Royal Rumble 2006
Date: January 29, 2006
Location: American Airlines Arena, Miami, Florida
Attendance: 16,178
Commentators: Joey Styles, Jerry Lawler, Michael Cole, Tazz

This is going to be an interesting one as the Rumble itself has received very little build. It has gotten about as little attention as I can remember in recent years, but things are in a weird place at the moment anyway. Other than that, we have Mark Henry challenging Kurt Angle for the Smackdown World Title and John Cena trying to get the Raw World Title back from Edge. Let’s get to it.

The opening video looks at all three main events, which is covering all of the bases fairly well.

Cruiserweight Title: Cruiserweight Open

Kid Kash, Gregory Helms, Jamie Noble, Funaki, Nunzio, Paul London

Kash is defending, it’s one fall to a finish, only former champions are allowed in, and if this was mentioned on Smackdown, it was in a one off statement. They go with the parade of rollups to start until the five Smackdown wrestlers jump Raw’s Helms. Noble armbars Kash but it’s broken up by London as this is more like a battle royal with everyone pairing off. London is sent to the floor and Nunzio hits the Sicilian Slice (middle rope Fameasser on Helms).

Noble hits a flying leg lariat on Kash with Funaki breaking it up at two. Funaki whips Noble to the ropes but Noble dives onto Nunzio instead. Kash and Funaki head outside and it’s London hitting a shooting star onto the big pile at ringside. Back in and Helms hits a super swinging neckbreaker on London, followed by Kash hitting London with the Dead Level. Nunzio and Funaki make the save so Noble chops the heck out of Funaki. A fireman’s carry gutbuster sets up a dragon sleeper but Helms makes the save. Noble is sent outside and a Shining Wizard to Funaki gives Helms the pin and the title.

Rating: C+. This was the right call for Helms, who lost clean to Jerry Lawler on pay per view earlier this month. He needs to get away from Raw as fast as he can and this is as good of a way as he can do it. There are only so many spots for cruiserweights on either show but it’s not like Kash was anything special anyway. Good move, and a nice choice for a start.

Teddy Long and Vince McMahon are ready for the Rumble but Vince is more excited that Torrie Wilson, Candice Michelle and Victoria are monitoring the tumbler. Randy Orton comes in to draw his number, as does HHH. Trash talk ensues and HHH asks Candice to hold his ball. HHH is really unhappy with his number, with Randy telling him that he’s screwed.

Trish Stratus, refereeing the next match, is warming up when Mickie James comes in with something to tell her. It’s not a good time, but Mickie says she loves her. Trish leaves without saying anything.

Ashley vs. Mickie James

Trish is refereeing and Lawler longs to be her shirt. Mickie and Ashley fight to the floor before heading back inside for an exchange of wristlocks. Ashley actually gets the better of it, with Joey calling her “technically sound”. Mickie is sent outside for an apron clothesline from Ashley, followed by some technically sound right hands in the corner. Trish breaks it up so Mickie grabs a quickly broken half crab.

That’s fine with Mickie, who gets to stare at Trish and beat Ashley up on the floor. A bow and arrow goes on with commentary pointing out that Mickie is trying to impress Trish. Ashley fights up and throws her down by the hair a few times before rolling Mickie up for two. Something like a spear drives Mickie into the corner as the fans are loudly booing Ashley. More right hands in the corner have Mickie in trouble but she uses the trunks to pull Ashley down with a powerbomb for a distressed three from Trish.

Rating: D. Ashley is trying as hard as she can but she’s just not that good. It doesn’t help when you have Mickie and Trish, two of the best of their generation, out there while we have to sit through Ashley’s bad….well almost everything. They’re stretching this out until Wrestlemania and putting Ashley in the ring on pay per view for nearly eight minutes is not the best way to go about it.

Post match Mickie hugs Trish, who still doesn’t seem pleased.

Vince admires the women’s tattoos, some of which are in some suggestive places. Big Show comes in to draw his number but can’t get his hand in the tumbler. Rey Mysterio comes in and, after an Eddie chat with Big Show, draws his number. Rey: “Eddie, you got me man. You got me.”

John Bradshaw Layfield vs. Boogeyman

Jillian Hall is here with JBL. After cowering during Boogeyman’s entrance, JBL hides behind Ashley and then bails to the floor. Boogeyman mounts her and spits worms onto her, which is finally enough to get us ready. JBL hammers away to knock Boogeyman outside before taking him inside for some choking with the tape. The Clothesline From JBL only hits the corner though and Boogeyman hits the pumphandle powerslam for the pin. I’m not sure if that’s a good idea or not, as Boogeyman isn’t exactly a main event star, but JBL isn’t as much of one as he was just a few months ago.

Worms are consumed post match.

Mama Benjamin hits on Vince and Shelton Benjamin draws. That goes well for him but here’s Melina to interrupt. Mama gets Shelton out in a hurry as MNM come in to draw. They seem rather pleased and Melina offers to have the two of them get rid of Shawn Michaels.

We recap the Royal Rumble, which is more or less “anyone could win”. They haven’t focused on it that much this year and that leaves some options open.

It’s Royal Rumble time but here’s the Spirit Squad to interrupt. After a cheer about the Rumble, we’re ready to go. Glad we got that out of the way, but it’s certainly a unique gimmick.

Royal Rumble

Ninety second intervals with HHH in at #1 and Rey Mysterio, in a low rider, in at #2. Lawler: “If you’re number one or two, you’re screwed.” This company really doesn’t have much of a memory does it? Rey goes fast to start with a running dropkick to the knee and a headscissors. The right hands in the corner set up the missed 619 and it’s Simon Dean in at #3. Dean stomps on Rey but can only send him to the apron. For some reason Dean thinks HHH will like him and that’s good for an elimination in a hurry.

Rey hits the Bronco Buster on HHH and it’s Psicosis in at #4. Psicosis goes after Rey as well and a swinging sitout faceplant drops him again. An attempt at a Razor’s Edge over the top results in a hurricanrana to get rid of Psicosis. Before anything else can happen, it’s Ric Flair in at #5 (Flair was in five Rumbles. In four of them, he was in the first five entrants.). HHH panics and the fight is on, with Flair grabbing him low but getting poked in the eyes.

A backdrop gets rid of Flair and it’s Big Show in at #6. That means another beatdown on HHH, including the standing legdrop and an elbow. Jonathan Coachman is in at #7 and Big Show gets rid of him as quickly as you would expect. Show stands on HHH’s head again and it’s Bobby Lashley (a dark horse according to Cole) in at #8. A big right hand puts Lashley down but he backdrops Show in a nice power display.

Lashley kicks Show to the floor (not eliminated) and it’s Kane in at #9 as they’re stacking the first part of this thing. Kane and Lashley slug it out with Kane hitting a big boot. Lashley snaps off a belly to belly, knocks down HHH, and hits the Dominator on Kane. It’s Sylvan in at #10, giving us HHH, Mysterio, Big Show, Lashley, Kane and Sylvan.

After Lashley dispatches him even faster than Show got rid of Coach, it’s a double chokeslam to plant Lashley. Kane and Show get rid of him after a strong showing and it’s the giant slugout. They choke each other on the ropes until HHH dumps both of them out (I’m shocked too) so here’s Carlito at #11 to fill in the ring a little more. Carlito stomps on Rey and HHH until a Roddy Piper style eye poke gets HHH out of trouble. Chris Benoit is in at #12 with Cole explaining about Benoit winning last year (hopefully jogging Lawler’s memory a bit).

The Crossface has Carlito in trouble, with HHH making the fast save. That wasn’t the brightest idea in the world but he sends Benoit to the apron where they fight over a suplex attempt. Benoit puts him down and hits the Swanton but here’s Booker T. (back in the long tights) in at #13. Benoit gets rid of Booker in about 20 seconds (Booker was probably still injured) so it’s back to chopping away at everyone else.

Joey Mercury is in at #14 and Benoit gives him a German suplex in a hurry. More chopping ensues as Tatanka of all people is in at #15 to go after HHH. The fans seem to remember him, but that might just be the Florida State Seminoles chant. Everyone pairs off and it’s Johnny Nitro in at #16 as Benoit gets HHH to the apron. Trevor Murdoch is in at #17 (Lawler: “He looks like a big bottle of milk.”) as the ring is getting full in a hurry. Rey is sent to the apron for the third time but is right back in with a basement dropkick to HHH.

Eugene is in at #18 for an airplane spin on Murdoch so Rey gives the two of them a double bulldog. Animal, with bright green shoulder pads, is in at #19. Things slow down again with the only thing between entrances being MNM failing to get rid of Rey. The returning Rob Van Dam is in at #20, giving us HHH, Mysterio, Carlito, Benoit, Mercury, Tatanka, Nitro, Murdoch, Eugene, Animal and Van Dam. Rob goes after almost everyone, including a spinwheel kick to HHH. MNM goes after Rob but he shrugs that off and gets rid of Animal.

Orlando Jordan is in at #21 and doesn’t even get a reaction in his hometown. There are WAY too many people in there and it’s making it hard to do much. Van Dam manages a middle rope kick to Carlito’s face and it’s Chavo Guerrero in at #22. Rolling Thunder hits Jordan and Chavo gets to clean a little house, including Three Amigos to Nitro. For some reason Chavo goes up top and HHH shove shim out without much effort.

Matt Hardy is in at #23 as there is only room for about two people to do anything at a time. MNM dumps Tatanka and it’s Super Crazy in at #24. He comes in with a very high crossbody to MNM and it’s back to fighting on the ropes. Shawn Michaels is in at #25 and PLEASE GET RID OF SOME PEOPLE. Murdoch is Shawn’s first victim and it’s Chris Masters in at #26 because the ring MUST stay overly full. Mercury and Hardy both save themselves and HHH has to do it as well.

Viscera is in at #27 (lucky us) for a Samoan drop on Hardy. There’s the Visagra and Hardy is out for daring to try a Twist of Fate on the monster. Shelton Benjamin is in at #28 as Benoit gets rid of Eugene. There’s a Dragon Whip to HHH as Goldust is in at #29. Crazy seems to have been put out off camera and Randy Orton is in at #30.

Side note: Cole says Orton is coming off a phenomenal 2005. What exactly did he do? Lose the title match against HHH at the Rumble, lose against the Undertaker at Wrestlemania and in the Cell, and need his dad to help him beat Undertaker. Oh and be the sole survivor at Survivor Series (thanks to a distraction), which he had done twice before. That’s phenomenal?

Anyway, the final grouping is HHH, Mysterio, Carlito, Benoit, Mercury, Nitro, Van Dam, Jordan, Michaels, Masters, Viscera, Benjamin, Goldust and Orton, or nearly half of the field. Orton gets rid of Benoit in a hurry to make up for Smackdown and Carlito/Masters dump Viscera. Carlito immediately turns on Masters to eliminate him as they’re picking up the pace in a hurry.

Goldust hits Shattered Dreams on Carlito, and is quickly eliminated by Van Dam. Orton gets rid of Jordan (after a ridiculous sixteen minutes), leaving Shawn and HHH to do their big showdown. MNM breaks that up but Michaels breaks that up and sends Nitro into Mercury to get rid of Joey. Michaels clotheslines Nitro out and skins the cat back in but Shelton jumps him. Shawn superkicks Shelton out without much effort but here’s Vince McMahon to order Michaels out.

Cue Shane McMahon from behind to dump Shawn, who charges back in, chases Shane off, superkicks HHH for old times’ sake, and follows the McMahons to the back. Van Dam gets rid of Carlito and we’re down to Van Dam, HHH, Orton and Mysterio. The tag match breaks out with Van Dam and Mysterio getting the better of it. For some reason Rob goes up and gets crotched by HHH, who sends Rey into Van Dam for the elimination.

Rey has to knock HHH and Orton down at the same time, setting up a double 619. Orton clotheslines Rey down though and powerslams HHH for a bonus. HHH is back up with a spinebuster to Orton but Rey gets rid of HHH to bring the fans WAY back into it. Just because he’s evil, HHH pulls Mysterio to the floor and sends him into the steps. The EDDIE chants start up and Rey manages to slip off Orton’s shoulder and a hurricanrana gives Rey the win.

Rating: B-. It’s good enough, but the Eddie praise got a little rough to take as the match went on. The far bigger problem though was having so many people in the ring at once for long stretches, leaving the people to have to find what openings they could in their limited room. That’s not a good setup for the Rumble and when it’s for the sake of having people like Tatanka and Jordan in there for long stretches, they seem to be missing the point.

Mickie interrupts a Trish interview and says she understands what Trish had to do out there. It’s because Trish loves her too! Trish follows her off to straighten things out.

Rey celebrates in the back when Edge comes in to say Rey better not try Benoit’s loophole by jumping over to Raw.

We recap Edge vs. John Cena for the Raw World Title. Edge cashed in the Money in the Bank briefcase after Cena survived the Elimination Chamber and went on to be a very different kind of champion. It was rather cool at times, but he doesn’t have much chance in this one.

Raw World Title: John Cena vs. Edge

Cena is challenging and comes to the ring walking across a confetti shooting scaffold that was lowered from the ceiling. Joey says Cena is fresh here, rather than coming off a 45 minute Elimination Chamber. Why can no one in wrestling tell time? The match wasn’t even 30 minutes long. Cena clotheslines him to the floor to start but Edge manages a trip into the middle buckle.

Back up and Cena grabs a side slam for two so Edge bails outside. That means it’s already time for a Lita distraction and Edge spears Cena into the steps. Cena is sent over the barricade for a nine count and Edge mocks You Can’t See Me. Some kicks to Cena’s face get two and Edge suplexes him down to work on the ribs some more. Cena is sent outside this time and Edge follows to keep hammering away. Back in and Edge gets two off a missile dropkick, setting up a jumping clothesline.

Edge snaps off some jabs to the jaw but has to rake the eyes to get out of a quick FU attempt. Another boot to the face lets Edge go up for a high crossbody, with Cena rolling through for a quick two. A chinlock with a bodyscissors has Cena down again but he powers to his feet. Cena grabs a DDT and they’re both down. The comeback is on and the Shuffle connects for no cover thanks to Lita. That doesn’t really matter though as Cena hits the FU into the STFU to get the title back.

Rating: B-. The wrestling was good enough but the ending wasn’t quite in doubt. As cool as it was to see Edge win the title, I don’t think anyone was buying him as being the champion coming into Wrestlemania. Cena is still the biggest star in the world, despite the mixed reactions getting stronger. I’m thinking Edge will be fine though, as the ratings for his shows as champion are hard to ignore.

Post match, Edge doesn’t want to talk and storms off. Jim Duggan comes up for the obvious Lita joke. I love that Duggan got into gear for the sake of the cameo. It’s such a wrestler thing to do.

Kurt Angle is ready to beat Mark Henry. He’s coming in as champion and leaving as champion. Oh and Mark Henry: YOU SUCK!

Smackdown World Title: Mark Henry vs. Kurt Angle

Henry is challenging and has Daivari in his corner. Angle goes for the leg to start and is shrugged off with ease. With the direct approach not working, it’s off to some speed to make Henry miss. Henry gets hold of Angle’s hand though and starts cranking, before dropping Angle ribs first across the top rope. After a trip to the floor with Henry wrecking the steps for no reason, they head back inside with Henry dropping onto his chest for two. The bearhug goes on but Angle slips out and goes for the ankle lock. Henry powers out so Angle hits the German suplex.

