Tag: Batista

8 Times the Wrong Wrestler Won the Royal Rumble (and who should’ve won instead)

While the Royal Rumble is always an exciting time of year, and generally, the match itself is always enjoyable regardless of the winner, sometimes it can be hard to get around the fact that Rumbles are by and large remembered by their winners. This is fine for the most part, but there have been a few instances throughout history where thinking back, the winner seemed somewhat disappointing in the grand scheme of things.

Sometimes, when a Rumble winner is initially disappointing, it’s turned into an interesting story, and the whole thing works out in the long run, but that isn’t always the case. Thankfully, the 2021 Rumble winners seem to be excellent choices; however, in these instances, we’re going to discuss today, the person who won the Rumble either didn’t need it, failed to make any kind of impact in the long run, or was just a horrible choice compared to an alternative.

However, I’m not going to point out problems without suggesting solutions, so I will also cover who I believe should’ve won the Rumble match instead of the real winner, and we can have some fun speculating.

8 – Bret Hart & Lex Luger – 1994

A draw. The match ended in a draw.

Granted, the Rumble was still in its early days back then, so they could get away with more experimental stuff, but could you imagine how pissed off we’d all be these days if the Rumble ended in a draw? We’d be outraged and would mock it for decades to come, yet we all just seem to have accepted this one.

If I were to speculate, I think the reason this is the case is that Wrestlemania 10 ended up being a terrific show that told a pretty interesting story. However, no one ever gives a shit about Lex Luger’s role in that story. Seriously, whenever I hear anyone talk about this situation, it’s about how great Bret’s story was of wrestling Owen in the opener before coming back to defeat Yokozuna in the main event. Luger just gets completely forgotten.

Who should’ve won instead?

Bret Hart, on his own.

If you removed Luger from the occasion entirely, the whole story becomes so much better. You still make Bret wrestle Owen in the opener, and that match goes exactly the same way as it did in real life. The only difference is that you don’t have Luger wrestling Yokozuna earlier in the night, which means that come the main event, you have a fresh Yokozuna going up against Bret Hart, who not only put on a great match earlier in the night but lost.

You couldn’t ask for a better underdog story, and it would’ve added that extra layer of drama to the main event and an even bigger emotional exhale when Bret won the title. Not to mention, you don’t have to end the Royal Rumble in a sodding draw.

7 – Charlotte Flair – 2020

Truth be told, Charlotte winning this Rumble wasn’t actually that bad in the long run. Her story and match with Rhea Ripley was one of the highlights of Wrestlemania season this year, and the Rumble was a great place to start it. I just think there was a far better option on the table.

Who should’ve won instead?

Shayna Baszler.

Now, I know Baszler got her Mania match with Becky anyway, but I’d argue the Rumble would’ve been a far better way for her to get there. Consider what’s at play, Baszler entered in the number 30 spot in the Rumble that year, destroyed everyone in sight, only to get eliminated by Charlotte. It was a pretty underwhelming debut. Sure, she bounced back, but only after we had to sit through the most boring Elimination Chamber match I’ve ever seen.

If Baszler had won the Rumble, she would’ve come onto Raw with the kind of fire very few do, and you could’ve spent longer building her feud with Becky into something a lot more intense. You can still have Charlotte challenge Rhea for Mania because, let’s face it, all Charlotte would need to do is turn up in NXT and demand a match, or have Rhea show up on Raw and get in Charlotte’s face. Then, not only can you build a better story surrounding Lynch & Baszler, you don’t have to waste the Elimination Chamber on a match booked to be a complete and total snoozefest.

6 – Vince McMahon – 1999

I’m of two minds with this one. On the one hand, I can see how this Rumble win served the story, and it’s not like McMahon actually went on to fight at Wrestlemania, so what does it matter? However, I think there’s more to it than that. For one thing, this is one of the less-liked Rumbles as a whole, and I can see why it focused so heavily on McMahon & Austin that it felt like no one else involved in the match was even remotely important, other than maybe Chyna.

In many ways, wrestling fans view the Rumble as sacred. It only happens once a year (unless Saudia Arabia wants one) and to turn it into an hour-long angle like this wasn’t the best use of anyone’s time. I think this is a clear example of how wildly people’s opinion on things can change depending on who wins. The truth is, if McMahon had eventually been toppled at the final hurdle here, I think this match would be far more fondly remembered.

Who should’ve won instead?

