs. Dean Ambrose

ER: First minute or so is total dullsville, and then suddenly something wakes up in Dean and he starts throwing stinging chops on Miz and a huge lariat that sends Miz super fast to the floor. Okay, we're doing this. Miz is great trying to goad Dean into using a chair, and Miz hitting an apron DDT looked real good. Both men tighten things up with Dean actually trying on a couple kicks to the stomach (something he hasn't put effort into in over a year), Miz hits a great dropkick in the corner, Dean levels Miz with his flying elbow to the floor (great timed bump by Miz) and this is definitely better than I was expecting. The fight over the figure 4 is pretty lackluster and I hate that the rebound lariat hits 90% of the time. Finish was logical but couldn't be seen as satisfying to anyone, as ending a match by arguing with the referee for 30 seconds before being hit with a finisher is just unsatisfying. Still, match exceeded expectations.

3. Alicia Fox/Noam Dar vs. Sasha Banks/Rich Swann

ER: Really liked the early Fox/Sasha tangling, Alicia going for a tilt a whirl only for Sasha to reverse to the Banks Statement looked really great. Goddamn do I hate Michael Cole constantly given the directive that black babyfaces "love to have fun!" It's a dumb as hell line that they keep going to, and it never sounds convincing and always sounds insulting. Thankfully the fun hating women get in to break up a pin and yank arms in nasty ways. Sasha hits her pretty spectacular double knees off the top into Dar on the floor and Swann plants the phoenix. This whole thing felt like an inconsequential pre-show match, but was perfectly fine for what it was. Dug Team Swasha's post-match dancing.

ER: I have no clue who Elias Samson is, but shitty guy with an acoustic singing original songs is some pretty immediate heel heat from me. It feels like more of a college heel gimmick but it works as a guy who plays open mics and works 12 hours a week at a coffee shop. Michael Cole almost makes me spit out my coffee after the song, with the hilariously mis-delivered line "That sounds like something that should be on The Ghost of Tom Joad!" Nothing like dropping a reference to Springsteen's worst album, which is also over 20 years old. That's his go-to stark singer songwriter album reference!? Compare Samson to fucking Nebraska or something if you're going old. Shit, do I now have to go back and see if GoTJ has gotten better with age? Whatever, Cole's line could not have sounded less cool. Nobody reacted to it. It was amazing. "That sounds like a cut off of No Jacket Required!!" he says in his voice that sounds like he's recording a video game soundbite. 10 stars.

4. Kendo Stick on a Pole: Bayley vs. Alexa Bliss

ER: Well this couldn't have been more disappointing. Did Miz/Ambrose go way too long and this just had most of the middle cut out? The hype video was longer than the match! I don't tend to use terms like "bury" but damn did this feel like a "Spirit Squad get sent back to OVW" moment for Bayley.

5. Cage Match: Sheamus/Cesaro vs. Hardy Boys

ER: Both teams go for escapes right away which is like the least interesting way to work a team cage match, but Cesaro does look awesome running across the ring, leaping up the ropes and springing to the top of the cage. Jeff hits on of the best lariats of his career on Sheamus. Cesaro does the Scott Hall "Bad Guy" pose. Sheamus is the only one saving this with several painful looking bumps into the cage. he really has no problem flying over the ropes into that cage in violent ways. The escape attempts don't do much for me and I'd much rather see violent asskickings and guys getting thrown into the cage, but they win me over once Jeff is dangling from the side of the cage while Cesaro is holding on to only his arm. That looked great. The psychology of team escape cage matches just never makes sense to me, as it seems like the heel team should just let one of the faces escape, and then just kick the shit out of the remaining face for 10 minutes and walk out the door. If they had let Jeff escape 10 seconds in, this could have just been both of them teeing off on Matt with Jeff unable to save. It all just makes no sense. Jeff coming back in to do a dive off the top makes confuses me even more. So is he back in the match? Is he unescaped? Cole says so, and I actually like that. THAT makes me more interested in this. And that rule totally saved the match. Cesaro and Sheamus giving Matt such a beating that Jeff reenters the match, which leads directly to them losing, is a great finish. Matt dragging Jeff for the door while C&S climb over was really well done.