The Angle Slam connects for two and the straps go down, setting up another ankle lock. Henry powers out again and the referee gets bumped. Angle goes for a chair, which he uses on Daivari for trying to cut him off. Henry takes the chair from Angle, so it’s a low blow to slow Henry down. Two chair shots to the head give Angle two so he unhooks a turnbuckle pad. Henry goes face first and it’s a rollup with a grab of the rope to retain.

Rating: D. Well that didn’t work. Rey Mysterio got a better match out of Henry on Smackdown and Angle had to cheat over and over to survive here. They might have been able to do something with some more time, but at about nine and a half minutes, there wasn’t much that they could pull off as Angle had to spend the last few minutes cheating to keep the title. I get protecting Henry, but dang this was a rough sit.

Post match Angle celebrates but the gong sounds. Flanked by druids, Undertaker comes to the ring in a horse drawn chariot before motioning that he wants the title. Some lighting goes off at the posts and the ring collapses to end the show.

Overall Rating: C. There’s nothing on here worth seeing, as the Rumble is middle of the road at best, the World Title matches were never in doubt, and nothing was especially good. It’s a weird time in WWE as they’re trying to gear up for Wrestlemania but other than exploiting Eddie’s death, there isn’t much that can be done to fire up interest at the moment. Wrestlemania doesn’t look promising, but it does feel like it’s a long way off, which isn’t a good sign either. The show isn’t terrible, but it also isn’t anything you need to see.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and check out my Amazon author page with 30 different cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6

AND

Remember to check out Wrestlingrumors.net for all of your wrestling headline needs

Royal Rumble 2006
Date: January 29, 2006
Location: American Airlines Arena, Miami, Florida
Attendance: 16,178
Commentators: Michael Cole, Jerry Lawler, Joey Styles, Tazz

The opening video is about Mark Henry vs. Kurt Angle. The Rumble and Edge vs. Cena gets a little time as well.

Cruiserweight Title: Gregory Helms vs. Kid Kash vs. Funaki vs. Jamie Noble vs. Nunzio vs. Paul London

Nunzio hits a slingshot to send Noble into the corner and Funaki adds a bulldog for two. We finally get to the dives with Nunzio diving on a pair of guys, allowing Noble to get two on Kash via a leg lariat. Noble dives on Helms and Nunzio on the floor and Funaki is knocked off the top onto Nunzio and Noble. London kicks Kash to the floor as well and dives on everyone not named Helms with a shooting star off the top.

Trish is looking GREAT in a referee outfit when Mickie, currently the psycho lesbian, comes up and says she loves Trish. Ok then.

Mickie James vs. Ashley Massaro

Big Show draws his number. Rey comes in to talk about Eddie a bit. Apparently Eddie is joking with Rey by giving him this number.

John Bradshaw Layfield vs. Boogeyman

Before the Rumble starts, the Spirit Squad comes out to give us a chant.

Royal Rumble

HHH is #1 and Mysterio is #2, naturally coming out in a lowrider and an Eddie shirt. HHH tries to power him down to start but Rey comes back with kicks to the knee. Rey hits a headscissors to take HHH down and into the corner but HHH lifts him to the apron. Rey comes back with a springboard dropkick to the back but HHH ducks the 619. Simon Dean is #3 and goes after Rey to a bunch of boos. Dean sends him to the apron and wants a high five from HHH but gets punched in the face and hit by a seated senton. The elimination is academic.

Lashley immediately comes back with an overhead belly to belly and a third press slam to HHH. Kane takes a Dominator and Sylvan, the “Smackdown fashion consultant” is #10 and lasts about 18 seconds before Lashley throws him out. Unfortunately he turns around and gets caught in a double chokeslam followed by the elimination. The partners quickly turn on each other with Kane getting a boot up to stop a charging Show. They fight to the ropes and HHH runs up to throw them both out, emulating the same thing Shawn did in 1996 with Vader and Yokozuna.

Benoit chops on HHH until Joey Mercury is #14. Mercury fires off dropkicks but gets caught in Rolling Germans. Carlito jumps Benoit to break it up and Mercury pounds on Benoit a bit. Freaking Tatanka is #15, giving us a group of Mysterio, HHH, Carlito, Benoit, Mercury and Tatanka. Seriously why did the bring TATANKA back? He fires off chops as the fans do the Seminole chant.

Shawn has to skin the cat to stay in and turns into a kick to the head from Shelton. Michaels is cool with that and sends Shelton to the apron followed by a superkick to eliminate him. This brings out Vince who hates Shawn and the distraction lets Shane run in and dump HBK. Shawn is ticked and runs back in and superkicks HHH after escaping a Pedigree attempt. He goes after Vince but a single referee stops him. Ok then.

Mickie comes in to hit on Trish as she does an interview on WWE.com.

We recap Edge vs. Cena. Edge won MITB back at Mania and waited nine months before cashing in on Cena after Cena survived the Elimination Chamber. Tonight is the rematch three weeks later.

Raw World Title: John Cena vs. Edge

Edge tries for a countout but Cena DIVES back in at nine. Back in and Cena pounds away but charges into a spinwheel kick for two from the Canadian. Edge punches Cena to the floor again but goes after him instead of going for the countout again. Cena gets sent into the steps and back inside a missile dropkick gets two for the champion. Edge loads up a superplex but gets shoved off, only to avoid a guillotine legdrop from Cena.

Edge freaks out on Todd Grisham in the back. Edge storms off and Lita panics a bit. We get a random Hacksaw Jim Duggan cameo (does anyone do those better?) to call her a HO!

Smackdown World Title: Kurt Angle vs. Mark Henry

Instead Angle hits a German (kind of) to put both guys down. The Angle Slam gets two (duh) and the ankle lock is broken up again. The counter causes the referee to get bumped so Angle gets a chair. A low blow and two chair shots take Henry down for two, so Angle takes a buckle off. Kurt drop toeholds him into the buckle and rolls Henry up to retain. Our hero everyone.

Taker comes out in a freaking horse drawn chariot and motions that he wants the title. Then he shoots lightning from his hands at the stuff over the ring, before slamming his arms down to send lightning at the posts. The ring collapses to end the show. Yeah that happened.

Ratings Comparison

Gregory Helms vs. Kid Kash vs. Funaki vs. Jamie Noble vs. Nunzio vs. Paul London

Original: B-

Redo: C+

Mickie James vs. Ashley Massaro

Original: C-

Redo: D

Boogeyman vs. John Bradshaw Layfield

Original: F-

Redo: N/A

Royal Rumble

Original: D

Redo: C-

John Cena vs. Edge

Original: B

Redo: D+

Kurt Angle vs. Mark Henry

Original: D-

Redo: D

Overall Rating

Original: C-

Redo: D

What was I on for that Edge vs. Cena match?

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2011/01/25/royal-rumble-count-up-2006-eddie-guerrero-puts-on-a-mask-and-wins-the-rumble/

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and check out my Amazon author page with 30 different cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6

AND

Remember to check out Wrestlingrumors.net for all of your wrestling headline needs

Royal Rumble 2006
Date: January 29, 2006
Location: American Airlines Arena, Miami, Florida
Attendance: 15,000
Commentators: Joey Styles, Michael Cole, Tazz, Jerry Lawler,

The main changes are Batista and Cena. They’ve more or less taken over the company as the biggest things in the world. Except for Batista because he’s out with an injury. Edge is the current reigning world champion though as he had more or less stolen the title at New Year’s Revolution. He’s got his rematch with Cena tonight. On the other side, Mark Henry is main eventing the show. I give up.

The other main issue is of course the death of Eddie Guerrero, which there’s been more than enough written about already. Other than that, there’s just not a lot going on here. This more or less is the first Rumble of what would be classified as the modern era, so let’s get to it.

The intro is just a recap of the major feuds. For some reason, Angle vs. Henry gets the most hype. Naturally they push Raw vs. Smackdown again. Edge is the Rated R Champion now. Lita’s stomach is the thing that dreams are made of. I’ve always wanted to say that. For reasons that no one will ever comprehend, the theme is Roman or something, which meant nothing and no one wanted to see. Stephanie in Roman clothing was nice though.

Cruiserweight Championship: Cruiserweight Open

This is the standard thing they were doing back in the day as they had completely given up on having any kind of storylines or flow to the division, so they just said screw it and threw everyone into one massive match where everyone is legal at once. In this, you have to be either the current Champion or a former champion. The participants are Kid Kash who is the champion, Paul London, Nunzio, Funaki, Gregory Helms and Jamie Noble.

London is wearing a gold mask for some reason that was never really explained. Helms is a surprise here. Oh geez there’s a Roman theme again where they have guys opening the door where people from out of the back from. It’s kind of like KOTR 96 for those of you that have seen that. Helms is from Raw here so he’s an outsider or something like that. Shockingly, the match is a huge mess to start as there are no tags or anything like that. Screw that order stuff.

London’s dropsault is stupid when it’s just one person but it’s cool when there’s two. It’s completely not effective but it looks good. Heck Rock won a bunch of world titles like that though so who cares? London looks like Tajiri for some reason. This is a pure spotfest here with nothing resembling flow or a story or anything like that, which makes sense I guess. At least they didn’t try as that would have been really stupid.

In a nice spot, Funaki whips Noble in and he launches a suicide dive through the ropes to take out two guys. You can tell a lot of these spots are preplanned but that’s fine as it’s working pretty well for what it’s supposed to be. With almost everyone else on the floor, London goes to the top rope and throws a shooting star press to the floor, more or less missing everyone and just slamming into the floor.

It looked PAINFUL and the fans give him a well deserved hokey smoke chant. In a cool spot that I haven’t seen before, London and Helms are on the top and Helms hits a swinging neckbreaker to get us back on the mat. It looked a lot better than it sounds.

For those of you that don’t know, Kash was a fairly big deal in ECW but other than that he’s been a minor player at best. The steps in the background are orange here so it looks like a bunch of empty seats. They get really fast in a hurry but it gets cut off too fast as Helms hits a Shining Wizard to Funaki for the pin.

Rating: B-. Now before everyone jumps on me, this isn’t the same kind of grade that I would give a normal match because this wasn’t supposed to be a standard match. This was designed to be completely insane and all spots to get the crowd awake and it worked fine. That’s the point of this and it did its job, so it gets a decent grade. There is no story to something like this and there shouldn’t be. Helms would hold the belt over a year.

Vince and Teddy long are around the Rumble drawing and Vince tells Long to leave. Naturally there are three hot women there. Orton and HHH come in and draw their numbers. Orton is happy and HHH hates his. Sex jokes abound as these two continue their eternal battle that never goes anywhere. Victoria looks incredible.

Trish is getting ready to be the referee. Mickie James says she loves her, and we have a lesbian stalker angle.

Mickie James vs. Ashley Massaro

For no apparent reason, this isn’t for the title as Trish is the referee and the champion here. They would have a decent match at Mania. This is back when Mickie was not only insane but also wore ridiculously awesome skirts. Ashley was one of the biggest flops in wrestling history as the winner of the Diva search who was just awful on a lot of levels. If nothing else we have Lillian, Mickie and Trish in the same ring. That’s not bad at all.

They have a headlock and actually go to the floor without breaking it up. That’s hard to do. Ashley can’t even lock up right. That’s almost sad. What’s sadder is that Joey has to say she’s a superstar. Oh yeah this was also when Mickie would scream her head off, which I’ve always liked for some reason. Ashley tried at least so I’ll give her that. The crowd is completely dead by the way. Mickie’s figure is flat out mesmerizing.

This is so odd to see someone with so much talent like James and someone with so little in Ashley. The thing here is that Mickie loves Trish but Trish trained Ashley. There are far too many bad submissions being done here to have a coherent match too. Ashley goes on offense and while it’s really bad, she’s trying. You can tell the different between someone that just doesn’t want to be there and Ashley, while bad, is trying.

However, her offense is either so limited or the fans like Mickie so much that they completely turn on her and boo her LOUDLY. Mickie powerbombs her out of the corner and Trish is really hesitant to count it, which is either part of the angle or then just giving up and saying let’s try to save some face here and just ending it early. Either of those would be believable to me.

Rating: C-. And that’s as generous as I can be. Ashley was bad here, but she was trying as hard as she could and I can easily respect that. Now later on when she just didn’t care, screw that. The fans turning on her like that annoyed me, but I can get what their point was. This was really just to set up Trish vs. Mickie, which is fine.

We see Helms at the WWE Interactive area, which means he’s chatting on WWE.com, which WCW had about 10 years prior to this.

More Rumble drawings with Rey and Big Show. It’s preceded by Vince checking the girls’ tattoos which is just annoying and stupid. In a funny bit, Show can’t get his hand in the tumbler to get a number out. Show is pleased and Rey is…oh screw it. They’re talking about Eddie again, which draws a huge chant and gives away the ending to the Rumble. Ok, before this comes up later, let’s just get it out of the way now.

The WWE needs to understand something. No wait, actually wrestling in general needs to understand something. When a wrestler dies unexpectedly, it doesn’t make them better. Eddie was indeed a very good if not great wrestler, but based on the things you hear about him now, you would think he was Ric Flair. He’s more about the level of Randy Orton or so. However, the undisputed champion of this is ECW with Louie Spicolli.

He was the epitome of an ok if not decent wrestler that was all of a sudden great after he died from a drug overdose. He simply was not as good as people made him out to be. For all of you ECW marks out there, show me ONE very good Spicolli match. It doesn’t even have to be great.

Show me one time where he had a great match. What was my point here? Oh yeah. Eddie was very good, but he only became considered great after dying. “KB you don’t know anything. He won the world title!” Yeah well this is 2 days after TLC and Sheamus is world champion so the belt really doesn’t prove all that much does it?

JBL vs. Boogeyman

The idea here is that JBL is terrified of Boogey. Oh and Boogey bit the “mole” off of Jillian’s face. She’s his assistant here or something like that. My goodness JBL has fallen far since winning the world title less than two years before this. It continues to amuse me when someone like Boogeyman is weighed in. And now I’m annoyed. I’ve never liked the Boogeyman character for one reason: he makes a mockery of wrestling.

Now yes, there’s a lot of stupid characters and while I tend to dislike the majority of them, when they can have a decent match, it’s almost acceptable. Boogeyman couldn’t do that, so when he does stuff like eat worms, then spit them up and spit them down into Jillian’s mouth, I have no use for him at all. It continues to have stupidity attached to it as we have to hear about how disgusted the announcers are.

Seriously, the Four Horsemen are in the same business as this guy. That’s just ridiculous. Thankfully, this lasts about a minute and a half, as after a stupid brawl where Boogey sells nothing at all, JBL misses a Clothesline and somehow slams into the post in a completely awful looking spot. A pumphandle slam ends it.

Rating: F-. This would usually be an N/A, but this was just a complete and utter waste of time. Seriously, why did this need to happen? I know it took less than 5 minutes, but really, there was NOTHING else we could have used that for? I hate gimmicks like these, I truly do.