Stone Cold Steve Austin

This one’s pretty straightforward. Austin ended up getting the title shot at Wrestlemania 15 anyway, so why bother taking us around in circles like this? It’s like the build to Wrestlemania 35’s main event, the perfect story was standing there, and it was so simple. Then, they added all these extra layers, and it took the shine off the apple, so to speak. If Austin had won this Rumble, even if you’d kept everything else the same, the match would’ve felt like a compelling story that reached the proper climax. Yes, we would’ve gone through some boredom, but it would’ve been worth it for the payoff.

Instead, we ended up with an underwhelming match with an underwhelming winner. Plus, regardless of the circumstances, it’s never a good look when the person in charge of the show books themselves to win a big match like this.

5 – Sheamus – 2012

I’ve made no secret that I’m not a big fan of Sheamus in the past. In all honesty, I like him a hell of a lot more than I used to, thanks to his work in The Bar and recently with Drew McIntyre, but for the early years of his time in WWE, I couldn’t stand the guy. I thought he was boring and not even that good of a wrestler. As such, I’ve never liked the fact that Sheamus won this Rumble.

While I do think he was one of the best opponents for Daniel Bryan at the time, I don’t think we needed the Rumble win to get there, especially when the match ended up being the 18 seconds atrocity that sent the entire wrestling fanbase into a furious frenzy for the next 3 years. While Sheamus had been building as a face over 2011, he didn’t feel like a worthy top guy just yet, and sometimes a Rumble win can serve that purpose, but this one really fell flat.

Who should’ve won instead?

Chris Jericho

The story was so perfect. Not only was Jericho vs Punk a match people were ready to pay like mad to see, but this was Jericho’s big return after a few years away from the business. Jericho vs Punk had a great build and ended up being a fantastic Wrestlemania match, so why the hell didn’t they kick it off the right way?

Well, that’s the thing that makes this sting so much. Jericho was originally supposed to win this Rumble. He was to make his surprise return and immediately become a conquering hero by winning the Rumble and challenging Punk. However, it leaked in the weeks before the event that Jericho was coming back, so WWE decided to completely change plans for the Rumble, cutting off their nose to spite their face.

WWE has never seemed to grasp the fact that just because something’s predictable doesn’t necessarily mean it’s bad. It’s true that sometimes when we’re expecting one thing and get something else, it’s a fantastic thrill (see Seth Rollins cashing in at Wrestlemania 31), but sometimes things are predictable because it’s what should happen. In films, when the hero defeats the villain and saves the day, people don’t complain that it’s ‘predictable’ because it’s the correct way to round off the story in a satisfying way.

It was a stupid knee-jerk reaction to something leaking online (it only leaked that Jericho was returning, by the way, not that he was going to win) and left everyone watching feel deflated.

4 – John Cena – 2013

So you know how I just said sometimes it’s fine when things are predictable? This was a case when being predictable was bad.

After Wrestlemania 28’s main event between The Rock & John Cena was billed as ‘once in a lifetime’, it would’ve been safe to assume that the match would’ve only happened…well…once. WWE would disagree, though, as, from the very beginning, the plan was to do the match twice on consecutive Wrestlemanias. I know we’re always asking for more long-term booking in WWE…but not like that.

As 2012 progressed and Cena’s story continued to focus on his downward spiral with The Rock, only for The Rock to show up at Raw 1000 (in July) and announce that he’s going to challenge for the title at the Royal Rumble (in January), it became clear to everyone what was going on. After carrying the company on his back for over a year, CM Punk was going to get snubbed for the Rock/Cena rematch that no one really cared about or wanted to see.

This meant that everyone knew who was going to win the Royal Rumble in July, half a year away from the actual event. Now THAT is a case of lousy predictability.

Who should’ve won instead?

The Rock

Now, hear me out. While the story between Rock & Cena was boring and no-one wanted to see it, CM Punk vs The Rock was still a match that people were excited to see, and rightly so, it was a good match (even with the weird booking at the end). So, why not have that be the Wrestlemania match instead? That way, Punk doesn’t get snubbed from the main event (potentially convincing him to stay with the company a little longer), and the fans don’t have to endure a rematch from the previous year that was way worse than the first one. Hell, make it a triple threat if you’re that scared about Cena having nothing to do.

It was a simple case of WWE making their plans two whole years in advance and then refusing to budge on them when a new star rose up and took the wrestling world by storm. By all means, plan out grand year-spanning storylines, but if the times change, you’ve got to change with them.

