205 Live – July 17, 2019: Another Instant Classic (They Have A Lot Of Those)
IMG Credit: WWE
205 Live
Date: July 16, 2019
Location: DCU Center, Worcester, Massachusetts
Commentators: Aiden English, Nigel McGuinness, Vic Joseph
Extreme Rules has come and gone and that means Drew Gulak is still the Cruiserweight Champion, having defeated Tony Nese to retain the title. That means we need to pick up the pace before we get to Summerslam in less than four weeks. Gulak needs a fresh challenger and we might be on our way to finding one. Let’s get to it.
Here are last week’s results if you need a recap.
The opening video looks at Gulak vs. Nese from Sunday.
Gulak says Tony dared to doubt him but now there is no doubt. His name is Drew Gulak and welcome to his 205 Live.
Opening sequence.
Akira Tozawa vs. Samir Singh
The Singhs want to give Tozawa the Bollywood Award for Best Comeback. Singh stomps him down into the corner to start and there are the swiveling hips. Tozawa stomps right back but a drop toehold sends him face first into the buckle. The chinlock goes on rather early but Tozawa is up in a hurry with a fireman’s carry for a unique counter. Tozawa kicks him to the floor and cannonballs off the apron to drop Singh again. Back in and Sunil tries a distraction, only to have Tozawa catch Samir running in and grab a sunset flip for the pin at 3:04.
Rating: D+. How much can you really get out of a Singh Brothers singles match? They’re only somewhat entertaining as a team so keeping it short here was the right call. Tozawa has more than enough charisma to carry this but there needs to be some more in ring work to help back it up. At least it was short, which is never a positive sign.
Post match the Brothers jump Tozawa but Brian Kendrick makes the save. Tozawa takes the Bollywood Award with him.
We get part two of the Humberto Carrillo interview, this time talking about his first year in WWE. There have been a lot of changes in the last year and one of his early goals was to keep the lucha libre tradition. Now he wants the Cruiserweight Title. Another short piece that doesn’t add much but it’s nice to see him get some spotlight out of the ring.
Mike Kanellis vs. Jackson James
Mike is on his own here as Maria is watching in the back. A boot to the face drops James at the bell and there’s a spinebuster to follow it up. Mike hits a pair of hard clotheslines and the swinging neckbreaker faceplant finishes James at 1:40. Just a squash.
Post match Mike stomps away even more and says Drake Maverick can keep bringing the fines because this isn’t changing. Drake comes out and says Mike needs to take a look in the mirror because Mike is the one responsible for his place here. Does he think he’s more deserving of a spot than the people who have built this brand?
Mike brings up Drake embarrassing himself in the hotel room with his wife and all the time that Drake has spent chasing the 24/7 Title in his underwear. Drake needs to go home and beg his wife for forgiveness because he’s not acting like a real man. A real man wouldn’t let Mike call their wife a filthy….and there’s a right hand to Mike’s face and a dropkick to send him to the floor. Mike smiles as he leaves. What I learned the most from this: Mike’s voice is rather similar to CM Punk’s.
We look back at last week’s wild Ariya Daivari vs. Oney Lorcan match with Lorcan superplexing him through some tables for the win.
Jack Gallagher vs. Chad Gable
Rematch from over a month ago where Gable won via countout (and maybe by accident). After a handshake, Gable takes him to the mat to start but Gallagher is right back up with a wristlock. An early chinlock doesn’t do much for Gable as Gallagher gets up again and spins back into the second wristlock early on. More spins keep Gable confused and some nitwitted fans call this boring.
We get the headlock takeover into the headscissors sequence a few times until Gallagher snaps off a good armdrag to make Gable’s eyebrows go up. Gallagher is right back on the arm but Gable jumps for an armdrag of his own into an armbar to put Gallagher down for a change. Another armbar from Gallagher is reversed with a British Bulldog deadlift and Gallagher bounces hard off the mat. One heck of a belly to belly gives Gable two more and it’s time to start in on Gallagher’s knee.
A hard dragon screw legwhip sets up a standing leglock and Gallagher is in trouble. His leg is fine enough for a dropkick and a rather British sneer. The delayed vertical suplex gets two on Gable and Gallagher busts out a Kimura of all things. Gable gets out so Gallagher sends him outside for a whip into the barricade. The suicide dive doesn’t work on Gable for some reason as Gallagher bounces off of him and gets suplexed on the floor, just like last time.
Gable doesn’t want it that way and throws Gallagher back inside, where it’s a small package to give Gallagher two. Gallagher is right back in trouble with an ankle lock into a grapevine (BUT THEY MADE JASON JORDAN KURT ANGLE’S SON BECAUSE IT WAS FUNNY!) but he manages a rope. The rolling Liger kick stuns Gallagher, who bounces back with a headbutt for two and they’re both down.
They slug it out with Gallagher getting the better of it (ignore the camera catching the tarped off side of the arena) but charging into a sitout Dominator for two more. Gable’s moonsault hits raised feet and Gallagher’s running corner dropkick gets two as Gable gets a foot on the rope. Gable goes up but Gallagher, with a big bruise on his upper thigh, tries a belly to back superplex. That’s reversed into a crossbody to crush Gallagher and it’s Rolling Chaos Theory to finish Gallagher at 16:10.
Rating: B+. Good grief HOW DID THEY NOT KNOW WHAT TO DO WHAT GABLE??? The guy is in great shape, has more charisma than he knows what to do with and is an Olympic wrestler. Oh but WWE could make a joke about Angle’s taste in women so they went with that instead of something that makes sense. This was an outstanding match as they beat each other up with counter after counter and had the fans digging everything going on. This was a great match and Gable needs to be on the main roster right now (and getting pushed for a change). Gallagher was his usual awesome self too and the result was awesome.
Post match Gable lets Gallagher have the ring for a bow to end the show.
Overall Rating: B+. The main event was awesome and the Maverick vs. Kanellis angle was good enough to make up for the first match being pretty weak. As usual, this is the kind of show that works well when they go with simple angles and a big main event (very Ring of Honorish) and they went with the sweet formula here. Check out that main event though as it’s one of the better matches the show has ever had.
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I liked Chad Gable Before it Was Cool
It’s amazing how Maverick plays 2 entirely different characters.
I didn’t like him as Rockstar Spud, but he has been rather impressive with his mic and acting work lately.
Also, Kanellis sounds exactly like Punk, whether it’s a Chicago thing or not who knows.
He’s also a better character on this show than RAW, where he just comes off like total crap.