Vince hits on the girls more and you can see they hate it. Shelton’s mama shows up. This was a freaking stupid gimmick where Shelton’s mom showed up to make sure he was taken care of. It was some comedienne that no one has ever heard of in a fat suit. You figure out how well it worked. Melina shows up and gets hit on too. Mama prevents him from hitting on her.

MNM, Joey Mercury and Johnny “Morrison” Nitro show up to draw as well. Both seem fairly middle of the road with their numbers. Melina says they’ll eliminate Shawn. We finish this long segment off with more Vince hitting on the girls. They eventually became a stable called Vince’s Devils. Yeah it went nowhere.

Before the Rumble starts, we have the Spirit Squad. Now for those of you that weren’t around for these guys, they were male cheerleaders that won the tag titles from Kane and Big Show. Amazingly everyone said the only one with talent was Kenny Dykstra. The one known as Nick became known as Dolph Ziggler. What does that tell you? Lillian is jaw dropingly hot here.

Royal Rumble

Lillian flubbing her lines is somehow sexy. How is that possible? HHH is number one and Rey is number two. Well you certainly can’t say they’re using no names to start us out. This is big match that’s never happened before. Oh the intervals are 90 seconds here. Oh here we go Rey is driving a lowrider. HEY, WE GET IT ABOUT EDDIE! I wouldn’t be so annoyed about it, but seriously, he brought up Eddie in the BATISTA feud.

Oh look he draped an Eddie shirt on the car. This is freaking ridiculous because it’s obvious Rey is going to win here for the sake of “honoring Eddie.” Rey’s entrance reaches Taker levels of time. He does the ten punches in the corner and looks up before he does it. This is freaking ridiculous and we’re just hitting number 3 which is Simon Dean. Cole, who is doing the commentary with Lawler, FREAKS because a Smackdown guy is attacking a Smackdown guy.

They team up and eliminate him easily. Have I mentioned that I hate the Bronco Buster? Psicosis of the Mexicools is 4th. They were a team of Mexican stereotypes who rode lawnmowers. I wish I was making that up. Rey counters a Razor’s Edge to put him out with ease again so we stay with those two guys. Number 5 is Flair of all people. He trips coming into the ring as Rey is down for no apparent reason.

Flair and HHH hammer on each other for awhile as I think HHH is a heel here. Oh yeah he would be. That was a stupid comment. He and Flair feuded over the IC belt of all things in some decent matches. You know for a guy that was allegedly the biggest ladies man ever, he used a lot of testicular claws. He’s gone soon after and we’re back at 2 people. Big Show is 6th so hopefully we get people in here for awhile.

He’s mad at HHH also, which is still going on today, which works as it’s been less than five years ago so a feud can easily go on that long. Naturally Show dominates here. With an eyeroll from me, Coach is number 7. Why did he always get spots in the Rumble? Show puts him out in about 30 seconds. Show demonstrates his intelligence by having HHH above his head twice and not even getting close to the ropes.

The announcers say that Coach might have set a record for shortest time in the Rumble. That’s so stupid I’m not even going to bother making fun of it. Lashley is 8th and they say he could be a dark horse. Can I get a rim shot? He’s a rookie phenomenon here, meaning that his career wouldn’t mean much since Vince refused to ever pull the trigger on him, even though he tried. In an impressive move, he gets a backdrop on Show as Kane, who is currently tag champions with Show, is 9th.

He and Lashley square off in a match of two guys that will never win a world title in WWE again. In a very impressive looking spot that wasn’t really that impressive, he hits the Dominator on Kane. Rey has been down WAY too long for no apparent reason. Sylvan, playing a gay character who doesn’t actually say he’s gay is 10th. He’s the fashion consultant or something. Yeah he’s gone in about 30 seconds.

Show and Kane hit a double chokeslam on Lashley and throw him out. So HHH and Rey are more or less just laying on the mat for about 5-6 minutes at a time which is again, stupid. HHH puts Kane and Big Show out, thus reaffirming his theory that he could out fight God if he had to.

Carlito is 11th, as other than the first two guys, no one has lasted 10 minutes yet. I really don’t like this theory of only having a few guys in there for the majority of the match. The Rumble should have about 6-7 guys in the ring for the majority of the match. It’s just right and it allows for things to not be too boring but also not too weak. Benoit is 12th as we’re picking up a bit.

He chops and suplexes the heck out of everyone just because he’s Chris Benoit and they’re not. Carlito gets a crossface for good measure as Benoit is freaking awesome. He and HHH fight over a suplex with Benoit on the apron which was cool looking if nothing else. The Canadian fights out of that and hits the headbutt on HHH so Carlito can get back up. Booker is 13th and the US Champion at the moment.

He’s wearing long tights which looks odd indeed. He would become king in a few months. Yep Booker is gone already, naturally by Benoit as those two were eternally joined at the hip for some reason. Apparently 20 minutes or so is a long time now. So the most we’ve had is what, 5 people I believe?

Mercury of MNM is 14th and since he brings Melina with him, he’s awesome. I love the way they carried the belts as they hung them from their pants so they swung between their legs. It’s original if nothing else. Mercury really is underrated in the ring. He’s a lot better than people realize. Cole brags about setting ratings records on UPN. That’s just hilarious. Tatanka is 15th to ZERO reaction.

He returned for a few months and no one, I mean NO ONE cared at all. His offense has somehow gotten even more generic if that’s possible which I didn’t think it was. The fans do the Florida St. Seminole chant to try to validate his entrance. Nitro is 16th. More commonly known as John Morrison if you’re not familiar. Tatanka beats on him, which somehow validated Matt Hardy and Tatanka vs. MNM on PPV in a non title match. You read that right.

The fans chant Eddie to just tick me off even more. Only Vince would manage to use death to push storylines. Trevor Murdoch is 17th. To recap we have HHH, Rey, Carlito, Benoit, Mercury, Nitro, Murdoch and for some reason Tatanka. Cole takes a lull to mention that Rey is dedicating this match to Eddie. Eugene is 18th, and is booed out of the freaking building. He’s a classic case of a comedy character being used badly.

Rey hurts him to get a solid pop. For the love of goodness Animal of the LOD is 19th. Seriously, who picked these people? Oh apparently the new LOD are the long time rivals of MNM. You know, the team that’s been around for a few months. There are WAY too many people in there right now. RVD is 20th to a HUGE pop. Thankfully for the first time in history the company listened to the pop and made him world champion in June before he smoked his way out of the main event.

Oh yeah this was the summer that ECW returned. He cleans house of course. MNM is doing the Demolition thing of teaming up on everyone which is smart. Animal is out thank goodness. Orlando Jordan is 21st and I somehow manage to lose even more interest in this match. There are FAR too many people in the ring at the moment. Chavo is 22nd. Ok, him I have no problem with doing the pointing thing. There’s your difference between Chavo and Rey.

Chavo won a match with JBL on the Eddie tribute show, pointed to the sky a few times, and started using the frog splash. He’s mentioned Eddie a few times over the years, but for the most part he’s just said that he’s a Guerrero which he would have been no matter what. He had one angle with Rey over the Guerrero name, which made sense when you thought about it. That’s perfectly fine.

Then you have Rey, who used the splash, drove a lowrider, blew one up, pointed to the sky and dedicated about a year’s worth of matches to Eddie, using him as an angle and getting the world title because of it. He still mentions Eddie for storylines 4 years after Eddie passed away. There’s paying homage then there’s just being freaking ridiculous. What does Chavo get for being more humble about it? He lasts a minute here while Rey lasts an hour.

Of course Chavo shouldn’t have won or been in the last group or anything, but would 10-15 minutes have killed anyone? Seriously, Tatanka can get a long time but Chavo can’t? Matt Hardy is 23rd. There’s like 12 people in there right now and it’s absurd. You can’t see a thing in there at the moment either. Tatanka FINALLY goes out as Super Crazy is 24th. What is the point of half these guys being in here?

Shawn is 25th to a nice pop. He gets pyro when he comes out which is odd in a Rumble match. He ends Murdoch to thin the ranks out a bit. Chris Masters, who is more or less a newcomer at this point, somehow gets pyro also at 26th. I’m not even bothering to try to tell who all is in there at this point. Nothing of note is happening anyway. Viscera, currently the world’s largest love machine is 27th.

He puts out the far more talented Matt Hardy, but not before giving him the Visagra, which is where the other guy is on his stomach and Viscera gets on top of them and gyrates his hips. Yeah it’s worse than it sounds. Shelton is in next along with his mother. This is somehow stupider than I thought it was going to be. Eugene is gone, leaving a huge pool of sweat on the mat beneath him.

They’re really speeding up the intervals here to get through this. Goldust, who is returning for like the 12th time is 29th. That leaves Orton as number 30. Rey puts Crazy out as Orton comes out last. Ok, so your final group is Rey, HHH, Carlito, Benoit, Mercury, Nitro, RVD, Jordan, Shawn, Masters, Viscera, Shelton, Goldust and Orton. Yeah that’s not too many people at all. Screw the sarcasm. YES IT’S TOO MANY FREAKING PEOPLE!

Geez do you think 14, or just under half of the people being left at the end is enough? Why don’t we just get rid of the whole unique aspect of the freaking match and make it a regular battle royal like the classic World War 3 series that WCW used to do? Those things went great didn’t they? Dang it Vince how hard is it to book a freaking Rumble? You have about 7-8 guys in at the end, 5-6 of them are big names and two or three jobbers.

Three are legit contenders, three are dark horses, and two are jobbers. There, that took 8 seconds to come up with. Orton puts Benoit out which Cole says is a rematch from Summerslam two years ago. More like a year and a half but who cares about facts? Carlito and Masters put out Viscera and then Carlito throws out Masters. Goldust takes forever to set up Shattered Dreams but at least manages to kick that turnbuckle really well.

RVD puts him out just before Orton puts out Jordan. Shawn and HHH go at it to keep the balance of the universe in order. Shawn puts out both of MNM within 5 seconds of each other to further kill the tag division which HHH and Shawn are the current champions of as of this being written. Sweet Chin Music puts out Shelton as Shawn is on a roll. Vince’s music hits as he and Shawn were feuding at the moment. He distracts Shawn so Shane can put Shawn out.

That leaves us with Rey, HHH, Carlito, Orton and RVD. Well I’m glad they took their time getting rid of the people. Shawn goes after Shane but HHH stops him but gets chin music. HBK chases the McMahons out because he’s a face and they’re heels. Van Dam puts Carlito out to give us our final four of Rey, HHH, Orton and RVD. RVD was returning so he wasn’t going to win.

HHH and Orton were possible and Rey was the clear winner so there we go. They split off with HHH vs. Rey and Orton vs. RVD. The faces hit some nice double team stuff to hurt the heels. Van Dam shows how stupid he is by going for a Five Star and gets put out. Orton and HHH get together for no apparent reason other than to beat up a guy that’s 5’5. However, Rey is empowered by the memories of a guy that he feuded with so he takes them both down.

Orton fights HHH. In other news, the sky is blue. Rey puts out HHH and it’s officially inevitable. Rey gets beaten up by HHH to just further make us take note of how awesome Rey is. Orton acts cocky and yeah Mysterio is going to Mania. Orton would get in and make it a triple threat where Rey would win the title and of course, dedicate it to Eddie since that’s all he’s allowed to do.

Rating: D. Eddie oversaturation aside, this Rumble sucked and it sucked hard. The booking was way off here as there were far too few guys in the ring at first and far too few in the end. The Rey thing annoys the heck out of me as people like to say RIP Eddie, yet they have zero problem with his history being exploited for the sake of bad storylines. Rey was passable as champion, but let him get there on his own and not because a guy died. That’s just stupid.

Other than that, WAY too many jobbers and fillers in there, which kind of reflects on the company as a whole. Seriously, why did Booker and Lashley stay in there for just a bit? To be fair, Booker was hurt so that might explain it. Either way, this match was awful in a lot of ways and I hated it quite a bit.

Rey is happy with his win.

We recap Cena vs. Edge, which was a result of the first cashing in of the Money in the Bank in a truly shocking moment. This was a huge thing as Cena was completely dominant and everyone was TICKED when he held the title again after the Elimination Chamber.

But when Vince’s music went on, everyone knew what was coming and it was awesome. Naturally Cena insisted on a rematch and talked about respect and having the title mean a lot to him. This was also the reign with the live sex celebration that apparently made Edge’s career better than Taker’s.

Raw World Title: John Cena vs. Edge

So the scaffolds from the ceiling begin to lower. Smoke and lights and pyro go off. Styles says it looks like a spaceship. Yep, Cena is getting a special entrance that of course looks awesome. More or less his feet are where the top of his head would be if he was walking normally. Yeah there’s nothing at all that’s being implied about who wins here at all. Lita of course looks completely amazing. If nothing else I’ve heard Edge’s theme live so that’s cool.

For the love of all things good and holy, change the spinner belt. The W is spun almost halfway around and it just looks stupid. It starts off with their standard stuff which is traditionally good. Cena starts off in control but thanks to Lita Edge hits a spear into the steps, which more or less proves that he desperately needs a new finisher. We go into the crowd for just a bit but it goes nowhere. Cena dives in to beat the ten count which if nothing else looked cool.

Edge goes old school with his spinning heel kick. Why is Joey Styles the only commentator that mentions the referee’s names consistently? Cena can sell really well if nothing else. Good night Lita’s chest is amazing. The announcers get into an interesting argument: who is the better technical wrestler? That’s a most interesting question that’s going to get a thread soon. Edge’s facials remain awesome as ever. The crowd is fairly loudly booing John here.

Edge chokes Cena so of course despite being put in a hold that should kill him or would end any MMA fight, he gets up with ease. Both guys are down so we get another few shots of Lita’s chest to fill time. Following some botched interference from the hot chick, the FU and STFU give Cena the belt again. That was abrupt.

Rating: B. Eh, this was what it was. Cena and Edge work together just fine so their matches are almost always passable. Edge was more or less given the title as a test run and that’s fine. He got his name in there and that’s what counts. Cena was definitely the right choice to have the belt going into Mania so I have no issues with the booking here. The match was fine and it came off well. It’s nothing great but it’s fine for a title change that goes 15 minutes.

In case you were wondering, Rey is still happy that he won.

We do a very quick, as in about 10 second long recap of Angle vs. Henry, which consists of Henry breaking the ankle lock, which had been done by about 15 people up to this point, but it’s impressive here because of POWER. Angle was a transitional champion if there ever was one.

He took over when Batista got hurt (shocking isn’t it?) so he’s held the title less than three weeks at this point. Angle does his usual solid promo and then comes back to tell Henry he sucks. That’s what makes Angle better than most. He would head to TNA later in the year and be a huge coup for TNA.

Smackdown World Title: Kurt Angle vs. Mark Henry

So Daivari used to hang out with Angle but he dumped him for Henry for no apparent reason. Soon after this Khali would show up. Yeah Angle is introduced as the new World Heavyweight Champion here. That’s the beauty of having guys like Angle or Shawn on your roster.