3 – Randy Orton – 2017

The 2017 Rumble was fascinating because it was the first time in a long while where the winner didn’t seem blindingly obvious. See, as much as there are 30 participants in a Royal Rumble, there are usually only one or two realistic contenders to win the thing. Sometimes this is obvious in how stars are booked towards the Rumble, or other times it’s because the dirt sheets have already leaked what WWE is planning for Wrestlemania that year. However, in 2017, everything was still up in the air, and there was a whole host of different people who could conceivably win.

Brock Lesnar, Goldberg & The Undertaker were a heavy focus in the build, and they were all set to collide in the Rumble. Bray Wyatt was building back up after a relatively lacklustre year, and Braun Strowman was seeing momentum like never before. All of these people and more would’ve been exciting choices to set up a match for Wrestlemania. It seemed like WWE had a win-win situation on their hands because the fans would seemingly be happy with any of these choices.

Then Randy Orton won. Unlike over the past year, Orton was still a somewhat dull character in 2017, and no one had any interest in seeing him compete for a world title at Wrestlemania. Everyone knew his current partnership with Bray Wyatt was going to explode sooner rather than later, and it’s not like we needed a Royal Rumble win to make that happen. Not to mention, it wasn’t even that interesting of a storyline, and no one wanted it to be the biggest of Mania season.

Who should’ve won instead?

Chris Jericho

By FAR the most compelling story going into Wrestlemania that year was the story between Kevin Owens & Chris Jericho. They had worked their asses off all year, with both men doing the most entertaining and genuinely funny stuff on WWE TV week to week. With the Universal Championship over Kevin Owens’ shoulder, the pairing had been the focus of Raw ever since the brand split in June 2016, and their story was that should’ve been the most important one heading into Wrestlemania.

The Festival of Friendship, where Owens turned on Jericho, happened about a month following the Rumble. It was one of, if not the best TV segment of the entire decade and think how much better it would’ve been knowing they had a Wrestlemania match on the horizon. Instead of going with what was clearly the most compelling storyline, WWE destroyed Owens’ credibility by having him drop the title to Goldberg like he was nothing for a Lesnar/Goldberg rematch that, while good, did not need the title AT ALL. Jericho & Owens did get their Wrestlemania match, but it was for the US title as the 2nd match on the show, and it felt so underwhelming because the story hadn’t been treated in the way it deserved.

2 – Batista – 2014

Much like with the Cena/Rock situation, this was a case of WWE having already made their plans and stubbornly sticking to them rather than realising what all of the fans were crying out for.

In the build-up to the 2014 Royal Rumble, it leaked that Batista would be returning for the match shortly after finishing filming the first Guardians of the Galaxy movie. Naturally, WWE smelt money in the waters and thought that they quite liked the idea of having the WWE Championship over the shoulder of Batista when he goes to all of those premiers and is all over the news. There was a problem, though, because the fans didn’t give a shit about Batista. They instead had their hearts set on a different, smaller, bearded wrestler.

Who should’ve won instead?

Daniel Bryan

The moment Rey Mysterio came out in the number 30 spot of that Royal Rumble, to the moment the show went off the air, the crowd booed and booed until their lungs gave out, and can you really blame them? Since last summer, people had been clamouring for Daniel Bryan to claim his place atop WWE, and over and over again, the people making the decisions told us no. They had characters tell Daniel Bryan that he wasn’t good enough repeatedly, and then the real people behind those characters would book Daniel Bryan to lose, making it seem like they were right. WWE is so needlessly combative with their own audience sometimes it’s genuinely baffling.

The fans didn’t take any of that shit, though, and essentially told WWE that we’re going to keep booing every ‘top guy’ you put in front of us until you give us Daniel Bryan. At the 2014 Royal Rumble, WWE refused to give us Daniel Bryan and stayed the course, and no-one was happy about it. What’s worse is that immediately after the Rumble, CM Punk (another star beloved by fans) walked out of the company over what we would later discover was a laundry list of horrible things that happened to him there over the years.

What’s so baffling is that making the fans happy in this circumstance was the easiest thing in the world. They were quite literally chanting Daniel Bryan’s name ALL. THE. TIME. And yet WWE decided to plug their ears and push forward because, once again, they seem to despise their own fans. The upside here is that, eventually, it worked, WWE relented, and Wrestlemania 30 ended with Daniel Bryan holding the world championship aloft. However, WWE could’ve saved themselves so much strife if they’d have woken up sooner and given the fans Daniel Bryan at the Royal Rumble.

