Average, inoffensive week of WWE TV. It’s slow down time for WWE, and there’s a lot of multi-person clusters being built to – Extreme Rules, Money in the Bank, Women’s 5-way next week. So you rely on the characters and wrestling vs. any compelling week-to-week story. And the characters… they are alright. The shows this week… they were fine.
The Hardys are having consistently good TV matches with Cesaro and Sheamus, Alexa Bliss rules, RAW is kind of sort of trying something with Crews and Kalisto and Goldust, the re-introduction of Finn Balor has been really fun. The Jinder Mahal push is fascinating to watch, the Fashion Files are great, Nakamura is here, Corbin is getting some steam. But Wyatt and Rollins and Reigns are in a holding pattern, I miss Miz completely crushing it every week, the cruiserweights still suck, and everything about Bayley is bumming me out. The Golden Age of SmackDown has ended, and while it remains a solid show every week there are a lot of folks – Owens, AJ, Charlotte – in pretty boring spots, and a lot of others – Mojo, Alpha, Harper, Tye, English – just completely missing in action. Braun and Revival are missed. Cena and Jericho not so much.
RAW (5/22/17)
I just kept coming back to the word decent. Everything was fine. Proper. Appropriate. Lots of short matches that mostly accomplished something. Nothing worth going out of your way to see. But they got the point across for Extreme Rules, and Matt Hardy vs. Sheamus was good. Is that enough for 3-hours? Depends how much of a geek you are. I’m a geek. I accepted it.
Decent Bray Wyatt promo opened the show. Liked the recurring “STAND UP” bit. And his delivery of “Lest we forget, there is… a fifth” to introduce Roman was the kind of delivery that makes you appreciate the existence of Bray Wyatt, even if he is a chump-ass jobber.
Question: What if Roman Reigns wore glasses with thick black frames to the ring?
Decent enough 5-minute slugfest between Roman and Bray. Bray has worked all 3 Shield guys on back-to-back-to-back RAW’s now. The Extreme Rules theme music hitting at the end of all the hoopla with Samoa Joe and Seth Rollins getting involved was positively ridiculous.
Decent squash by Tozawa of Daivari. WHAT A SENTON BOMB!!! Dick Togo would be proud.
Decent match between The Drifter and Dean Ambrose. A match that made me think The Drifter vs. Roman Reigns would be awesome. The big knee catch on Dean coming off the top rope was neat. Also highly enjoyed Kurt Angle reacting to The Drifter backstage.
Decent Finn Balor/Paul Heyman promo. Balor vs. Brock is probably the most compelling possibility of the 5 guys in the Extreme Rules main event… this promo felt both like a preview and a red flag. Points for Balor’s ‘oops’ ad-lib.
Very decent Balor vs. Karl Anderson match, a fine showcase for Finn with his best bud. Really hot last couple minutes with the missed Coup de Grace, Karl’s spinebuster near fall, and finally the Finn Sling Blade > dropkick > Coup de Grace run. Completely acceptable TV professional wrestling, yeah buddy.
Decent 90-second match between Sasha Banks and Alicia Fox. Is Cedric Alexander gonna team up with Sasha?
Decent Goldust promo!!
Decent few minutes between Apollo Crews and Kalisto, a couple neat exchanges here. Titus screaming at Crews from the outside was great, would be all-in on the Titus Brand getting some love as a legit stable but I think while WWE likes Titus they don’t take him seriously enough to run with it.
Sheamus/Matt was a lot more than decent, but it also curbs the theme I’ve been building here, so I’m not sure how to feel. Once again – these two are god damn PROFESSIONALS. Sheamus in control, Matt selling his ass off, crowd buzzing for all of it. They got a “This is Awesome” chant off a totally basic-ass match, incredible. Sheamus’ knee is one of the coolest things in pro wrestling.
Decent squash for Austin Aries on Tony Nese, all about him selling his leg and showing off submissions. The chops to Nese’s ABS were pretty tremendous, as was the setup for the Last Chancery at the finish.
Way more than decent DDT by Alexa Bliss vs. Mickie James, that was awesome.
Reigns/Rollins vs. Wyatt/Joe was a very decent main event to cap off a very decent show. Totally formula stuff but it didn’t overstay its welcome and the hot spots were hot.