If something like an injury happens, you can throw the title on them for a quick fix and because they hang around the upper midcard with occasional main event matches, it’s perfectly believable to put the belt on them and no one really had a problem with Angle as champion. We get a fairly long feeling out period, but Henry catches Angle in position for the World’s Strongest Slam. Naturally though instead of slamming him though, he throws him to the floor.

More or less Henry beats the tar out of Angle for awhile as you would expect. Good night Henry you’ve been in the company ten years at this point. Don’t you think it’s time you learned some new offense? I mean really, we know you can slam, club, punch and squeeze. LEARN ANYTHING NEW. Angle gets a bad German, but to be fair, look what he’s working with. Angle Slam gets two. Henry powers out of the ankle lock using the same counter that everyone else uses to knock the referee down.

Angle gets a bad chair shot to Daivari and takes it into the ring. The chair is bent which always looks cool. Angle goes Hogan and cheats but remains a face. Two decent chair shots put Henry down but the fans are more or less dead here. They of course get two which gets a decent pop. I really don’t get the point of the chairs this early in the match. Angle pulls the turnbuckle pad off the middle turnbuckle and sends Henry’s head into it on a reversal for the pin. Really? That’s the best you’ve got?

Rating: D-. I have no freaking clue what they were going for here, but it was just an epic failure. Henry had no business being in there but he came off looking like a far bigger face than Angle did. It was really short, and I have no idea what the point was of this main eventing the show. Oh wait. Now I get it.

A gong goes off and the lights go purple. Ok, Taker has druids and a horse drawn chariot. That makes up for the main event. He signals that he wants the belt and sets off lightning. The ropes fall to the ground and the ring collapses as Angle holds the belt to his chest as we go off the air. Ok, that was freaking cool.

Overall Rating: C-. This was a very lackluster show. I know a lot of people will love the Eddie tributes etc. but I HATED them. One or two points to the sky and some frog splashes are just fine but seriously, giving the Rumble and ultimately the world title to a guy over Eddie? That’s WAY too much. Other than that, there’s just nothing special here at all. Edge and Cena is pretty easily the match of the night.

This show really was more about setting up for the future though, as Cena had to get the belt back and Angle had to get set up with Taker, which they managed to accomplish both. This really started setting the table for Mania, so that’s fine, but the show just wasn’t that interesting. Not recommended at all really, although some people might like it.

Smackdown
Date: January 15, 2021
Location: Tropicana Field, St. Petersburg, Florida
Commentators: Michael Cole, Corey Graves

We’re well on the way to the Royal Rumble and that means things are getting all the more interesting day by day. Last week took a surprise turn as Roman Reigns helped Adam Pearce become the new #1 contender to Reigns’ Universal Title. There is a good chance that the spot could go to someone else, but Pearce getting the match wouldn’t stun me either. Let’s get to it.

Here are last week’s results if you need a recap.

The opening recap looks at Roman Reigns destroying Kevin Owens and making Adam Pearce #1 contender by attacking Shinsuke Nakamura.

Reigns is reading the contract for the Royal Rumble match but doesn’t seem happy. Paul Heyman says it’s the same contract Reigns always signs with a different name. Reigns still isn’t pleased, so Heyman suggests adding a stipulation. That seems to work for Reigns, who hands Heyman the contract to solve. Reigns glares a lot.

Here’s Jey Uso for a chat. He says this is the Bloodline Show because his family runs this show. Adam Pearce needs to be careful or he is going to find out the hard way at the Royal Rumble. Everyone in the back should be thanking Roman for everything from the towels to the food at catering to the millions of people watching every week. Now it’s time to expand, with Jey entering the Royal and planning to go to Raw and become the new WWE Champion at Wrestlemania.

Now people are talking about Shinsuke Nakamura’s performance last week, when Nakamura beat everyone in front of him….until the Bloodline cut him off. Nakamura should be thanking them because they kept Nakamura alive. So now Nakamura wants to fight? Come on now and get ready to leave on a stretcher. Cue Nakamura (with the non-lyric music again) to say if Reigns is the big dog, that makes Uso his little puppy. Nakamura kicks him in the head and bows.

Jey Uso vs. Shinsuke Nakamura

They strike it out to start with Nakamura snapmaring him down and grabbing a headlock. Back up and Uso gets in a shot to the face, followed by a kick to the head to rock Nakamura again. Nakamura comes back and grabs a chinlock….as Cesaro comes down. Uso gets knocked outside and sent into the announcers’ table as we take a break.

Back with Cesaro on commentary as Jey sends Nakamura back inside. Uso stomps away as Cesaro talks about coming out for the save last week after the show was over. The running Umaga attack hits in the corner but Nakamura kicks him down. The knee to the rib puts Uso down again and Nakamura hits the sliding German suplex out of the corner.

Uso is right back with a Samoan drop and a neckbreaker gets two more. Nakamura kicks him away again and hits the middle rope knee for his own two. Kinshasa is blocked with a superkick but the Superfly Splash hits knees. A charge hits post so Uso grabs a rollup with his feet on the rope but gets caught at two (I bought that as the finish). Uso yells at the referee and gets Kinshased for the pin at 12:22.

Rating: B-. These two went back and forth here and they had a good one as a result. The best thing about it was I didn’t know who was going to win until the finish, which is not something you would usually expect from Shinsuke Nakamura vs. Jey Uso. It shows you how far Jey has come, but also how far Nakamura has fallen. Hopefully that can be corrected a bit in the weeks to come, but you never can tell with Nakamura.

Cesaro poses with Nakamura post match.

Sonya Deville goes over the contract with Adam Pearce when Heyman comes in with his own contract. Heyman talks about the opportunity that Pearce has and even says that the stipulations are in Pearce’s favor. If Pearce signs, the match can be No Disqualification. Pearce doesn’t buy the sales pitch but signs anyway, telling Heyman to have Reigns sign as well.

Uso yells at Charles Robinson for messing up the count and threatens him for not doing his job.

The Street Profits are not happy with their loss last week but they are certainly not scared. They held some kind of Tag Team Title for 312 days and they are not going to insult the team that took the titles from him. We hear some of the nicknames they have for Dolph Ziggler and Robert Roode, such as RuDolph and Entertainment Dysfunction, but now they are called champions. The rematch is coming.

Heyman is back in Reigns’ dressing room (with Apollo Crews as well) and isn’t interested in a No DQ match. Instead, he wants a Last Man Standing match. Reigns says then he’ll consider this handled and then starts talking to Crews.

Commentary is confused by Reigns and Crews being friends too.

We recap King Corbin attacking the Mysterios.

Natalya vs. Liv Morgan

Tamina is with Natalya and Billie Kay, in punk rock (I guess?) gear is here with the Riott Squad to sit in on commentary. Morgan sends her into the corner as Kay gives a history of her “mosh pishing”. Natalya gets frustrated and hammers Morgan down into the corner so she can shout about this not being a joke. A small package gives Morgan two but Natalya is back with an over the shoulder backbreaker.

That’s broken up and an enziguri sends Natalya into the corner, setting up some stomping. This also lets commentary bicker about what it means to call Natalya the BOAT, because that’s still a thing. Morgan kicks out of the Sharpshooter and hits the Codebreaker for two. Kay goes over to yell at Tamina and even gets in the ring, with the distraction allowing Natalya to grab a rollup for the pin at 5:45.

Rating: D. This is rapidly becoming one of the dumbest stories on either show at the moment with Kay being annoying as well as causing us to have to watch more Natalya and Tamina. Why we need these women to always have random best friends of the month is beyond me, but in theory this is all leading to an IIconics reunion. As in the team that NEVER SHOULD HAVE BEEN BROKEN UP IN THE FIRST PLACE BUT WWE HAS NO IDEA HOW WOMEN OR TAG TEAMS WORK.

Rey Mysterio vs. King Corbin

Dominick Mysterio is on commentary as Corbin hammers away in the corner to start. Corbin gets in a quick dropkick but is sent outside, where Corbin runs him over with a clothesline. After a shout at Dominick, Corbin takes it back inside and gets frustrated at Rey for kicking out. Corbin punches him down again, shouts down at Dominick, and gets the air in front of his knee dropkicked out.

Rey’s springboard spinning crossbody is pulled out of the air but Rey gets onto his shoulders and scores with a hurricanrana. The 619 is countered into Deep Six for two and Corbin is upset. Rey sends him outside where Corbin decks Dominick, earning himself a 619. That sends Dominick into the post or steps though, which draws him inside to go after Corbin. Rey calls him off but Corbin drives them into each other, setting up the End of Days for the pin on Rey at 5:00.

Rating: C. This is the kind of place that Corbin can be valuable, as this is more about being a bully and causing problems for people without being the big centerpiece. They could be teasing Mysterio vs. Mysterio, though I’m not sure if I want to see that go down. Dominick needs to do something though, because he really doesn’t have anything to him other than being Rey’s son.

Rey looks upset but lets it go.

Heyman and Pearce run into each other again with Heyman pitching the Last Man Standing match. Pearce thinks about it but Heyman says Pearce and Reigns can talk about it in the ring tonight. For now though, Heyman is considering this handled.

Dominick doesn’t like Rey backing down from a giant but Rey says think about this. You don’t pick a fight with someone like Corbin without a plan. He’s a former US Champion! Rey has an idea though.

And now, the debut of Ding Dong Hello with Bayley (in glasses and some kind of sweater and blazer for a change), who says this is already bigger than Wandavision. Her guest is Bianca Belair, who has to come through the stand alone door, complete with doorbell. Belair takes Bayley’s chair and says Bayley has good taste in furniture.

Bayley promises to win the Royal Rumble and shows us a clip of her beating Belair. We hear about the EST name, which seems to annoy Bayley. The challenge for a rematch is thrown down, but Bayley would rather have an obstacle course, which is of course accepted. I can’t stand talk shows, but Bayley was rather funny here with the costume making it that much better.

Earlier today, Daniel Bryan was training with the Alpha Academy and said something about Nakamura. Cesaro came up to say that Bryan isn’t Nakamura’s friend and a match was set for tonight.

Daniel Bryan vs. Cesaro

They start fast with Bryan grabbing the arm and taking it to the arm with an armbar. Some knees to the shoulder keep Cesaro down but he’s right back up with a hard slam for a breather. Bryan is right back with a monkey flip into the ropes, with Cesaro’s head almost landing on Bryan’s. That’s enough to send Cesaro outside, where Bryan takes him down with a dive. Bryan’s big kick to the head hits the post though and we take a break.

Back with Bryan taking Cesaro down into the YES Lock but Cesaro powers out. The Swing sets up the Sharpshooter but Cesaro tries to switch into a Crossface as Bryan reaches for the rope. Bryan reverses that into the YES Lock, sending Cesaro’s foot into the rope for the break. Cesaro is put up top and manages to reverse a superplex into a spinning superplex (ala Kevin Owens) for two, using the good arm in the process. Bryan grabs a backslide for the same and then kicks Cesaro down hard. A quick pop up uppercut drops Bryan though and the Neutralizer finishes Bryan clean at 11:48.

Rating: B-. Well ok then. That’s not the kind of thing I would have expected and while I have little confidence in having Cesaro go anywhere, it is nice to see him getting a chance at least for a night. Odds are this is designed to give Bryan a chip on his shoulder on the way to the Rumble, but I’ll take Cesaro getting a huge win in the process.

Carmella talks trash about Sasha Banks, who runs up to go after her. Reginald gets between them so Banks says Carmella can have her rematch, assuming Sasha can face Reginald first.

Apollo Crews vs. Sami Zayn

Before the match, we see a clip of Paul Heyman giving Crews a pep talk on Talking Smack after last week’s loss to Big E. Heyman told Crews to come back like a man with the Intercontinental Title and it seemed to get Crews’ attention. Sami has his documentary crew with him and Big E., with a fruit cup and a Ghostbusters sweater, is laying on a couch to do commentary.

With all of those details out of the way, Crews dropkicks Sami down to start and tries the Toss Powerbomb but Sami grabs the rope. Sami sends him outside for some shots to the face buts Crews sends him face first into the announcers’ table. There’s a moonsault off of the table to keep Sami in trouble and they head back inside. Crews gets caught on top so Sami can choke away in the corner, followed by a top rope elbow to the head.

A quick German suplex gets Sami out of trouble and there’s a step up enziguri. The standing moonsault hits Sami’s knees though and he grabs a rollup, with trunks, for two (the referees are being attentive tonight). Sami suplexes him into the corner but the Helluva Kick is countered into a rollup with a lot of pants to pin Sami at 3:17.

Rating: C-. I could go for Crews being a new Paul Heyman Guy, as Heyman probably has the time to spread out a bit. That and having Crews as a heel might be the next move for him, as it’s not like anything else he has been doing has been working in recent months. There is something there with him, and a showdown with Big E. could go rather well.

Post match Big E. isn’t pleased, and Crews picking up the Intercontinental Title doesn’t make things better.

Next week: Crews gets an Intercontinental Title shot, plus Bayley vs. Bianca Belair in an obstacle course challenge.

Here are Roman Reigns and company for the contract signing with Adam Pearce. In a nice touch, Pearce comes out with no music, because he really doesn’t have a personality. Pearce sits but Reigns wants his chair. Jey gets Pearce out of the chair to give it to Reigns, because he is sitting at the head of the table. They both sign, with Reigns smirking a lot. Pearce says he has been waiting all night for Reigns to do that, picks up the contract, and leaves.

Pearce starts limping on his way up the ramp, saying it’s an old injury that flare up every now and then. However, all WWE contracts say “card subject to change”, an as a WWE official, Pearce will find a suitable replacement for Reigns. That’s just what he has in mind, so cue Kevin Owens to sign the contract to face Reigns at the Rumble in the Last Man Standing match. Just like Raw has done a few times in recent weeks, the show cuts off during commentary’s closing line. Fair enough on the switch, and it worked well enough as a way to get Owens another match.

Overall Rating: B-. Smackdown is not a perfect show and there are some problem areas up and down the card, but it gets its job done. They are setting up some feuds at varying levels and do enough nice things to keep me interesting. The most important thing is they never come off like they’re trying too hard. Raw has such a bad tendency to try to do some massive angle or story and falling on their face. Smackdown is much more slow and steady, with good ideas that are executed at a higher level. That is what they did here, and the show worked as usual.

Results

Shinsuke Nakamura b. Jey Uso – Kinshasa

Natalya b. Liv Morgan – Rollup

King Corbin b. Rey Mysterio – End of Days

Cesaro b. Daniel Bryan – Neutralizer

Apollo Crews b. Sami Zayn – Rollup with tights

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and check out my Amazon author page with 30 different cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6

AND

Remember to check out Wrestlingrumors.net for all of your wrestling headline needs

Royal Rumble 2004
Date: January 25, 2004
Location: Wachovia Center, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Attendance: 17,289
Commentators: Jim Ross, Michael Cole, Tazz, Jerry Lawler, Jonathan Coachman

It’s a big night and one of the most important shows of the year as we officially start the Road to Wrestlemania. The Royal Rumble is more wide open than in recent years and that’s often the best thing that can happen for the match. Other than that we have a pair of World Title matches, with Raw’s likely being too long and Smackdown’s needing to move on before the company makes itself look worse. Let’s get to it.