It doesn’t end there, though, because one year later…

1 – Roman Reigns – 2015

…WWE still hadn’t learnt their lesson.

I’m not going to tease you with this one.

Who should’ve won instead?

Daniel Bryan.

Take what I said about 2014, add a year of Bryan being tragically out of action with an injury, only to return just in time for the 2015 Royal Rumble. The story was perfect. After 8 months of pain and suffering as Bryan recovered from his injuries, he stood with the perfect chance to reclaim the championship he never lost by toppling the company’s biggest monster in years in the form of Brock Lesnar.

Once again, though, WWE had made their plans, and it was time to once again bury their heads in the sand and ignore everything else going on around them. WWE decided Daniel Bryan wasn’t the plan they had in mind and completely ignored the fans for the second year in a row, instead giving us the new WWE manufactured star in the form of Roman Reigns. Once again, the fans weren’t as stupid as WWE hoped they’d be, and they saw it for what it was, a transparent attempt to try and create the next John Cena in the form of Roman Reigns.

What makes this so much worse than in 2014, though, is that this choice didn’t just deny Daniel Bryan. It actively hurt Roman Reigns’ career for YEARS. While there were many other issues with Roman Reigns around this time, I genuinely think that him winning this Royal Rumble is what made it as bad as it was. To be clear, after this Rumble, the fans booed even the mention of Roman Reigns’ name for years. People’s opinion on him didn’t soften until late 2018 when he got leukaemia, and EVEN THEN, people didn’t start to properly enjoy the man’s work until the summer of 2020.

For 5 years, Roman Reigns was this absolute toxic entity that caused the fans to immediately hate anything he was involved with. While him winning this Rumble isn’t the sole cause, I believe that if Daniel Bryan had won this Rumble instead, the fans would’ve got over it a hell of a lot quicker than they did.

And there you have it! Thank you very much for taking the time to read this post. Let me know what you think of these Royal Rumble winners and my alternate bookings, either in the comments below or on Twitter @SStyleSmark. Finally, make sure to come back here next week as it’s Wrestlemania week and I’ll be doing both predictions & reviews for both NXT Takeover: Stand & Deliver and Wrestlemania!

WWE Wrestlemania 35: Every Match Ranked

Well! That sure was something. It did get exhausting at points, but I really enjoyed this Wrestlemania, it didn’t have any of those deflating losses that draw down a lot of other Manias of late and I think it was structured in just the right way to make it very hard to get bored.

Not everything was great of course, but coming away from the show I feel that the bad was heavily outweighed by the good, and this was certainly the best Wrestlemania we’ve had since 31 as far as I’m concerned.

“But Ryan”, I hear you ask, “Where can we find an arbitrary and subjective ranking of all sixteen matches on the card?” What an oddly specific question, however, you’re in luck, as that’s exactly what I have for you right here, let’s get into it, shall we?

16 – Triple H def. Batista
(No Holds Barred)

I don’t think this is going to surprise anyone, is it?

I’ve said it so many times before, so I’m not going into detail on it again, but a slow-paced weapons based match with nothing but high spot after high spot is my least favourite kind of match, and that’s exactly what this match was.

There were a couple of cool looking spots, like Triple H pulling out Batista’s nose ring with some tweezers and a good old fashioned table break, but there was a whole lot of nothing between all of it. Batista ended up getting in very little offence, and the one time he did get close to win, there was absolutely no drama in it because there was no chance Triple H was losing this one.

I don’t think anyone was expecting anything that great from this match, which is good because we didn’t get it, (aside from a ridiculously over the top Triple H entrance of course). By the same token though, nothing stupid or nonsensical happened during the match, so I guess that’s a good thing that this is a bad as it got.

15 – Baron Corbin def. Kurt Angle
(Kurt Angle’s Final Match)

I told you so.

This match was fairly similar to Triple H vs Batista in that it was fairly slow and boring, except I enjoyed this just a little bit more, since there was actually some decent back and forth between the two men, and they aren’t just ambling about trying to set up a spot that ends up not looking all that impressive.