6. Austin Aries vs. Neville

ER: I hate how high Neville cuts on missed clotheslines. Aries is freaking 5'5", he can duck a normal lariat. This gets good once Neville goes after Aries' left arm. Graves is good putting over how Aries is a southpaw and this is going to take his most important weapons away from him. The kicks to the arm look great and the fight to the ring ropes was quality. They lose the magic pretty kick when Aries grabs a guillotine with that same arm that's been beaten to a pulp. Do you know how hard your arm has to work to hold a guillotine? So I did not like that, but then Aries crashes hard on a missed dive and Neville hits a picture perfect red arrow, so I can't complain too much. Still, other than some Kendrick, it doesn't seem like I'm missing too much by skipping 205 Live.

7. Bray Wyatt vs. Samoa Joe vs. Seth Rollins vs. Finn Balor vs. Roman Reigns

ER: I wish they had found a 6th man, odd numbered matches are usually the pits. This is okay I guess. There's a lot of movement, so that's something. Bray is doing a nice job of not ignoring the people just lying around selling, always throwing in a kick or stomp whenever he passes one. This is pretty predictably a mess, but the fans have been engaged the whole time which doesn't always happen in formless multimans. They even counted along to Roman's corner clotheslines which made me smile. Roman/Joe do an absolutely terrible phone booth fighting spot. My god those were ugly punches. Does Rollins aim a couple feet past his opponent on every dive on purpose? All of his dives end up looking like really painless slingblade clotheslines. It has to be intentional. At least Bray throwing Joe into a tope looked nice (even if the tope was ugly). This is apparently "Extreme Rules" but it takes 18 minutes for a chair to get involved. How is that possible? The big moment in a lot of these matches is the go go go spot where one guy hits a finisher, then gets leveled by someone else's finisher, and so on. But since this match was tornado style they had already basically been doing that the whole time, so when they went into that mode it felt pretty anticlimactic. Having Joe against Lesnar is at least a new match, so I'm interested, despite not being very interested in current Samoa Joe.

ER: Overall the PPV over-delivered, though Rachel was most excited for the Bliss/Bayley match and that...was really weird. That's like the match that happens before we find out Bayley got a wellness suspension.

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2012 Match of the Year

John Cena vs. Brock Lensar WWE 4/29/12

PAS: You often hear this match compared to the best Sting v. Vader matches, but rewatching it, it actually reminded me more of the Cactus Jack v. Vader series. The beating Lesnar lays on Cena breaks the boundaries of pro-wrestling. In the opening seconds Lesnar slices open his face with MMA elbows and lands downed knees which look like they broke Cena's ribs. Lesnar felt truly dangerous, something completely other, the MMA gloves and Jimmy John's shorts were like nothing anyone had seen in the WWE, and that flurry at the beginning signaled that this was a different thing. Cena was great as the foil for the monster, he was overwhelmed and destroyed, but you always believed he had a punchers chance. His powerbomb from the Kimura is one of the great strength spots in wrestling history, and I loved how the kept teasing Chekov's bicycle chain, until that final big punch. Lesnar is a total nutball, he leaps full sped headfirst into a fist covered with a chain. Totally crazy one punch KO, Lesnar starts leaking immediately, and is a glassy eyed mess. Great finish, to arguably the best match in WWE history

ER: I don't honestly understand how a lot of this was allowed to happen. A giant man was basically allowed to give brain damage to the company's top money maker, and do all sorts of moves that looked like they could have severely damaged any of Cena's limbs. Cena is a lunatic, and Brock is a monster. This is Batman without his utility belt going up against Bane hopped up on Venom. Cena takes an absolute thrashing, genuinely getting hard to watch at times. Lesnar busts him open early with an elbow to the side of the head, clobbers him around like nothing, and then lands one of the grossest knees to the ribs you've seen. Cena is lying fetal and Brock just rears that knee back and blows right through him. It looked like Cena's entire torso collapsed, and then Lesnar pushes him out of the ring with his feet, as if he were shoving a bag of Quikrete out the back of a truck. And it just keeps getting worse. Lesnar continues caving in Cena's insides.