The opening video talks about how life’s road is unpredictable and how one turn can change everything. As you might guess, the Last Man Standing match gets the most time and the Rumble itself is mentioned last.

Raw Tag Team Titles: Dudley Boyz vs. Ric Flair/Batista

Flair and Batista are defending and it’s a tables match with Coach on commentary. Before the match, Batista gets in a quick jab at the Dudleys for being the biggest losers since the Philadelphia Eagles. They fight on the floor to start with Batista clotheslining the post by mistake to put the champs in early trouble. In a painful looking impact, Bubba slides a table from one side of the ring to the other, hitting Batista in the ribs to keep him in trouble.

A neckbreaker slows Batista down and D-Von takes him to the floor with a Cactus Clothesline. Flair has Bubba in the corner on a table (that’s so wrong for Flair) but Bubba is right back with the Flip Flop and Fly (that’s more Flair’s speed) Batista comes back in for the save though as I’m glad they’re not wasting time with tags here.

The belly to back suplex/neckbreaker combination puts Batista down as Evolution can’t get much going here. Flair goes up, and in a shocking change of events, Flair gets slammed down. It’s time for the table but cue Coach, with his bad ribs, for the save. That earns him a What’s Up attempt but Flair makes a save of his own. Batista is back in with a spinebuster to put D-Von through a table for the win.

Rating: D-. Just a Raw match designed to get these guys on the show, though I can appreciate them putting the tables match on first and hopefully we don’t get a bunch of chants about wanting tables. Other than that, I see nothing positive about this entire thing. Batista and Flair are fine as champions, but it’s not like they have anyone important to feud against at this point.

Flair says they’ll keep the titles as long as they want.

John Cena raps about how he’s going to win but Rob Van Dam comes in to steal the last rhyme, saying he’ll win the Rumble. Cena makes weed jokes and says Van Dam can suck his candy cane.

There’s an empty chair for Mick Foley, should he bother to show up.

Cruiserweight Title: Rey Mysterio vs. Jamie Noble

Rey is defending and Jamie has the still blind Nidia with him. A 619 attempt in the first ten seconds is countered into a hot shot as Jamie takes over. Cole says that Nidia, who is blind, is looking on as Jamie hiptosses Rey down, earning one heck of a tongue lashing from Tazz. Rey gets in a dropkick and a hurricanrana, followed by the sitout bulldog for two. The tiger driver is broken up and Nidia trips Jamie by mistake, setting up the 619. Rey Drops the Dime to retain in short order.

Rating: D. Well don’t bother wasting time I guess. This was barely three minutes long and they didn’t have time to do anything. Nidia’s interference was the most important part of the match and that took all of two seconds. These two are talented but they need more time than a run of the mill women’s match from this era to get anywhere.

We recap Eddie Guerrero vs. Chavo Guerrero Jr. They were a successful team but Eddie got way more popular, sending Chavo into a jealous rage when the team stopped doing as well. Chavo went nuts, blaming Eddie for all of their problems and bringing in his father to turn it into more of a family affair, even as Kurt Angle tried to play peacekeeper. This is one of the few stories that is going to work every single time and both of them have sold it exceptionally well, turning it into the best thing going on in WWE at the moment.

Eddie Guerrero vs. Chavo Guerrero Jr.

Chavo has his father with him. They fight over a hard lockup to start until Chavo slaps the taste out of Eddie’s mouth. A fired up Eddie shoves him into the corner but can’t bring himself to follow up because his heart is broken. He’s willing to take Chavo down into a chinlock but Chavo is right back up for a chop in the corner. Eddie chops him back and gives the first smile of the match. Some shoulders put Eddie down and Chavo is very pleased with his early success.

That just earns him a poke to the eye as the stalling continues. Eddie takes him down again but Chavo pops up in short order and hooks a hurricanrana to put them both on the floor. With Chavo back inside, his dad sends Eddie face first into the steps (Tazz: “I guess he doesn’t like his little brother.”) to give Chavo the first real advantage. Back in and Eddie grabs a cross armbreaker but can’t get it all the way on. Chavo scores with a belly to back suplex but the tornado DDT is broken up. Eddie rolls the suplexes and drops the frog splash for the win.

Rating: C. It was good while it lasted but it should have lasted about twice as long. This was a big time story on Smackdown and it ended in a match that was about half as long as the Smackdown main event. I’m assuming they’re setting Eddie up for something bigger down the line and they needed to get this out of the way, but this deserved more time.

Post match Eddie gets fired up for the first time and beats up both Chavos. Sr. gets tied to the bottom rope by the tie while Jr. gets stomped in the corner, busting him open in the process. They did a good job here with Eddie wanting to hold in his emotions during the match but being pushed too far after and finally erupting.

Chris Benoit is ready to go in at #1 when Evolution comes in with their champagne to celebrate. Flair says Benoit is the best technical wrestler alive and all man but the brass ring always slips out of his hand. It’s all about Evolution holding all of the gold so Benoit is always going to be second best.

We recap the Smackdown World Title match with Brock Lesnar defending against Hardcore Holly. Lesnar broke Holly’s neck back in 2002 and since we must go with real life instead of something, you know, interesting, we’ve been stuck watching Lesnar run from Holly for the last month. This is possibly the most ice cold title match in history as Holly is little more than a former comedy guy with a bad attitude who is ranting about wanting to break Lesnar’s neck. Lesnar can beat up Kurt Angle and Chris Benoit, but Hardcore Holly suddenly scares him? That’s what we’re going with here?

Smackdown World Title: Brock Lesnar vs. Hardcore Holly

Lesnar is defending and Holly jumps him before the bell. The champ gets posted twice in a row and the bell rings with Holly on the apron, only to miss a top rope clothesline. Lesnar scores with a suplex as the referee is getting in the way more than usual here. A ram into the apron gives Lesnar two and it’s off to a waistlock on the mat. What would eventually be called a Shell Shock gives Lesnar two as this is a complete squash so far.

It’s back to the waistlock as you can hear the limited interest the fans had seeping out of the arena. A bearhug sets up a suplex and it’s right back to a head and arm choke. Holly fights up with some kicks to the ribs and clotheslines, followed by the Alabama Slam….for no cover as it’s off to that stupid full nelson. The hold stays on even as they fall to the floor so Holly tries it again with Lesnar on the apron. That earns him a neck snap across the top and the F5 retains the title.

Rating: F. Oh give me a break. Lesnar was never in danger here and in the six and a half minutes they had, at least half of it was Lesnar keeping him on the mat in a hold. Holly’s finisher, while fine for beating a midcarder here and there, is nowhere near enough to be a real threat to Lesnar. Thank goodness they didn’t tease a bunch of near falls and just got out of there, because this was a bad idea from the beginning.

We’re not even 52 minutes into the show and we’ve covered four matches, including three title matches. That’s a ridiculous pace, even for a Royal Rumble.

We recap Shawn Michaels vs. HHH, which they’re billing as seven years in the making. So we’re counting all of the four and a half years Shawn was on the shelf and the months long feud they had in 2002? They’ve traded wins and the title until Shawn got a pin on the last show of 2003, albeit with his own shoulders on the mat. Therefore it’s a Last Man Standing match tonight, which somehow ties into everything else they’ve ever done, including the most recent match, which is barely discussed.

Raw World Title: HHH vs. Shawn Michaels

HHH is defending and it’s Last Man Standing. They fight over a lockup to start until Shawn gets the better of a chop off. It’s time for a mat sequence with Shawn loading up a backslide, only to let it go when he realizes what kind of match they’re having. One heck of a whip into the corner starts n on Shawn’s back, which is still a target six years after it was originally hurt.

Shawn is right back up with a Figure Four but HHH turns it over for the break. That’s enough of the wrestling so it’s time to head outside with HHH loading up the announcers’ table. A suplex through the table is broken up and Shawn ax handles him in the head. Back in and a backdrop puts HHH on the floor again but Shawn’s springboard spinning crossbody only hits table in a big crash.

Shawn is busted open (of course he is) and we get a replay, showing that Shawn would have cleared HHH by two feet even if HHH had stood in place. Back in again and the very bloody Shawn won’t stay down, instead telling HHH to bring it on. Right hands get a seven and a spinebuster gives HHH eight more. It’s chair time and a hard shot to the back gets nine this time. The Pedigree on the chair is countered into a slingshot into the corner, followed by Shawn’s own chair shot to the face.

Back up and the forearm into the nip up have the bloody HHH in trouble. The top rope elbow looks to set up Sweet Chin Music but HHH cuts him off with a low blow. Back up and Shawn grabs a sleeper, which lasts as long as a sleeper is going to in a match like this. HHH’s DDT gets eight so he loads up a belly to back superplex, which is countered into a spinning crossbody for a double knockdown. The Pedigree gets nine and Shawn hits Sweet Chin Music, good for a double knockout and a draw.

Rating: C-. Well of course we need to see these two fight again. You wouldn’t expect HHH and Shawn Michaels to wrap up their feud in just two matches right? This wasn’t very good with just an exchange of moves and nothing that went anywhere, though the blade jobs were both quite nasty looking. I’m sure we’ll see these two again, but these two will likely be fighting in their retirement home.

The fans are NOT pleased with the draw and I can’t say I blame them. HHH is taken out on a stretcher but Shawn insists on walking.

Video on the Royal Rumble, which really just shows the names involved. Chris Benoit is in at #1 and Goldberg is in at #30.

The Fink is ready to start the introductions but here’s Eric Bischoff to promise that Raw will win the match. He runs down Paul Heyman’s abilities to run shows in Bingo halls, in a line that has to have been repeated a thousand times now. Ignore that WCW officially went out of business before ECW (on an extreme technicality but it was still officially in business after WCW was purchased). Heyman tackles Bischoff but here’s Steve Austin on the ATV to say they’re both in violation of the law. Stunners abound and beer is consumed. I’m so glad they spent five minutes on this when four matches got less than twenty two minutes combined.

Goldberg is asked about being #30 in the Royal Rumble when Brock comes in to wonder where his interview is. Brock asks where Goldberg’s title is but Goldberg says it’s coming back at Wrestlemania. Goldberg suggests Brock is a coward.

Foley still isn’t here.

Royal Rumble

JR and Tazz are on commentary, thankfully giving us a standard booth instead of the usual mess that these things have become. Tazz even has keys to victory: hide, stamina, get a high number. I’ve heard worse analysis so I’ll take what I can get. Chris Benoit is in at #1 and Randy Orton is in at #2 and we have ninety second intervals. Benoit gets aggressive to start (ignoring key to victory #2) and scores with a suplex but gets uppercutted into the corner.

Mark Henry is in at #3 and shoves Benoit down so he can choke Orton in the corner. The clock seems to get a little faster as Tajiri is in at #4 and gets suplexed down for his efforts. Henry throws Orton ribs first onto the top rope and everyone pounds away as Bradshaw is in at #5. Clotheslines abound until Benoit pulls him into the Crossface and gets him out in less than a minute. Well at least they’re keeping the ring at a manageable number. Rhyno is in at #6 and goes after Orton and Benoit as Tajiri kicks away at Henry.

Tajiri can’t get the Tarantula so Rhyno Gores Henry, eliminating Tajiri in the process. Benoit dumps Henry and we’re already down to three. They fight by the ropes and it’s Matt Hardy in at #7. There’s a Side Effect to Rhyno but Benoit knocks Matt to the apron. Matt gets back in and everyone pummels everyone until Scott Steiner is in at #8. Benoit rolls some German suplexes on Steiner as JR gives us the good stat of there being no former Rumble winners in this match.

Matt Morgan is in at #9 as the ring is starting to fill up. A helicopter bomb plants Benoit and there’s a big boot to Hardy. It’s back to the exchange of forearms around the ring with no one going for an elimination until Hurricane is in at #10. Before I can recap who is in the match, Morgan tosses Hurricane in short order, leaving us with Benoit, Orton, Rhyno, Hardy, Steiner and Morgan. Morgan throws Hardy to the apron but not out as Steiner lays on Orton in the middle of the ring.

Booker T. is in at #11 to a nice reaction but also to a really annoying song. An ax kick has Orton in trouble and Steiner is thrown out off camera (in his last match with the company) as Kane is in at #12. Benoit and Morgan both get chokeslams and the Gore and RKO are both blocked. Kane starts beating on Matt in the corner…..and a gong strikes at #13. As expected, Kane freaks out and the distraction lets Booker throw him out. It’s actually Spike Dudley in at #13 so Kane beats him up in the aisle, both for the gong and for Spike upsetting Kane on Monday. Things settle down and it’s Rikishi in at #14.

Benoit dumps Rhyno and Orton gets a Stinkface as the fans aren’t exactly interested, probably due to the gong taking some of their interest away. They’re certainly not burning up the pace for eliminations here but that’s not the worst thing in the world. Rene Dupree is in at #15 to get us to the halfway point. He dropkicks Hardy out but turns into a superkick from Rikishi to get eliminated as well.

A-Tran is in at #16 and goes after Rikishi as Benoit ducks Morgan’s charge to get rid of him. Orton dumps out Rikishi and Booker in the span of a few seconds, leaving us with Benoit, Orton and A-Train. Benoit eliminates A-Train as Shelton Benjamin is in at #17. Benjamin slugs away as JR completely missed A-Train’s elimination. How do you not notice the 6’8 350lb bald guy being gone? Orton dumps Shelton and we’re down to two again. To be fair, other than Kane and maybe Booker, none of the other entrants are worth anything so far. Lamont runs out to introduce Ernest Miller at #18 and Tazz loves the song.

Benoit tosses Lamont and Orton does the same to Miller so these two can keep slugging it out. Kurt Angle is in at #19 and now things can pick up a bit. Benoit and Angle go at it (of course) while Orton is smart enough to just chill in the corner. Angle has Benoit in trouble on the ropes but Orton makes a rather questionable save. Rico is in at #20 and goes after Orton, who dropkicks him almost immediately. A kick to the head rocks Orton though, leaving Benoit to roll some German suplexes on Angle. Orton dumps Rico with ease and it’s Test…..not in at #21.

We cut to the back where Test is unconscious. Austin sees who did it and makes that person #21 instead. In the arena, MICK FOLEY is #21 and Orton knows he’s about to die. Foley slugs him down in the corner, throws up a BANG BANG and hits the running knee in the corner. The Cactus Clothesline gives us a double elimination and it’s down to Benoit vs. Angle. Foley isn’t done with Orton and sends him into the steps as Christian is in at #22.

Orton gets in a few wicked chair shots to Foley and punches him down before slamming Foley’s head into the ramp. Some right hands get Foley out of trouble and it’s Mr. Socko but Foley has to give it to Nunzio, who comes in at #23. The distraction lets Orton get in a low blow and run off after a great angle that makes me want to see these two have a heck of a fight. Back in the ring, Christian can’t get rid of Angle or Benoit so Angle suplexes Benoit instead. Benoit is the only one standing as Big Show is in at #24.