I know people are going to be pissed off about it, but like I said in my predictions I think Corbin winning was the right choice. No-one would’ve benefitted in any way from Angle winning, and while I doubt anything big is on the horizon for Corbin, at least he’s going to be on Raw every Monday for the next while and stands a chance of getting something out of winning.

Not to mention, it’s not like this has sullied Angle’s legacy. For one thing, if anything had done that is was the awful matches he’s been having on Raw and Smackdown for the past month, and for another, when people think back on Angle’s career, they’re not going to be thinking about this match. They’ll be thinking about all the awesome stuff he did from ’99 through ’06, and losing to a dude in a dress shirt isn’t going to spoil that.

…much.

14 – Braun Strowman wins the Andre The Giant Memorial Battle Royal
(Kickoff Show)

Thank God for that.

While I’m happy about the result, this may have been the most boring ARMBAR to date, and that includes the one where the final two were Jinder and Mojo. Several people were eliminated within seconds of the bell ringing, no-one really got much of a chance to show off their stuff aside from Braun and the comedy stuff wasn’t all that funny.

Andrade eliminating himself has got to be one of the worst eliminations in the history of the ARMBAR and doesn’t protect him, it makes him look like a total idiot. I’ll admit I laughed when one of the SNL guys (don’t know his name, don’t care enough to look it up) brought out his “therapist”, but everything after that was super predictable, and I never really found myself actually enjoying what I was watching.

13 – Zack Ryder & Curt Hawkins def. The Revival(c)
(Raw Tag Team Championships)
(Kickoff Show)

Oh for fu-

I’m trying not to hold the result against this match too hard, but seriously? If WWE are still trying to convince The Revival to stay they’re doing an awful job of it, having them lose to a guy who’s the whole gimmick is that he always loses is the kind of pit I never thought I’d see The Revival in, but here we are. Even if they win the titles back on Raw, it doesn’t matter, the damage is done.

The match was fine but didn’t really have much excitement to it, The Revival very much wrestled like they knew they were going to lose and decided they didn’t give a shit anymore. It was still solid but lacked the polish that we’ve come to expect from The Revival, and even Ryder seemed like he was phoning it in a little bit.

The finish was fine (and honestly, the only finish this match ever could’ve had), but it didn’t really surprise me, it just caused me to sigh. It wasn’t anything awful but was exactly the kind of match you think of when you think “pre-show tag match”, so it wasn’t anything great either.

12 – Samoa Joe(c) def. Rey Mysterio
(United States Championship)

Finally.

Don’t get me wrong, I loved the result of this match, but given that it went under a minute, it’s hard to put it any higher up.

Samoa Joe winning was absolutely the right result, the United States Championship needs a dominant champion like Joe to pull it out of the ditch it’s been in for the past year, and this was the perfect start. If you ask me, have him squash guys while defending the title week in and week out on Smackdown, while having slightly longer matches on PPVs, and that US title will have it’s prestige back in no time.

As for the match itself, it’s understandable that it went this short, since the number of matches required at least one or two to be squashes, and Rey’s recent injury may have made it a necessity, but I hope we get a full-length match later down the line, because I think it could be really good.

11 – Roman Reigns def. Drew Mcintyre

WWE just doesn’t seem to understand Drew’s strengths.

Drew is the kind of guy that is best when he’s running around murdering dudes and a breakneck pace, this match should’ve been somewhat in the style of Lesnar vs Goldberg from a couple of years ago, where it’s about 10 minutes of them going back and forth hitting each other with big hard-hitting moves until one of them couldn’t stand anymore.

Instead, we had Drew holding Reigns to the mat and “wearing him down” for the whole thing until it was time for Reigns to make his comeback. It had just enough to keep me somewhat engaged, with some tense spots on the ropes and some well-timed kick outs which Reigns is great at, but I feel it could’ve been so much more.

I was somewhat surprised that Reigns got a pretty mixed reaction on his entrance after how he’s been in recent months. Maybe it was just casual fans who don’t know what’s been going on and still think booing Reigns is the default, but really I think it’s time that we just cheer the guy. I get you’d rather see other guys get the spots he does, but he’s a pretty good wrestler these days and by all accounts, he’s an amazing person in real life, so let’s just stop relentlessly booing him for no reason now, yeah?

I’m sure my words have fallen on deaf ears, but I tried.

10 – The IIconics def. Sasha Banks & Bayley(c), Nia Jax & Tamina, Natalya & Beth Phoenix
(Women’s Tag Team Championships)

IIIIIIIIIIIIIICONIC!