Decent. Completely, utterly decent.
SMACKDOWN (5/23/17)
Absolutely love it when World Wrestling Entertainment goes all in on something. Jinder Mahal with a police escort, goons, a limousine, persian rug, tailored suit, turban, and CHAMPIONSHIP. So cool. This wasn’t the best show – Jinder stuff, Corbin beating down Sami, and Fashion Police vs. Usos were highlights, while the women’s stuff, Rusev and New Day just on the sidelines, and everything about the follow-up to Shinsuke Nakamura’s debut kind of made me sad.
Either way, the Money in the Bank match might just be incredible. AJ, Owens, Zayn, Corbin, Ziggler, Nakamura – that’s a line-up right there, with AJ and Owens and Zayn bringing the “these guys are going to do some crazy shit in a ladder match” factor, Corbin bringing the “big guy who doesn’t give a shit if his ladder match is good” factor, Ziggler bringing the “yeah he’ll probably do some wild bumps” factor, and and Nakamura bringing the “WTF IS HE GOING TO DO IN A LADDER MATCH” factor.
Actual MITB opening segment wasn’t much, though I guess I appreciated the tease of Owens being in at first and then Nakamura being introduced. Truthfully, the Nakamura mic work should probably be shorter. He’s straight-up reading WWE scripting and it’s hurting my insides.
Charlotte/Becky vs. Natalya/Carmella was solid, a beatdown and hot tag and all that. Match was actually a bit better than Backlash’s 6-man tag, felt a lot tighter and had a better hot tag by Charlotte than whatever Becky was doing on Sunday.
We are back to picture-in-picture commercials on SmackDown, and we are so blessed to be able to watch a reverse chinlock during a Geico commercial.
Sami Zayn vs. Baron Corbin ending in 20-seconds was a fun idea but Sami jumped up way too early on that cradle, that motherfucker. Good beatdown by Corbin though, classic example of pushing two guys at once: Sami shows he can beat Corbin, Corbin gains steam by losing anyways, as now he’s gonna be ALLLLLL pissed off.
I liked a lot about Jinder Mahal’s Punjabi Celebration. It was very much like the Futurama pro wrestling bit: I AM NOT FROM HERE. I HAVE MY OWN CUSTOMS. But it was also very Tuesday Night Titans-esque, and I mean that as a compliment. Vince McMahon has always been all about going all in on stereotype, and I’m not sure that’s a positive thing but regardless it’s been what he’s been doing for the last 40 years and usually it is kind of a riot to watch. Promo was whatever, but all the colors and dancing and angry crowd surrounding it made it a win of a segment.
This Lana shit is weird.
I’m not sure if tonight was designed to help out Breezango or quickly write them off in advance of New Day coming in. Either way, the eventual Tag Titles match was fun stuff. The initial singles matches were just weird: THREE quick roll-up finishes on a 2-hour wrestling show is professional wrestling blasphemy. There were some weird highlights… I mean a match ended with a water gun shot. Then, the bonus of announcing the Tag Titles match was a great little hook, loved Chioda on the headset talking to the BACK. There were some issues with this… picture-in-picture commercials meant Usos immediately went to a super bland heel beatdown, and a couple basic spots – Breeze forcing an Uso out of the ring, Fandango taking the post bump – seemed off. But for the last few minutes this thing got BUMPING, as the crowd was out of their seats wanting the Breezango win.
I know the open of the show had the full Nakamura entrance, but AJ Styles and Shinsuke Nakamura getting the “and already in the ring” entrance for the tag vs. Owens and Dolph rough. This started OK with AJ and Dolph having a good exchange, but then it settled into Nakamura as face-in-peril and my god did it get weird. Nakamura doesn’t have to kick-ass every time, but this thing went like 20 minutes and was just BORING. He did no real spots based around his timing and charisma, which is why he’s a star in the first place, and just took the most boring of heel beatdowns. Love AJ, but Nak & Tye vs. Owens & Dolph building to the Nak hot tag would have been far more compelling. I dunno. This was a very boring tag team match, and ended the show on a cold note. An example of WWE reaping what they sewed in making AJ and KO kinda bland and boring post-Mania.