Show starts fast with the overhand chops and throws some Canadians around until Chris Jericho is in at #25 to a very nice reaction. Jericho and Christian stomp on Angle in the corner until Show makes a save with a double noggin knocker. How old school of him. Everyone goes after Show so he shrugs them off and Charlie Haas is in at #26. Christian tries to turn on Jericho but gets dumped out instead, which just fits for Christian for some reason. Billy Gunn returns at #27 and hits some Fameassers but can’t get rid of anyone.

John Cena is in at #28 to a very nice reaction and you can feel the star power growing every night. Cena catches Nunzio sitting on the floor and throws him inside as the ring is starting to get too full. For some reason Nunzio goes after Show, earning himself that hard shot to the back. Rob Van Dam is in at #29 and can’t get rid of Show either. Cena gives Angle an FU and here’s Goldberg in at #30 to complete the field. I’m not going to bother saying who all is in there because we’re about to lose a bunch of them.

Goldberg wrecks everyone and tosses Haas, Gunn and Nunzio (after an insane spear). That leaves us with Benoit, Angle, Show, Jericho, Cena, Van Dam and Goldberg for a heck of a final group. Goldberg loads up the Jackhammer on Show but here’s Lesnar to jump him from behind, allowing Angle to dump Goldberg, who is busy seething at Lesnar. Show shrugs off the masses again but Angle chop blocks him, which isn’t the brightest idea. That means a Lionsault, a Five Star, a Shuffle and a Swan Dive but Show is unconscious on the mat. Real smart guys.

Show fights up and dumps Cena, who lands VERY awkwardly on his knee. Van Dam is gone too and we’re down to Jericho, Big Show, Angle and Benoit. Jericho goes after Show’s knee and bulldogs Show now, which has done so well against him already. The Walls make Show tap but Jericho lets him go. That’s not the brightest move in the world and Show makes him pay with a chokeslam over the top for an elimination. A regular chokeslam drops Benoit so Angle gets the Angle Slam on Show.

Benoit gets one as well and now it’s the ankle lock to make Show tap again. Show gets up and muscles Angle out as well, leaving us with two. With Show hanging over the top rope, Benoit hits the Swan Dive to the back of his head, accidentally bringing Show back in. The chokeslam is countered into the Crossface to make Show tap for the third time.

A side slam gets Show out of trouble as we hear about Benoit getting close to Ric Flair’s longevity record. Show loads up a gorilla press but Benoit pulls him down into a guillotine, even as Show puts him on the apron. Benoit pulls him down and slides back inside as Show goes out, giving Benoit the big win.

Rating: A. It’s one of the best Rumbles ever, mainly due to Benoit. There was some great storytelling near the end, with Jericho and Angle both making Show tap but then making some kind of a mistake to get eliminated while Benoit was smart/determined enough to make it work in the end. The same thing happens when the big groups try to get Show out and Benoit does it on his own, showing how technique and determination are better than brute strength. It kept you wondering if Benoit could finally win the big one and that’s what they managed to pull off in a great story throughout the whole match.

Other than that, they did a great job of not letting the ring get too full save for near the end, which Goldberg took care of in short order. Pacing is often such a problem in these things and it’s very nice to see them get it right. They had a big angle with Foley and Orton too, giving it something besides the winner to go off of from here. Finally, there were multiple possible winners, which always makes for a better match than having one or two people be the only ones who could win. Great Rumble, and one of the best of all time.

JR loses it praising Benoit, who smiles (a rare thing for him) to end the show.

Overall Rating: C. The Rumble is always a unique show as it’s the only one where one match can really save the whole thing, as the main event is often at least a third of the show. The problem is the rest of the show was so bad due to the matches either being rushed or being HHH vs. Shawn in their annual attempt at an epic match that it’s hard to call this good overall. Really though, the Rumble itself is more than enough to carry it, but on any other card of the year this would have been a disaster.

Here’s the original review if you’re interested:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2011/01/23/royal-rumble-count-up-2004-he-who-must-not-be-named/

And the 2013 redo:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2013/01/18/royal-rumble-count-up-2013-redo-2004-they-couldnt-wait-any-longer/

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s Complete 2004 Monday Night Raw Reviews (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/08/26/new-book-and-e-book-kbs-complete-2004-monday-night-raw-reviews/

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6

Royal sRumble 2004
Date: January 25, 2004
Location: Wachovia Center, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Attendance: 17,289
Commentators: Michael Cole, Tazz, Jerry Lawler, Jim Ross, Jerry Lawler

Raw Tag Titles: Dudley Boys vs. Evolution

Rating: D. This match fell into the same trap that all bad tables matches fall into: the dull set of spots that fail until one works for the win. You rarely get something that gets around this through sheer carnage such as the match at the 2000 Rumble, but this was just terrible. I have no idea what they were going for here as the fans were disappointed and they only had four and a half minutes to get into it. Also: real smart WWE. This is the right way to start a show in Philadelphia: have some of the most famous ECW guys ever lose.

Cena raps about winning the Rumble when RVD comes in to steal the joke. Weed jokes are made. Josh Matthews looks like the king of all tools here.

Cruiserweight Title: Rey Mysterio vs. Jamie Noble

Noble yells at Nidia post match.

Eddie Guerrero vs. Chavo Guerrero

Back to the mat with Eddie working on the arm before Chavo nips up and hooks a rana to send them both to the floor. Chavo sends Eddie into the announce table to finally take over and get some of the aggression going. Back in and they get into a kind of MMA style brawl on the mat until Eddie hooks a cross armbreaker of all things. That goes nowhere so Chavo suplexes Eddie down for two, followed by the Three Amigos. Eddie counters a tornado DDT and hits Three Amigos of his own. Chavo is down so Eddie goes up and hits the Frog Splash for the pin. ANOTHER quick ending tonight.

Rating: C+. This was way better than the other matches, but this felt like it was missing fifteen minutes or so. Three matches so far have combined to be about fifteen minutes long which is pretty lame for a modern PPV, even for the Rumble. This could have been a lot more, but the feud was completely done after tonight. Eddie would become #1 contender on the following Smackdown.

Eddie destroys Chavo post match in a pretty heelish display. Chavo gets busted open.

Smackdown World Title: Brock Lesnar vs. Hardcore Holly

Raw World Title: Shawn Michaels vs. HHH

Out of nowhere Shawn takes out the leg and hooks a Figure Four, because where would we be without a Flair tribute? That gets a five count so Shawn hits a chop block for a four. HHH low bridges Shawn and we head to the floor for a bit. HHH loads up the announce table but Shawn blocks a Pedigree attempt. They slug it out on the table with HHH getting knocked to the floor, drawing a bunch of booing from the bloodthirsty Philadelphia fans.

Rumble video with a focus on Benoit.

Royal Rumble

The handspring elbow takes Orton down but Benoit rolls some Germans on Tajiri to take him down. Tajiri only gets two as I guess Benoit is conserving strength. Henry throws Orton to the apron but stops looking like an idiot. Bradshaw is #5 and he immediately clotheslines down everyone not named Benoit. Benoit takes offense to being left out and puts Bradshaw in the Crossface before pulling Bradshaw out. Eh he would get a nine month title reign stating in the summer so I feel no sympathy for him.

Everyone tries to throw each other out while laying on the ropes until Rikishi is #14. Benoit dumps Rhyno to keep us at six people (Benoit, Orton, Rikishi, Booker, Morgan, Hardy) in the ring. Morgan gets a Stinkface and nothing else happens for a bit. Renee Dupree with the French Tickler is #15. In a surprising moment, Dupree actually knocks Matt out, only to be superkicked out by Rikishi a second later.

Ratings Comparison

Evolution vs. Dudley Boys

Original: C

Redo: D

Rey Mysterio vs. Jamie Noble

Original: N/A

Redo: D+

Chavo Guerrero vs. Eddie Guerero

Original: C+

Redo: C+

Brock Lesnar vs. Hardcore Holly

Original: D-

Redo: D

HHH vs. Shawn Michaels

Original: C+

Redo: C-

Royal Rumble

Original: A

Redo: A

Overall Rating

Original: C+

Redo: B-

Just as last time, the Rumble is the only thing worth seeing.

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2011/01/23/royal-rumble-count-up-2004-he-who-must-not-be-named/

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s Complete 2004 Monday Night Raw Reviews (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/08/26/new-book-and-e-book-kbs-complete-2004-monday-night-raw-reviews/

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6

Royal Rumble 2004
Date: January 25, 2004
Location: Wachovia Center, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Attendance: 17,289
Commentators: Jim Ross, Jerry Lawler, Tazz, Michael Cole, Jonathan Coachman

So another year has passed and the only real change is that Evolution is running wild on Raw. Yeah, HHH is champion again, Benoit is still having great matches but getting nowhere with them, Brock still owns the world, and the Dudleys are still the only tag team worth a thing. The levels of similarity between the two shows astounds me. Oh and Cena is now a face. Yeah that’s all I’ve got.

This really was a show that doesn’t mean much in the history of the company because nothing much happens. Shawn and HHH are going to have another classic in their endless series and Lesnar is having a match with Hardcore Holly of all people. Let that sink in for a bit before we start this up.

Naturally the opening video is about Shawn and HHH, because, you know, they’re more important than the match the show is named after. The whole thing is about roads which is fine but geez, could you be a bit more subtle next time? I didn’t really get what you were trying to talk about here.

Raw Tag Titles: Dudley Boys vs. Ric Flair/Batista

This is in the Evolution period so Flair thinks he’s a Horseman still I guess. It’s a tables match so at least we don’t have to worry about it lasting long. Evolution came in as champions here after having the belts stolen from them a month before. Oh and they’re 17 time champions here. They put Coach through a table on Raw in a pointless segment. Oh dang it they gave Batista a mic. Who thought this was a good idea at this point in his career?

The fight is on in the aisle, and I think Flair is on the verge of bleeding already. In a cool spot, Bubba is on one side of the ring and gets a table out. He slides it across the ring and it hits Batista on the floor on the other side of the ring. That was impressive. Seeing Dave with a lot of hair is just amusing. Flair is told to suck on that by Bubba which is an image I never want again. We go to a completely ranomd shot over the shoulders of the announcers. What the heck was the point of that?

The Dudleys hit that reverse neckbreaker that is always called a 3D by idiotic fans in the crowd. Shockingly, Flair is slammed off the top rope. Coach leaves for no apparent reason as Flair is about to get a 3D. He almost gets the What’s Up but Flair stops it. Batista puts D-Von through a table to end it. That was incredibly pointless.

Rating: C. It’s four and a half minutes long. How much of a rating could I actually give this thing? It was a way to give Evolution a bit more credibility as champions and that’s what it did. They lost them to RVD and Booker a few weeks later but whatever. This was fine for an opener I guess.

We go to the back and I have to take a break for a minute as Josh Matthews looks like a cross between Vanilla Ice and….something not meant to be crossed with Vanilla Ice. I mean it’s just hilarious. Anyway, he’s with Cena who is a face now but he still raps. RVD interrupts him in a bizarre cameo. Cena was getting there but he wasn’t quite there yet.

We see a chair that’s reserved for Foley. This is in the middle of the angle where he was afraid of Orton and refused to fight him.

Cruiserweight Title: Rey Mysterio vs. Jamie Noble

Talk about two careers that have gone in completely opposite directions since this. Rey comes out first for no apparent reason. If Noble’s music was any more generic it would be off an American Idol winner’s CD. Oh yeah and Nidia, Noble’s girlfriend, has been blinded by Tajiri. It’s a fake, and if that surprises you I have to wonder why you’re here. Apparently Noble has been using her to help him win matches without her knowing about it.

Cole gets in the flat out stupid line of “Nidia looking on”. Cole, you are a plague upon mankind. Even Tazz calls him out for saying something stupid. How bad does that tell you he is? Nidia trips Noble “by mistake” and Rey gets a 619 and drops the dime for the win. Yeah that’s really all that happened. It’s a 3 minute match.

Rating: N/A. There’s more or less nothing here to grade so I can’t do it justice. The angle was stupid though and this is kind of insulting to the crusierweights. They give them 3 minutes for their title? Seriously, what’s the point in even having them out there? This was stupid and is a great example of why this division is considered a freaking joke.

So Chavo can’t stand Eddie because he’s jealous or something stupid like that.

Eddie Guerrero vs. Chavo Guerrero Jr.

I put Jr. because Chavo Sr. is with Chavo here. This was right before Eddie turned into the mega face and would become the most overrated wrestler in recent history. Yes Eddie was great, but you would think he was the second coming of Lou Thesz based on how much praise he got all of a sudden. He’s mad over here but still it’s annoying considering they’re still using his name in angles now.

Now in case you didn’t know that they grew up more or less as brothers, they’re going to let you know for the first time in the first two minutes. That should only be mentioned about 15 more times in the match. Oh and apparently Chavo hates Eddie now. I get that we have faces vs. heels, but this pro-Eddie stuff from Cole here is driving me insane. SHUT UP ALREADY. WE GET IT. In a funny spot, Chavo does Eddie’s dance thing and Eddie just flips him off. That was great.

Oh Eddie refuses to punch too. Chavo Sr., who is Eddie’s brother in case you can’t remember the family tree in your head, trips him to give Chavo the advantage. Since Chavo pales in the shadows of Eddie though, that lasts all of a second. Chavo steals Eddie’s sequence of moves, so Eddie follows it up by doing the exact same sequence. This allows for the frog splash to end it. That was just pointless. Eddie follows it up with a long beatdown of both Chavos to fill in some time.

Rating: C+. The wrestling here was quite good, but I still don’t get what was accomplished here. Eddie was just treading water at this point until less than a week later when he was launched into being number one contender for the Smackdown Title in a battle royal. This ended this mini feud so I guess that’s the point it served. I never liked Eddie vs. Chavo for some reason, but the wrestling was very solid.

Buy Mick Foley’s Greatest Hits and Misses. No you really should as it’s a cool set.

Benoit is in the back with Josh Matthews but Flair and Evolution interrupt him. If anyone can explain to me logically why Benoit was never made into the next big star of the Horsemen in WCW, I’ll get you a ham sandwich. They talk about Benoit being unable to win the big one, which more or less gives away the ending to the Rumble.

Since apparently I murdered a baby in a past life or something, we recap Bob Holly vs. Lesnar. It’s an even numbered year so it’s time to push him again. Holly fought Lesnar in 2002 and Lesnar messed up a powerbomb and it broke Holly’s neck. That apparently is what it takes for him to get a title shot. Holly kept jumping Brock and trying to hurt him with a full nelson. Yes, Hardcore Holly is getting a title shot at the Royal freaking Rumble. Just take me now.

Smackdown World Title: Brock Lesnar vs. Hardcore Holly

They announce Holly and that this is for the WWE Title and I expect Chimmel to just break up laughing. I mean seriously how could you keep a straight face announcing that? It’s amazing to think that Lesnar would be done with the WWE in three months. Holly jumps him before the match starts so the bell rings while Holly is waiting on Brock to get up. He misses a cross body, meaning that he was in control for all of two seconds of this match.

After that, it’s all Brock. I mean literally, four minutes have passed and Holly has been on defense since then. Tazz and Cole are really trying to make this sound like a legit match. They even say that Holly might be pound for pound the strongest guy in the company. That’s just completely stupid. Hey there’s offense! It’s a head slap and two punches and he’s down again. Also most of this is Brock with Holly on the mat in a hold.