Have your Kofimanias and Becky chants all you want, this is the win that made me the happiest all night.  The IIconics are just so entertaining at what they do and are up there with the best in terms of wrestling ability so I’m over the moon to see them get these spots, hopefully, this reign lasts more than 2 days.

That said, the match itself was fairly underwhelming, maybe it was because we’d already had a very good 4 way tag match on the show, or maybe it’s hard to make an exciting match when 75% of the participants aren’t known for high spots or taking risks, but something about this just didn’t click for me. It thought everything was fairly standard and vanilla, with the match moving at a fairly predictable pace, and attempts at bigger spots leading more to confusion than anything else.

The only thing I really enjoyed about it was the way in which The IIconics one, taking advantage of being the right place at the right time and nothing more. Granted, 4 ways tend to have a base level of excitement that they will always be (hence why this match is as high as it is), but it really didn’t do much to go beyond it.

The IIconics won though, so who cares how good the match was?

9 – Finn Balor def. Bobby Lashley(c)
(Intercontinental Championship)

Demon Finn needs more Wrestlemania entrances because that looked cool as fuck.

This match was just a glorified squash, so I can’t put it too high, but I think it was much more entertaining than the US title squash earlier in the night. This had a small about of back and forth to keep the momentum of the match going for the full 4 minutes, and it also had some pretty impressive spots to boot.

Lashley’s apron spear looked brutal, and I wish more of his offence was in that style because he could be a really entertaining wrestler if he did that more often. On the flip side, we saw a rare display of power from Finn Balor because that Powerbomb to Lashley was such a good feat of strength. Things like that are what you need to give The Demon more mystique because that really made it feel like Finn is stronger when he’s the Demon.

Once again though, I really don’t want to see this match anymore. This is clearly as good as it’s ever going to get, now it’s time to let Finn run and have great matches with everyone on whichever show he lands on post-shakeup.

8 – Tony Nese def. Buddy Murphey(c)
(Cruiserweight Championship)
(Kickoff Show)

So not only are they forced onto the kickoff show, they’re forced to open the kickoff show when there’s all of about 26 in the arena, great.

Ultimately, I think the middle of the list is the best place for this match, because while it didn’t have anything amazing in it, it was an extremely solid match, with several enjoyable moments throughout. Nese’s baseball slide to the outside, where he took Murphey’s legs out from under him at the same time was a very satisfying thing to watch, and generally the chemistry the two of them had made for a match that I had no problems sitting through.

Nese winning was actually quite the surprise to me, mostly it’s my own fault for not knowing what Nese’s finisher looked like, but also I didn’t really expect him to win, I always got the feeling that WWE loves Buddy Murphy (because he’s great) and that this thing was gonna last a little while longer, however I can’t argue with the decision and I do now wanna watch 205 Live this week to see where this all goes next; so it’s mission accomplished really.

7 – Carmella won the Women’s Wrestlemania Battle Royal

Well, this was a surprise.

Not so much the result, but the fact that the match was actually pretty damn enjoyable, it really seemed like everything was working against it. It has Asuka being dumped in it after losing her title, Lacey Evans not even being in the thing, and all of 16 competitors it really seemed like this thing was doomed to suck.

It wasn’t anything special to start off with, but once the field cleared a bit and we were down to a few competitors, things got pretty fun. There were many of the battle royal spots we’ve come to expect, and I really liked that they gave both Sonya Deville and Sarah Logan some time to shine because I think they’re both wonderful people, and damn good wrestlers to boot.

Surprisingly, because of the way it went down, I don’t actually have a problem with Asuka not winning. I’d rather it was Sarah Logan than Carmella sure and it seemed they’d already forgotten about that win by the time she showed up later on in the night, but the match itself was a nice little bit of fun on the pre-show, which is really what the pre-show matches should be for.

6 – AJ Styles def. Randy Orton

Well, that was pretty much exactly what I expected it to be.

I don’t have any complaints about this match, it wasn’t anything super exciting, but everything was perfectly solid the whole way through. It was slow enough to cool down the crowd after the excitement of the opening, but not so slow as to be boring, and it was just a really well-rounded match with 15 minutes of perfectly enjoyable wrestling. We even got an RKO kick out, which hasn’t happened in what feels like years.