Cool staredown between AJ and Nakamura, at least – if neither is in the title picture I think that’s your SummerSlam match.
TALKING SMACK (5/23/17)
This show was alright but Talking Smack is no longer must-see or anything. It’s lost Daniel Bryan being a crazy person, and the promos seem a lot less loose. Either way, what an entrance for New Day on this show, what ENERGY!! New Day on Talking Smack is gonna be fun.
205 LIVE (5/23/17)
God was the first half of this show rough. Can you imagine paying for a ticket to a WWE show and the show opens announcing the card for a show in a few weeks, then a big 5-way women’s match is announced for next week, and then you watch the ungodly long Nakamura tag and THEN you have to watch this boring-ass Daivari/Swann match? And THEN you have to watch a satellite interview!? Felt like they were intentionally killing the territory for a bit.
Cedric Alexander is back, so that’s fun. HE squashed a fella.
The Akira Tozawa vs. Brian Kendrick Street Fight was great though. These guys have had the most underrated in-ring feud of 2017, they are 4 for 4 on great matches even if they have to work their asses off to get the crowd to care. Movesets are overrated, but damn if Tozawa doesn’t have the best moveset in WWE – not just a bunch of cool moves, but legitimate signature spots. Kendrick takes all of it really well… he ups the snug when working Tozawa. Tons of great stuff here: Kendrick throwing his jacket at Tozawa to block the tope and Tozawa HOOKING HIS LEGS on the rope so Kendrick could beat on him (SO impressive), the follow-up to that with the suplex to the floor, Kendrick putting on the Captain’s Hook and covering Tozawa’s mouth with the purple tape (Kendrick was always fighting for the Captain’s Hook the whole match), Kendrick using all the outside forces to take it to Tozawa (stairs, LED, belt), Tozawa getting his receipt with the belt shots, and finally the MASSIVE senton bomb to the outside through the table. SO good!!!
NXT (5/24/17)
I was there live for the taping of this show and talked about it in Quick Thoughts – NXT TakeOver: Chicago (5/20/17) – LIVE!. Watching this show on the Network, had three in-ring take-aways: 1) Glad Aleister Black being super over in Chicago came off on TV, 2) Velveteen Dream has hops but match was just as unimpressive on TV as it was live, and 3) Forgot about how great Blake’s bump on the big McIntyre kick was.
Otherwise, liked the handling of the #DIY turn on TV – the TakeOver recap at the start of the show where they cut to black right as Ciampa began attacking Johnny, and the editing and camera angles in the #DIY turn recap video later in the show. Titling the video DI-WHY was tremendous. Ember Moon, Asuka, Roderick Strong, Pete Dunne, and Bobby Roode all had backstage interviews – can’t say any blew me away.
MAIN EVENT (5/24/17)
It was the debut of Vic Joseph on commentary! OK!
A rematch of the CWC Finals on Main Event… sounds about right. Gran Metalik vs. TJP was good, nothing you absolutely need to see but totally a Main Event Match Worth Watching. Some of the early stuff was SO blistering fast and beautiful that ya don’t have time to realize none of it makes sense, which is really ideal cruiserweight professional wrestling. Fast-paced formula Main Event stuff, alright? Rhyno & Heath vs. Curt Hawkins & Curtis Axel was the other match. Rhyno and Heath got ECW and He’s Got Kids chants, otherwise pretty basic boring stuff. Guess they sold Hawkins and Axel not getting along, or something. Yeesh.
WWE TV Match of the Week: Akira Tozawa vs. Brian Kendrick on 205 Live… Tozawa did his crazy shit, Kendrick was a good foil for his crazy shit, and there was a senton bomb from the top rope through on a table on the outside.
WWE TV MVP of the Week: Jinder Mahal had all the buzz this week. Don’t know if it works long term but man is it fun to see them try.
The rating doesn’t give RAW enough credit, but it was just SUCH a middle of the road show that I still weirdly kind of liked. Most stuff this week was completely average but in a good way. Nothing was offensive, some stuff was pretty boring, but other stuff mostly made sense and we got a few good matches here and there.
RAW: 5/10
SmackDown: 4/10
205 Live: 4/10
NXT: 5/10