He gets a slightly longer one here, even hitting his finisher, the Alabama Slam (think of a guy going for a sunset flip but not getting over and the guy he’s using it on grabbing his legs and slamming him back down to the mat). Naturally though he doesn’t cover but goes for the stupid submission and since that doesn’t work, the F5 ends this in like 6 minutes.

Rating: D-. This was a squash on PPV for the title. I can get the idea of having a throwaway feud that ends at the Rumble to set up the real feud at Mania, but this was just a waste of time. Serious, HARDCORE HOLLY is the best you can do? You couldn’t throw someone like Cena in there for a quick feud and title match that went 12 minutes or so? Vince loved Holly for some reason and refused to quit pushing him until he finally woke up and fired him.

We’re four matches into a six match card. The longest match so far: Eddie vs. Chavo at eight minutes and three seconds. I know I complain about PPVs being too much like a TV show but this is ridiculous.

HHH and Shawn are getting ready for their title match tonight. Of course it’s seven years in the making despite them feuding extensively since then. Basically this time Shawn had gotten a title shot in his home town and pinned HHH, but his shoulders were down too so HHH kept the belt.

That’s a great match that you should check out which I believe is on the Heartbreak and Triumph DVD. They go through the usual whining about HHH taking Shawn’s spot after the injury and I want to beat myself with a rock. This highlight package literally goes on for almost four minutes. WE GET IT.

Raw World Title: Shawn Michaels vs. HHH

This is last man standing. From the beginning of the recap package to the bell was about seven and a half minutes. Shawn is finally back to looking like a pro wrestler instead of looking like a tiny man that he was in the Elimination Chamber. What’s the deal with announcers always misusing the word literally? Monsoon said they were literally hanging from the rafters and Lawler says they’re literally beating the tar out of each other. No, not really.

Ross follows that up with a line saying that Michaels made a calculated mistake. I just shake my head and move on. In a shocking turn of events, HHH works on Shawn’s back. Lawler goes on a limb and says that Shawn’s back might be healed SIX YEARS AFTER HE HURT IT. I love how they try to make it sound like Shawn left and then HHH was a big deal the next day. In reality it took about a year for him to get to the big time and another year and the Rock before anyone took him seriously.

Shawn hooks on a figure four and Ross manages to plug the recently released Flair DVD. If anyone has ever been a better or more hardworking salesman than Vince McMahon, I want to meet them and buy something from them. We’re already seeing the problem that exists in every Last Man Standing match: the first fifteen minutes or so mean nothing.

You can go do something else while waiting on that part to end. There will be some decent spots, but it’s simply not going to end during that amount of time. We move to the let’s dodge each other’s finishers which is clichéd but fine I guess.

Shawn goes to the apron and tries a reverse springboard cross body to the floor but eats table in a good looking spot. Since it’s a big match, Shawn is bleeding. I know he emulates Flair but come on now. Hey let’s get a chair since we haven’t had enough violence so far. Naturally Shawn is up in time because we haven’t had the big face comeback yet. In case you can’t tell, I’m not thrilled by this match. It’s ok, but nothing great.

Shawn blocks a Pedigree and slingshots HHH in front of the turnbuckle so HHH can jump to hit the post. Shawn kills him with the chair for an eight or so. Both guys are bleeding. Shawn nips up and the fans are into this if nothing else. He initiates his ending sequence which is just like what Bret Hart would do even though he’s nothing like Bret Hart right?

For the life of me, if Shawn wants to hit a big kick, WHY DOES HE STOMP THE MAT WHILE THE OTHER GUY IS GETTING UP??? That’s just freaking STUPID. Oh come on now. After Shawn gets low blowed, he hooks a sleeper. While it’s psychologically a good move, it’s the best way possible to kill a crowd dead. This match has been 80% punching and chopping.

This match is going on, but all of the clichéd spots like the long double count are just getting annoying as all goodness. A Pedigree puts Shawn down again. He gets up and since he just took a big finisher he’s able to hit Sweet Chin Music out of nowhere, because you know, that’s perfectly reasonable. This leads to a double count out which gets booed out of the freaking building.

This caused Shawn to be completely ridiculous and consistently demand that he get a title shot and generally coming off like a total whiny little troll. This is why Shawn was in the Mania main event, and yes, I think it had a lot to do with HHH making sure that his buddy got to main event ANOTHER Mania and kept him from having to job to Benoit clean, but you’ve heard more than enough rants about that.

Rating: C+. This match felt like it was missing the middle part. It felt like 18 minutes of the feeling out process and then we shifted to the finish for about five minutes. The double count out thing I couldn’t stand but at least they had a plan for these two moving forward.

The problem though is that it’s just Shawn vs. HHH. This feud went on forever and while it’s a big match, it’s been done. That’s the thing: it’s just more of HHH only making his buddy look good instead of just allowing him to lay down for Benoit at Mania like he should have. It’s not bad, but once you think about it the match loses some luster.

We go to a long video package about the Rumble, mainly focusing on Benoit which completely gives away the winner. He’s number one and Goldberg is number 30. Yeah that’s about it.

Austin, Heyman and Bischoff get together. Hilarity ensues.

Brock and Goldberg look at each other. I think Goldberg wants to go get some coffee.

Royal Rumble

As mentioned, Benoit is first and Orton is number 2. Tazz and Ross are doing the commentary tonight and Orton is the IC Champion here. These two would headline Summerslam in about 7 months in a great match which led to Orton’s horribly botched face turn. GEEZ Orton looks different here as he more or less was all clean cut like some college kid. Compare that to what you see now and you’ll be amazed.

I’m not sure if I like this style of the Rumble. I like having bigger names in at the beginning, but they couldn’t have made it clearer that Benoit was winning if they put the WM 20 poster on the mat for this. I like these hard hitting people if nothing else. Henry is 3rd as I think the intervals are two minutes or so. Teddy Long is managing Henry here which means more or less nothing. After about a minute, Tajiri is 4th. I know this because there’s a graphic in the corner that says Tajiri 4th.

He and Benoit do some sweet looking technical stuff. Bradshaw is 5th and somehow he would be world champion in 6 months. He clotheslines everyone but Benoit who pulls him into a crossface. Bradshaw picks him up and tries to dump him but Benoit holds on and pulls Bradshaw out. Rhyno is 6th here as the intervals are actually staying pretty close to accurate here.

Tajiri puts Henry in the Tarantula but Rhyno gores Henry to knock Tajiri out. That’s actually pretty creative and I liked it. Benoit puts Henry out by just running into him a few times to a solid pop. It was bigger last year but we’re not going to speak of that. Oh Henry took some mist according to a replay to cause him to be in the Tarantula. Matt Hardy is seventh. We now have Benoit, Orton, Rhyno and Hardy in there. Hardy is a face here I think. Yeah he’s getting pops.

I just don’t think he means anything as a singles guy, which would date this show as sometime between 2001 and the present. The two successful singles guys and the two lesser so successful singles guys are together. In at eight is Scott Steiner who means more or less nothing at this point. He dominates for the most part with amazingly enough, more suplexes. In an amusing moment, Benoit is just like boy please and starts throwing Steiner around with them.

Ross points out something interesting by saying that no one in this Rumble has won before. Again, that’s the point of an announcer. Lines like that can do a lot as far as elevating a match. Number 9 is MATT FREAKING MORGAN! They know he’s awesome even here where he’s been around all of a few months. Even WWE bills him as 7’0 tall even though he’s about 6’8. He puts Benoit down with a huge power bomb though.

They refer to him as a rookie here so he hasn’t been around long. I know he came out of nowhere at SS 03 and then left around Mania before coming back as Carlito’s bodyguard. Hurricane is tenth. Morgan throws him out in a few seconds and he lands really badly on his leg and might be legit hurt. He almost puts out Hardy who makes a nice save.

Morgan just looks at him while he comes back in which just looks stupid. Booker is 11th and is apparently a favorite to win this? He has a bad rap version of his theme song. He and Steiner go at it and we get a WCW reference. Benoit and Morgan just sounds like a TNA dream match. Ross says that Benoit is still alive somehow. That’s a creepy line. Morgan has shrunk to 6’10 apparently but grows back to 6’11 before Kane is in at 12.

Steiner goes out off camera thanks to Booker. Morgan either has lifts in his shoes or something is weird about his height as he’s almost Kane’s size. They do a smart thing though and spin the camera angles a lot while they’re fighting though. As a recap, we have Benoit, Orton, Rhyno (who gores Hardy as I say that for his first noticeable anything in about 10 minutes), Hardy, Morgan, Booker and Kane.

Of those seven, three would be in TNA within four years. That’s either saying a lot or nothing at all and I’m not sure which. Kane is the only person up as the clock goes down to zero. The lights go out and a gong sounds. To say the crowd pops is an understatement. Kane had buried Taker alive (again) back at Survivor Series. Only in wrestling would that make perfect sense.

That had ended the biker gimmick as Taker would come back as the Dead Man at Mania to face Kane in a glorified squash match. Kane is distracted and Booker puts him out. Spike comes out as number 13 and never gets in the ring. You figure out why not. Rikishi is in at 14 after about a minute of waiting. Benoit puts out Rhyno as Rikishi gets in. Morgan gets a stink face as he must be counting the days to getting to TNA. Tazz mentions that Benoit is hanging in there, which sent a chill up my spine.

Less than 75 seconds later, Renee Dupree is number 15. He actually puts Matt Hardy out with relative ease. That’s surprising if nothing else. Rikishi puts him out a few seconds later. A-Train is in at 16 as he must be about gone from the company at this point. Yeah he would be gone in November after getting hurt in the summer. Benoit puts Morgan out. Orton puts out Booker and Rikishi in about 15 seconds. That’s not bad at all.

Benoit puts out A-Train just as Shelton gets in at number 17. A-Train goes over the ropes and to the floor, and Tazz says that he thinks A-Train is out and I shake my head. Orton puts out Shelton and we’re back to where we started out. Both are down as a guy in a fake afro comes out to introduce Ernest Miller at 18. This was one of the dumbest signings ever as Miller was barely over in WCW so he got hired here for no apparent reason.

Anyway, after dancing badly for a bit, Orton puts him out. In a very funny moment, Benoit tries to throw out Lamont, the guy that did the introduction but as he runs him to the ropes to throw him, just the hair goes off. It’s a lot better than it sounds. Angle is 19th to a HUGE pop. This is kind of a dream trip in there really. Naturally he and Benoit beat the tar out of each other.

Rico, now in his full gay stage, is 20th. Tazz sums him up in one line: you have to be as tough as Rico to wear those pants in the Royal Rumble. Rico was a guy that never got a fair shake as a wrestler. He was chained down by his gimmick and no one could ever take him seriously. If nothing else though, I’ve never heard a single bad thing about him and before and after wrestling he was a police officer in Nevada where he graduated at the top of his class both times.

Like him or not, that’s very impressive. Orton hits an RKO on him and puts him out. As Benoit and Angle beat even more tar out of each other, Test is 21st as no one cares. Main reason no one cares is he’s not here. Orton hits an RKO on Angle as we cut to the back where Test is out cold. Austin, who was sheriff or something like that at the time yells at someone we can’t see that they’re now number 21 as it was apparently the guys that did this to Test.

Austin sounds like Christian Bale from Dark Knight. It’s Mick Foley as the roof is completely gone after being blown off by his music. This was during an angle where Foley was afraid of Orton and refused to fight him on Raw back in December so he left the company. Ross says he knew Foley wasn’t a coward. The look on Orton’s face is absolutely perfect as he’s scared to death. Foley beats the living tar out of him and a Cactus Clothesline puts both of them out.

Foley beats on him even more on the floor as Christian is number 22. Oddly enough ECW is on at the moment and he’s in the main event (shocking isn’t it?). Orton is just getting killed by Foley this whole time. Scratch that he’s coming back with a SICK chair shot to Mick’s head. They fight up the entry way as they set up Rock and Foley vs. Evolution at Mania and the EPIC hardcore match at Backlash.

If you haven’t seen the Backlash match, go get Mick Foley’s Greatest Hits and Misses and check that match out. It’s a great DVD too. The final disc has four Foley matches on it where you can pick between original commentary or Foley and Joey Styles which is a cool idea. Nunzio is 23rd but he walks into Socko on the ramp. We haven’t seen anything in the ring for about a minute and a half at this point, but in this case it’s ok. The crowd is WAY into this.

Orton runs away and Foley staggers after him. Nunzio (Little Guido for you ECW fans) sits at ringside while everyone else fights in the ring. Tazz makes fun of Christian wearing pink tights. Ross says some great Canadians have worn pink tights which shuts Tazz up FAST. Big Show is in at 24. He’s finally back in normal looking tights which I couldn’t be happier about. Again, Ross says something very insightful: Yoko and Studd were both #24 when they won.

See, again, that’s something no one would ever pick up on and it offers something to think about. That’s the sign of a great announcer. Jericho is number 25. We have far too high of a Canadian to American ratio in there. Haas is in at 26th. Nunzio is still sitting outside. Jericho puts out Christian for the second year in a row apparently. Billy Gunn is 27th and is apparently returning.

Why in the world is he getting a pop? I just don’t get it. He gets a Fameasser on both Angle and Show which Ross points out is a bad idea because you have to have Show up to put him out. Ross stays on fire tonight by pointing out that number 27 has produced the most winners in history. Even Tazz says Ross is on a roll tonight.

Cena is number 28 to a solid pop. He would win his first title, the US, at Mania over Show who he’s feuding with at the moment. He puts Nunzio into the ring but gets jumped by the Italian and Show. Show slaps Nunzio on the back and Tazz says that’ll shake your ribs cheeks. Where in the world did that come from??? RVD is 29th and we know Goldberg is 30th. Cena hits the FU on Angle.

Your final grouping as Goldberg comes in: Benoit, Haas, Nunzio, Angle, Show, Jericho, Gunn, Cena, RVD and Goldberg. That’s a pretty sweet grouping when you think about it. Of the ten in there, you have four former world champions and three that would be champion in the future. That’s not bad at all. Goldberg destroys everyone in sight and throws out Haas. There goes Gunn. Nunzio is out. He sets to Jackhammer Big Show and here’s Brock to screw that up.

He nails Goldberg and then Angle throws him out during the stare down. If either guy was staying at Mania, that could have been EPIC. We’ve got six now. Show gets the Andre treatment which doesn’t work at all. Everyone keeps beating on him and then they realize they screwed up because he’s out cold and weighs 500lbs.

Ok, I get that he’s dead weight, but Angle has freakish strength and RVD holds a world record for a dead lift while doing the splits, yet five grown professional wrestlers can’t get him up? Show just goes insane and puts out Cena and RVD. Jericho shows his intelligence and gets the Walls of Jericho on Show. Show puts him out with one arm to just show off. The final three are Angle, Benoit and Show.

If nothing else they’ve saved the best guys for the ending. Angle hits an Angle Slam on Show which never stops being impressive. Benoit takes one that’s close to it but not quite. Show gets a chokeslam but Angle rolls through it into an ankle lock and Show taps again.