At first the crowd is belting out dueling chants. And then it just gets quiet. People are suddenly just watching an elephant slowly drown. A mom is holding her kids in the front row. All you see are open mouths, everywhere. Brock is wiping Cena's blood on himself, kneeing him more, raining down isolated fists that look the same size as my head. Cena takes a couple of lariats that look man-killing. At one point Charles Robinson takes a nasty bump into the ropes and to the floor, which all leads to Lesnar tying Cena's legs with his own dumb chain. Lesnar rips at Cena's arm - and I do mean rips, as it looks like he can literally rip Cena's arm from his torso. With his feet chained, Cena gets hung from the ring post by his ankles, and it comes off incredibly organic. We've all seen lame "tie a guy's hands to the ropes" spots, and they're always a major mental stretch. Here it seems like Cena had no say in the matter, Brock was going to hang him by his fucking ankles. Brock goes on the bang Cena's arm into the apron a couple times, with Cena's pain being palpable the whole time. We get an all time insane moment when Lesnar does a flying hip attack to knock Cena off the apron, and comes in too hot and too high, flying totally unprotected over the top and crashing HARD on the floor. We rarely witness a flying wrestler not in control of their own body, but here was 300 pounds of mass that had no clue where it was headed. This sounds dramatic, but he literally could have died. Seeing him unexpectedly fall, he just as easily could have dropped straight onto his head. Finish is flat out perfect. Cena's chain has been teased as a weapon all match, only coming into play when Lesnar wrapped up Cena's legs earlier. But Cena eyes that chain on the floor, discreetly wraps his fist, and when Lesnar goes for another leaping shoulderblock Cena just clocks him right between the eyes. Lesnar goes out like a light and the crowd erupts. Lesnar just Wile E. Coyote'd himself into Cena's tunnel-painted-on-bricks. An AA on the ring steps makes this academic, and perfect. I'm with Phil, as at the moment I cannot think of a WWE match I love more. A true, unduplicatable masterpiece.


ALL TIME MOTY MASTER LIST

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NOT THEE 2014 Ongoing Match of the Year List

El Torito v. Hornswaggle WWE Extreme Rules 5/4

ER: Placed on the PPV pre-show and treated like a bad joke the entire time by the announcers, none of the actual participants actually seemed to care and went out and had probably the best match possible. The whole spectacle came off much more like something you'd see in IWA-MS in a bowling alley parking lot, with stupid bumps and a noticeably drunk midget ring announcer. The whole affair is plagued by horrendous commentary (going beyond the standard horrendous WWE commentary) as you had the addition of 3 mini versions of Cole, Lawler and JBL. I admittedly chuckled at "Micro" Cole's name, but the best the next guy could do was Jerry "Mini King" Lawler (which Lawler immediately blows out of the water by suggesting "Jerry Smaller"), and the whole time the "big" announcers just laughed at the absurdity of the whole thing, reminiscent of WCW announcers laughing at a MEXICAN hardcore match while guys took dangerous bumps. But forget those guys because we get stupid bumps and a drunk ring announcer, doing that drunk over-concentrating thing where you actively try to show people how not drunk you are, while looking like the drunkest person in the room, while kind of wafting in place, announcing every single name wrong (Hornwaggle, Matadordes). We even get some Frye/Takayama stuff from Torito/Hornswaggle to start! Every member of 3MB takes an exponentially stupid table bump, with McIntyre doing a swanton through one and Mahal crashing and burning through a few stacked onto ladders! Welcome to getting released a month later boys! Hornswaggle brings amusing comedy (kicking himself in the head on a missed punt, hitting the ropes on a dive attempt) and some stiff strikes and generally looks like an untrained wrestler. Torito puts him through a table with a springboard Thesz press, and also hits a huge dive on 3MB which probably felt like getting a full Alhambra bottle thrown into your chest. This was a real amusing spectacle and I always admire guys taking advantage of any given opportunity, no matter how…small…that opportunity may be.

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2014 Ongoing Match of the Year List

The Shield v. Evolution WWE Extreme Rules 5/4

PAS: Another classic Shield big match trios. Evolution were fine as a bunch of roided up old meatheads thumping on some younger crossfit guys. It was kind of like a fistfight at a Golds gym. I really liked Batista in this, he had a couple of nice bumps, a good looking spinebuster and some fun stumbly selling, Orton was technically fine, and Helmsley has credibility. This was the Shield show though, these three guys have just mastered their face trios roles. Ambrose is great as wild firey brawler, his running double table dives wasn't an athletic marvel, but it was a great lunatic move, like when Terry Funk would do an Asai. Reigns was pretty great as a heel bully, but his has really come into his own as an electric hot tag. He has such force and athleticism in his moves, it almost feels like early 90's Scott Steiner, he just explodes out of the blocks like Russel Westbrook on a fast break. Rollins is great as the crazy risk taker, swinging for the fences and crashing and burning when he fails. His tope into the wall was Rey Hechicero crazy, and the balcony dive was awesome, real props to camera guys who kept it hidden until the moment he comes flying into the shot. I was shocked at how much I dug this, put the Shield in a big match atmosphere and they deliver against anyone.

