Backlash hasn’t gotten a fair shot in a while. The first in April 1999 was a master class in WrestleMania follow-up, and it chugged along comfortably until it got canned in 2009 for other genius concepts like “Breaking Point” or “Stomping Grounds.” It returned in September 2016 with a great show put on by the on-fire SmackDown crew, then got shifted to April and became known for either Jinder Mahal winning the WWE Title or Roman Reigns vs. Samoa Joe stinking up the joint – take your pick.
Skipped in 2019, it returns in 2020 as not simply Backlash, but “Backlash: The Greatest Wrestling Match Ever.”
Was it?
Well, no. But read on anyways.
0. WWE U.S. Title: Apollo Crews [c] vs. Andrade w/ Zelina Vega and Angel Garza
As I say every time they wrestle any length over five minutes, both Crews and Andrade are capable but lacking that extra THING in the world of WWE. This was wrestled like some awkward showcase for whoever is still paying attention backstage, just a slightly better version of the TV match they’ve had a few times this year. The chin tuck by Andrade on Apollo’s belly-to-belly in the corner was an absolute marvel of chin tucking, as was Apollo’s chin tuck on Andrade’s slingshot DDT. Big negative points for the finish too, Andrade taking advantage of a distraction and grabbing Crews only for Crews to simply grab him back and hit his finish. DUMB. **1/2
1. Triple Threat Tag Team Match – WWE Women’s Tag Team Title: Bayley & Sasha Banks [c] vs. Alexa Bliss & Nikki Cross vs. The IIconics
The Triple Threat Tag Team Match in WWE is like Trump – I’m exhausted from trying to explain why it all sucks. Dumb match type aside, they went All Out or whatever that means. Peyton Royce in her two matches this year has seemed pretty fired up to get to work. The Bliss/Cross Shatter Machine looked ugly as did that 3-way cradle spot they tried early in the match, but Peyton’s crazy dive and Sasha’s reaction to winning made it all slightly worthwhile. **1/4
2. Jeff Hardy vs. Sheamus
Jeff Hardy clapping along with the Performance Center trainees to his theme music was some modern day Boogie Woogie Man stuff, just amazing. This was pretty good – both have their shtick down and played around with it well in a match I bet would’ve been pretty exciting had there been children in the crowd popping for their hero, the guy who threw piss at Sheamus. The Swanton Bomb kickout and Sheamus’ big Brouge kick at the end were nice, but I still don’t think there was ever anything that necessitated the match. ***
3. RAW Women’s Title: Asuka [c] vs. Nia Jax
The Asuka/Nia Jax pairing is excellent – Asuka fights to chop Nia down, runs full speed into her, gets tossed around, and you just know she’s the only one anywhere who’s like: “I don’t care if you hurt me Nia, you’ve gotta bring it baby.” There was some good action here but then it just ended with a double countout. **3/4
4. Handicap Match – WWE Universal Title: Braun Strowman [c] vs. The Miz & John Morrison
There were a couple minutes here where John Morrison made a pitch for this match being Braun against him solo, but then after a few more minutes the losers lost their match pretty quickly like a couple of losers. *
5. WWE Title: Drew McIntyre [c] vs. Bobby Lashley w/ MVP
McIntyre and Lashley are not the most dynamic performers in the world, and this really didn’t play to their strengths or provide anything extra to make up for that. There were a couple spots here where they went extra hard, but it could’ve ended any RAW in the last few months. It would’ve been a solid end, but it still would’ve just been a match on RAW. **1/4
Street Profits vs. The Viking Raiders?
This was supposed to be a match for the RAW Tag Team Titles, but it became a brawl around the Performance Center filmed with the cinematic style WWE has been employing for a few PPV matches lately. It was pretty terrible and really tone deaf (broken windows!?), but nice to see the tag feud get The Cinematic Match and I very much enjoyed both Akira Tozawa in charge of a mob of ninjas as well as Dawkins’ delivery of, “Fam – those are ninjas.”
6. The Greatest Wrestling Match Ever: Edge vs. Randy Orton
No, it wasn’t, but it was good.
WWE’s whole main event style throughout Cena’s run, from the winding down of Triple H/Shawn Michaels/Undertaker to the introduction of AJ Styles/Kevin Owens/Seth Rollins, has been all about throwing everything at the match – chain wrestling, rope running, table spots, no-selling, rare finishers, finisher kickouts, all that stuff. Edge and Randy Orton, good wrestlers but in the mid-range of guys expected to deliver that type of match, entered the ring for a match promoted as The Greatest Wrestling Match Ever and basically wrestled a meta version of that match, in which they took it all seriously and actually delivered. That’s impressive.
The effects they employed were risky in how silly they could easily come off, but mostly worked: Edge was given an obviously fake huge crowd reaction, ring introduction voiceovers were provided by the dearly departed Howard Finkel, the commentary and crowd occasionally sounded piped in from WWE 2k21, and besides the usual frenetic WWE camera edits they provided some great aerial shots of Edge and Orton just working HOLDS, like Johnny Valentine and Wahoo McDaniel were locking each other in leglocks and you wanted to actually see who was going to get out.
Parts of the match felt like the Road to WrestleMania mode in a video game, Edge and Orton being instructed to hit a certain amount of finishes and whatnot. But part of it also felt like a classic match, one that went 45 minutes and stayed exciting. The escalation was quality, the armdrags were DEEP. They traveled in approach from Budokan to Boston and put on a show. It was impressive with only employees in the crowd, and it was more impressive with the dumbass tagline. ****1/4
Happy Thoughts: I’m still just over the moon that Edge vs. Randy Orton actually delivered, but the rest of the show was a pretty bleak assessment of things in WWE to get excited about. 5/10