I think its place on the card has got a lot to do with it. If this match had happened in 6th or 7th hour, then I imagine I would’ve crapped all over it for being boring but as it is, it got a really good spot on the card and made the most of it, so I really don’t have anything to complain about.

I think AJ was the right choice in winner too, granted I don’t think either man is going to be doing anything major right after Mania – they’ll probably both be in Money in the Bank but I doubt either of them will win it –  but AJ has been losing a lot since losing the WWE Championship to Daniel Bryan, so this was the best way I can think of for AJ to re-establish himself to hopefully have a solid mini-feud with whoever gets called up on Tuesday evening, which should be fun.

5 – Shane Mcmahon def. The Miz
(Falls Count Anywhere)

How does Shane keep doing this?

Seriously, I don’t understand it, by all rights a singles match involving a 49-year-old Shane Mcmahon at Wrestlemania should be awful, but with the exception of his Undertaker match, they’ve all been rather good year in and year out. This year’s match relied a little more on spectacle than the past couple, but I think that was more to the matches benefit than anything else. It started out a bit plodding, but once business started to pick up, I found myself enjoying it quite a lot.

George Mizanin will forever be a meme that will go down in wrestling history, alongside that little girl who hates The Miz and anytime Brock Lesnar pulls a roided out face. Once that was out of the way though, I actually quite liked the slower, more hard-hitting pace that this match had; it had the same style as Triple H vs Batista, but it felt to me like everything flowed better and the match was never at a standstill while we were waiting for a spot to be set up. On top of that, the actual spots themselves looked much more impressive, the finish is the obvious one, but the spot where Miz smashed Shane in the face and he went sailing over the railing onto the floor below looked so painful and was really satisfying to watch.

Normally I’d be furious that Shane won, but the way the finish played out in this match meant it made total sense. Total, random luck is the only way Shane should ever win a match where he’s not being helped and the fact that Miz did what he did instead of playing it safe is both a brilliant illustration of how this face turn has changed his character (as heel Miz would often tout the merits of how safe his wrestling style was) and added an extra layer of intensity to the feud, since it really felt like Miz was putting hurting Shane in front of winning the match.

I can’t believe I’m saying this, but after watching this match, I really hope this feud isn’t over, I want to see more out of this.

4 – The Usos(c) def. Aleister Black & Ricochet, The Bar, Rusev & Shinsuke Nakamura
(Smackdown Tag Team Championships)

The flipside of the 4 way tag matches on this show,  we got a much better one when the men went at it.

Generally, I think this match was structured a lot better than the women’s one, with a feeling out process at the start before we jumped it all descended into total chaos, it gave the match a natural progression, instead of immediately becoming a clusterfuck.

Once things did start to breakdown though, the action was generally just much more entertaining to watch, with everyone getting a chance to shine as chaos reigned. The Bar continues to be one of the best tag teams out there, as they went absolutely mental spinning Ricochet exactly 42 trillion times and Sheamus turning Black’s ribcage to dust. Black & Ricochet got a whole bunch of stuff scattered through the whole match, as one of them was the legal man for very nearly the whole thing, and when everyone was hitting their finishers at the end I was having an absolute blast.

I wouldn’t have chosen The Usos to retain if I were making the decisions, but it’s definitely not a bad choice, The Usos have lowkey been the best tag team in the world for a couple of years now, and letting them have brilliant matches for the titles month after month will be a great way to showcase that fact, so bring it on I say.

3 – Seth Rollins def. Brock Lesnar(c)
(Universal Championship)

You have no idea how happy I am that I get to type that header because I was so worried.

Despite making Seth my prediction, the closer and closer it got to the show the more convinced I was that Brock was going to retain, so when Heyman came out and declared that Seth vs Brock would be opening show, it was music to my ears.

It was exactly what it needed to be too, don’t get me wrong, I’m sure an extended match would’ve been great, but this got me twice as excited in a quarter the time and I loved it. Everything from the post-match beatdown to the low blow, to the triple Curb Stomp, was booked to absolute perfection, and the only reason it’s not number 1 is because it only lasted 2 minutes.

I would’ve been annoyed that Seth won because of a low blow, but A) It’s Brock Lesnar, he’s taken a low blow in almost every match for the past few years and won anyway, and B) Brock took the first cheap shot by attacking Seth before the bell, so the low blow felt more like karmic justice than Seth cheating.