ER: Blah blah Shield trios blah blah match of the year blah blah give them 20 minutes. I doubted this would be as good as other long Shield tags, given their opponents, but I was wrong. This was super fun and it was fun seeing Shield work as equals (or higher) with three established names. HHH, for better or worse, always brings an extra element to matches aside from ring work, as you're always wondering in the back of your head how he's gonna make guys look like they don't belong in the match. It adds a weird sense of drama that could only be created through years of being an asshole, in the same way that women suffering in Lars Von Trier films always has extra gravity because you know they had to work with Lars Von Trier. The Shield looked great as usual, and this kind of "around the arena" brawl works great for them, as once you start to think "Hey where'd Rollins go" then suddenly Rollins is dropping 15' out of the air onto everybody. They're all really good at doing their own thing and then meeting back together in perfect time. I really loved Batista here. I saw a lot of people talk about how bad he looked on his most recent run, always gassing out and working soft, but I thought he looked really good. Here he was awesome, taking a big bump off the apron and an even bigger one getting thrown into the barrier, leaning into everything and taking the Shield's dangerous offense really well. He also had a real nasty running kick with Rollins draped over the ropes (nice note to he and Reigns respective roles in their stable). Fun match, still bummed they predictably rushed a break-up.


2014 MASTER LIST

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I Can't Get a License to Drive My Car, I Don't Really Need It If I'm A King

Jerry Lawler vs. Bill Dundee MPPW 4/18/98 - FUN

This was billed as the final battle between Lawler and Dundee on the debut show for Memphis Power Pro Wrestling. Lawler comes out on a throne carrying his action figure, talking up a K-Mart promotional appearance. Dundee throws him from the throne to the ring and it is on. Compacted Lawler v. Dundee, but it had the stuff you want. Big rights and lefts, diving punches, and shit talking. I liked Lawler hitting a really stiff stunner, it is normally a Lawler spot which looks bad, but he wasted Dundee with it here. Match gets cut off before it really hits 3rd gear as Austin Idol (who was doing commentary) wastes Dundee with a chair shot, setting up a Dundee v. Idol feud which never happened. Always good to see these guys match up although it was too brief to get a higher rating

Jerry Lawler vs. Tommy Dreamer NEW 1/15/11 - EPIC

This is a steel cage match billed as the final battle between Lawler and Dreamer (apparently a gimmick Lawler does a lot). Lawler starts out by giving a great promo, talking about how people always ask him if he really hates the people he wrestles. He says that most of them are just like the folks you all work with, some you like, some you don't, but he has only really despised a couple of people. One is Terry Funk, one is Michael Cole and the final guy is Tommy Dreamer. Just an awesome way to put over this match, really got me excited to see what these guys were going to do to each other. They do one of those cool Lawler deliberate starts with both guys landing a single big punch early, testing the mettle of their opponent. We get some Dreamer ECW style crowd brawling, which Lawler does fine with, before we get back into the cage for the big end run. Both guys miss second rope moves onto chairs, both guys take big nut shots. Dreamer hits a piledriver, with Lawler putting his foot on the rope. Lawler attaches Dreamer to the cage with a bolt tie and laces him with a kendo stick. Just a lot of great brawling. We get a classic ending with Dreamer about to blast Lawler with a chair, before Lawler goes back in the day and lights his ass up.

Jerry Lawler/Jim Ross vs. Michael Cole/Jack Swagger WWE Extreme Rules 5/1/11 - FUN

This was the best match of the last couple of months of this feud. Cole coming out in bubble wrap was a really amusing comedy spot, and I though Ross using the ankle lock was a great fuck you to Kurt Angle's Twitter. They probably should have saved Ross's potato shots for this match, after knocking out Cole's tooth on RAW the strap shots didn't really resonate. Lawler was really a secondary guy in this match, which seems a weird thing to do to this feud. The blowoff to Andy Kaufman v. Lawler wasn't a Lance Russell piledriver.


COMPLETE AND ACCURATE KING

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