Hopefully, Brock shows up on Raw, F-5’s everything that moves and then disappears off to get destroyed by Daniel Cormier while Seth puts on match of the year candidates with absolutely everyone while defending that title.

I couldn’t think of a more perfect way to open the show if I tried, and Seth Rollins once again manages to create one my all-time favourite wrestling moments, A freaking plus.

2 – Becky Lynch def. Ronda Rousey(c), Charlotte Flair(c)
(Raw Women’s Championship)
(Smackdown Women’s Championship)

Well, that sure was eventful.

People around the internet seem to be having pretty mixed reactions to this match, some say it was a massive disappointment that is the result of awful booking, while others say that it was an enjoyable match that was dragged down by everyone watching being exhausted and a slightly botched finish. I fall into the second camp.

Sure, this match wasn’t quite what it was hyped up to be, but it was still a great match that I had plenty of fun watching. It is worth mentioning the length of the show though, as much as it doesn’t bother me I am admittedly in the minority there as it was clear that the crowd were just too exhausted by hour 7 that there was no way they were ever going to be able to give this the reaction it deserved.

That said, WWE didn’t exactly help them to get excited. If the match had gotten an extra five minutes or so, they could’ve spent some time building up to a big climactic finish, and the crowd would’ve sensed that and reacted to it. Instead, we got a sudden roll-up win that was ever so slightly botched by Rousey making it look like it wasn’t the planned finished (the current report from Meltzer is that it was the planned finish, but Rousey lifted her shoulders when she wasn’t supposed to).

However, focusing on the positives, there was a lot to like in this match. For one thing, it really did have that big fight feel and spectacle that you’d expect from the main event of Wrestlemania, and when they were staring each other down at the start I really could feel the excitement in the air. There was also plenty of great psychology throughout the whole thing, with Becky and Ronda constantly going for the arms of their opponents while Charlotte spent an extended period of time working over Ronda’s leg which was great.

The table spot looked quite brutal if you ask me, and was in fact enhanced by the fact that the table didn’t break as it gave it what felt like a harder impact. Becky and Ronda staring down before the final exchange was a great moment too, and it did genuinely feel like the climax to this almost year-long story.

Would’ve I have liked it to be a bit different? Absolutely, that’s mainly why I’ve dropped it to second, but am I upset by what we got? Not in the slightest, I thought that this was a really good end to one of the better Wrestlemanias of the modern era, that said, it wasn’t the pinnacle of the night…

1 – Kofi Kingston def. Daniel Bryan(c)
(WWE Championship)

Come on, was it ever going to be anything else?

You take a competitor as hungry for success as Kofi, a story that was built organically by the fan’s love for Kofi, a heel champion as hated as Daniel Bryan, and a WWE Champion that does everything he can in the ring to make his opponent look amazing and also happens to be one of the best wrestlers in the world, and this match is exactly what you’d expect the result to look like.

This match took the fundamentals of a WWE world championship match and performed them to perfection. There was a constant back and forth between the two men, and they were constantly speeding up and slowing down the pace of the match as it was necessary for that moment in the story, because the story is exactly what this match was all about.

The idea of Kofi’s struggle was central to this entire performance, with Bryan constantly there to beat Kofi down time and time again just like he had been week after week since Elimination Chamber. That moment when Bryan was stomping on Kofi’s face only for Kofi to do the same thing to Bryan minutes later is perhaps the best way to illustrate this. Every single move in the match seemed to feed back into the story, building the emotional weight constantly until it was all able to come out at the finish.

Speaking of the finish, man what an emotional moment, after watching Kofi overcome every struggle that was thrown his way for his whole life in order to finally reach the pinnacle of his career and watching Big E and Woods be able to celebrate with him was just magical. I’m stealing this quote from many many people online, but this is why we put up with all the shit in WWE because when a story like this comes together in just the right way, it’s something truly unrivalled in terms of emotion and entertainment.

Even if Kofi loses the title on Tuesday it wouldn’t matter, because this is a moment that will forever stand in the history of Wrestlemania, and that’s something very few people will ever achieve.

So that was Wrestlemania 35! Overall I think it was a really enjoyable show, probably my favourite since 31, so I’m feeling very satisfied with all the wrestling over this past weekend indeed. As always thank you very much for taking the time to read an article as long as this one and please share it around on social media if you enjoyed. Follow me on Twitter @10ryawoo for live thoughts of wrestling and check back here every week for new opinions on both gaming and wrestling. I’ll see you soon.