In an awesome looking sequence, Show is in the ankle lock and climbs up the ropes, then he kind of rolls forward over them to pull Angle out, because Angle couldn’t you know, LET GO OF HIS FREAKING LEG or something like that. Benoit rolls through a chokeslam with the most basic counter there is to it and continues his streak of being the only guy in history to consistently work on the right arm of an opponent.

Show taps again. That’s a nice bit of continuity there as all three submission guys manages to get him to tap but it means nothing. I like it though as it shows they’ve at least thought this out a bit. It’s so simply yet it ties the match together and shows that while Jericho and Angle are both great, they’re not as great as Benoit as only he gets rid of Show in the end. That’s a nice little touch and it works so well.

Show is in that thing for at least thirty seconds too so that has to hurt. Show breaks it with a similar counter to what Bradshaw did earlier. Benoit breaks the hour mark. Show, with his handlebar mustache, gets Benoit in a gorilla press but Benoit shifts into a chancers (DDT grip with the arm held also) to pull Show over the ropes and in a cool looking finish gets enough leverage to get him out.

That’s a perfect ending as Benoit didn’t use power or some contrived move. He did what he does best: got a hold on Show and used leverage to get him out. That’s textbook Benoit and it’s the only way he should have won this. The pop is great and for smarks everywhere, this was a perfect moment.

Rating: A. This was a great Rumble for multiple reasons. First of all, Benoit wasn’t focused on until the very end, which made it far less obvious that he was going to be the winner. He blended into the background, which helped him out a lot here. In the 92 Rumble where Flair more or less went wire to wire, he was the focus of the match. Here, Benoit was mentioned but it was far more casual. Second, the ending 6 or so were awesome.

There were a bunch of people there that could have won. Angle winning wouldn’t have surprised anyone I don’t think, and Show is always a legit contender in something like this. This match went very well and while it may not have been great, it was very fun. That’s the best way to describe it: fun.

Overall Rating: C+. The Rumble I the only thing here worth anything. Look back at the show and see what else you have. The tag title match is a squash, the Cruiserweight title match is 3 minutes long, Eddie vs. Chavo is ok at best, Hardcore Holly got a title shot, and Shawn and HHH had a decent but far from great match with a bad ending. Then you have a great Rumble. That’s not a lot to go on really.

The part that kills it for me is HHH and Shawn being the only other match longer than eight and a half minutes. Seriously, you couldn’t chop off 6 minutes of that and give three each to the first two matches? Overall, the show isn’t much at all, but the Rumble is great.

I won’t really recommend it as a lot of this stuff felt like it was from a 3 hour special or something. This wasn’t much, but the Benoit Rumble win is great stuff. You won’t find a better example of someone being launched into the main event than that right there. Definitely check that out, but other than that take a pass.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s Complete 2004 Monday Night Raw Reviews (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/08/26/new-book-and-e-book-kbs-complete-2004-monday-night-raw-reviews/

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6

Smackdown
Date: January 8, 2021
Location: Tropicana Field, St. Petersburg, Florida
Commentators: Michael Cole, Corey Graves

We’re well on the way to the Royal Rumble and that means there are a lot of things that need to be taken care of in a hurry. Odds are we are going to cover a lot of that tonight, but we also have a pair of title matches with both the Intercontinental and Tag Team Titles on the line. Let’s get to it.

Here are last week’s results if you need a recap.

Here is Roman Reigns, flanked by Paul Heyman and Jey Uso, to open things up. Reigns is sorry for what happened to Kevin Owens last week but something had to be done. He has a lot of people to take care of around here because everyone needs food on their table. The real person to blame is Adam Pearce, who needs to get out here right now. After a few seconds, here’s Pearce, with Reigns showing him a video of Owens losing in the cage match and then getting beaten down again last week.

This is Pearce’s fault and Reigns wants to know how Pearce is going to make it better. Pearce granted Owens the rematch and now he has booked a gauntlet match because Pearce is trying to pick the Big Dog’s opponent. Maybe Owens can enter the match, or will Pearce himself enter to get the title shot? Pearce is starting to sound like he thinks Roman is stupid. Or maybe he thinks Vince McMahon is stupid. Pearce says no, but Reigns thinks Pearce doesn’t respect him or the family.

Reigns grabs him by the jacket but Paul and Jey calm him down. Maybe Reigns made a mistake, and maybe right now, right now, Pearce is perfectly safe. Reigns was excellent here, as he looks down on everyone because he knows he can. It’s going to get better as time goes on and he gets more confident too, which sounds excellent.

Intercontinental Title: Big E. vs. Apollo Crews

Big E. is defending and gets pump kicked down for an early two. Crews misses an ax handle though and gets elbowed in the face to slow things down a big. The apron splash connects but Crews is back up with the rolling German suplexes for two. Big E. heads outside so Crews moonsaults down onto him for another knockdown. Crews takes him up for the superplex, with Crews tying the legs together for the small package and the double pin at 3:13.

Back from a break with the title staying with Big E. on the draw, but Crews wants to keep going. That means a splash to Big E. to start the match over, with the Big E. running him over. The Warrior Splash gets two but the spear through the ropes is cut off with a knee. Crews gets two off the frog splash but Big E. grabs a Stretch Muffler. That’s broken up as well and Crews hits an enziguri, only to have the Toss Powerbomb countered. The Rock Bottom out of the corner sets up the Big Ending to retain the title at 10:28 (total).

Rating: C. They were going as fast as they could out there but they didn’t need to have Big E. even going to the double pin. Pushing him is one thing but if they’re pushing him as his unstoppable force, it isn’t a good sign to put him a step away from being pinned. That being said, he did come back and win with the straight power and the fire in his eyes, which are all that matter here. Crews looked good too, and at least he has won something to prevent these losses from feeling so bad.

Sonya Deville is back and rants about Mandy Rose going to Raw and leaving her career in the lurch. She accuses Pearce of entering the gauntlet match tonight but Pearce says no.

Bayley interrupts Bianca Belair and says she’ll waste her spot in the Rumble. Belair says she was looking forward to winning and challenging Bayley but she isn’t champ anymore.

Carmella brags about beating Sasha Banks last week and reminds Banks that she can’t touch her when it comes to raw talent.

Tag Team Titles: Dolph Ziggler/Robert Roode vs. Street Profits

The Profits are defending. Dawkins shoulders Ziggler down to start and then hits a dropkick for an early two. Ford comes in but gets taken into the corner for the double stomping. That’s too much from Ford, who makes the fiery comeback but Roode kicks the knee out to take him down again. Ford fights up again and hits the big flip dive onto both of them at ringside as we take a break with Ford’s leg in trouble.

Back with Dawkins suplexing Roode for two as Ford can barely stand on the apron. A cheap shot from behind takes Dawkins down though and we hit the front facelock. Ziggler rolls him around a bit until Dawkins fights up and gets in a knockdown shot. Despite Roode pulling Ford off the apron for a bit, the hot tag goes through anyway and Ford gets to clean house on one leg.

Ziggler catches him on top though and it’s a super X Factor for two. Ford hits a superkick for two but it’s back to Roode for two off a fisherman’s suplex. Dawkins gets knocked off the apron and it’s the spinebuster/Zig Zag combination to finish Ford for the pin and the titles at 14:29.

Rating: C+. I can go with the story of someone fighting through an injury and Ford did a great job of building sympathy throughout. At the same time, they had to go with the title change here as the Profits had beaten them so many times already that there was almost no choice but to switch the belts. It’s not like Roode and Ziggler are going to be the next big thing in the division anyway so this is perfectly acceptable.

Sonya Deville is still with Adam Pearce and asks about the next challengers for the Tag Team Titles but Paul Heyman interrupts. Deville leaves and Heyman sucks up to Pearce, bringing up the days of Scrap Daddy Adam Pearce, who could have been an even bigger star under the guidance of Paul E. Dangerously. Anyway, the point is Heyman has pulled some strings and Pearce is in the gauntlet match, courtesy of Roman Reigns.

Billie Kay comes up to the Riott Squad and is ready to join the team. They’re not sure so she gets a little emotional, which is enough to make it in. She knew it would happen as she has already put Mosh Pitter on her resume.

Gauntlet Match

The winner gets the shot at Roman Reigns at the Royal Rumble. Rey Mysterio, with Dominick, is in at #1 and Sami Zayn, with a documentary crew, is in at #2 but hang on as Sami has something to say. He is in the gauntlet match but he’s in the #1 spot, giving him the biggest disadvantage. This crew is here to document the conspiracy against him and you will get to see what he has had to deal with to get this far. The 619 into the frog splash gets rid of Sami at 17 seconds and Shinsuke Nakamura is in at #3.

We come back from a break with Rey kicking him down for two but missing a baseball slide. The sunset bomb is broken up so Nakamura knees him in the face for two back inside. Nakamura knocks him down again and then takes it up top but gets knocked back down. Rey’s frog splash hits knees though and a cross armbreaker makes Mysterio tap at 9:58.

King Corbin is in at #4 and jumps Dominick from behind. Corbin beats up Rey as well and we take a break. Back with Corbin beating Nakamura down, including a clothesline for two. Corbin gets sent shoulder first into the post though and Nakamura kicks him out to the floor. Back in and Nakamura hits a running kick to the chest, followed by another one to the head.

The middle rope knee to the chest gets two but Deep Six gives Corbin the same. Nakamura pulls him into a triangle choke but Corbin powerbombs his way to freedom in a hurry. Corbin tries the slide underneath the ropes into the clothesline but Nakamura is waiting on him with Kinshasa for the pin at 18:50.

Daniel Bryan is in at #5 and Nakamura isn’t happy. Back from another break with Bryan striking away but getting kicked out of the air for his efforts. The half crab has Nakamura in more trouble and a German suplex makes it even worse. Bryan kicks away and they fight over an armbar until Bryan gets the YES Lock. The rope is eventually reached though and Bryan is frustrated.

Bryan cranks away on the arm in the corner and takes him up top but the super hurricanrana is blocked. Nakamura knees him down for two but can’t get the cross armbreaker. Instead Bryan wins a strike off and kicks away in the corner. The running corner dropkicks have Nakamura in trouble, only to have him come out of the corner with Kinshasa for the pin at 18:45.

Bryan shakes his hand post fall but here are Roman Reigns and company to interrupt. We take another break and come back with Reigns and Uso beating up Nakamura, but also Pearce. Since there is a bell between the start of the matches, the bell rings and Pearce is put on top for the win at 28:48.

Rating: B-. I’m not quite sure what to think of the ending, as they telegraphed it the entire time and then went exactly that way. I was expecting Kevin Owens to come in at the end but at the same time, well done on having Owens stay off television for more than a week. There is a chance that Pearce actually wrestles the match and I’d believe Reigns can make it work. That’s a heck of a trick and Reigns has made it happen. The rest of the match worked rather well, with Nakamura wrestling as a face for almost his entire time. I could go with a fresh Nakamura, but I’m not getting my hopes up.

Overall Rating: B. I don’t remember the last time they had such an efficiently run show, with every match meaning something. You had a champion retaining, a title change and a #1 contender crowned with some other things sprinkled in. There is something great about seeing a show set up targets and then knock them down, which is how things went here. Good show, and it was more about the structure than the wrestling itself.

Results

Big E. b. Apollo Crews – Big Ending

Robert Roode/Dolph Ziggler b. Street Profits – Zig Zag/spinebuster combination to Ford

Adam Pearce won a gauntlet match last eliminating Shinsuke Nakamura

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s Complete 2004 Monday Night Raw Reviews (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/08/26/new-book-and-e-book-kbs-complete-2004-monday-night-raw-reviews/

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6

Smackdown
Date: July 28, 2006
Location: Joe Louis Arena, Detroit, Michigan
Commentators: Michael Cole, John Bradshaw Layfield

We’re done with the Great American Bash and the big story coming out of the show is King Booker defeating Rey Mysterio to end one of the weakest World Title reigns in recent memory. It would seem that all roads now lead to Summerslam in about a month and Booker is going to need a challenger. Let’s get to it.

Here is the Great American Bash if you need a recap.

We look at Chavo Guerrero costing Rey Mysterio the World Title at Great American Bash.

Opening sequence.

Mr. Kennedy vs. Batista

Bash rematch after Kennedy’s head was busted open so badly that his skull was visible (geez). Batista isn’t having any of this arm stuff from Kennedy, who is shoved into the corner early on. Kennedy gets shoved away again and Batista hits the shoulders to the ribs. Back up and Kennedy starts in on the leg to take over, including cranking away on the mat. They head outside for the brawl, where Batista clotheslines the post by mistake. Kennedy punches him off the apron though and it’s another countout to make Kennedy 2-0 against Batista.

Rating: D+. These wins against Batista aren’t exactly game changers but they are doing something for Kennedy. Just having him out there in the ring with Batista and not getting destroyed is going to do something for him and that’s the kind of thing WWE can use. Batista isn’t even getting beaten so much as losing so it is quite the efficient use of both guys.

Tonight: King Booker is crowned King of the World.

Wrestlemania is coming to Detroit on April 1 and WWE had the press conference to prove it.

Vito vs. Simon Dean

Earlier today, Vito walked around in the dress. Dean jumps him to start and hammers away as JBL plugs his FOX show and makes various jokes about Cole and Vito. The chinlock doesn’t last long as Vito fights up and hits a suplex (with the blurring starting up as the dress comes up). The attempted use of the Simon System bag doesn’t work so it’s the implant DDT to drop Dean. Vito armbars him for the win.

Rating: D. I’m not sure how much longer Vito can keep doing this but it’s not exactly thrilling stuff. It’s bottom of the barrel material and I can’t imagine anything really coming from it. That being said, it does help that they aren’t treating it as anything more than comic relief and they’re in and out in a hurry most weeks.

Rey Mysterio won’t talk about Chavo Guerrero because he wants the World Title back in tonight’s rematch.

Tatanka vs. Sylvan

Yes, this is the best they can think of for their TV time after Vito in a dress. Tatanka kicks him into the corner to start and slaps on a headlock as JBL makes Bingo/casino jokes. A thumb to the eye lets Sylvan send him shoulder first into the post and it’s time to work on that arm.

Back up and Tatanka misses a charge into the corner, allowing Sylvan to grab a belly to back for two. That’s about it for the offense as Tatanka hits a backdrop and the chops, including the top rope chop to the head. The Papoose To Go only gets two (that’s a rare one) so Grenier goes after his tomahawk. Since the referee doesn’t want potential murder in his match, he takes it away, allowing Grenier to hit a low blow. The TKO finishes Tatanka.

Rating: D. So that happened. I’m not sure what they’re going for this with this show and having people like Sylvan, Vito and Tatanka getting back to back matches isn’t the best way to get the energy going. On top of that, the match actually got some time to really hammer in the troubles, though that might be due to a stereotypical Native American vs. an ambassador in 2006.

Post match, Grenier throws Tatanka’s headdress on the floor to, hopefully not at least, keep things going.

Michelle McCool vs. Jillian Hall

Kristal and Ashley are the seconds. Michelle doesn’t seem to think much of Jillian’s looks as JBL loses it over Cole talking about athleticism, suggesting that Vito and Cole head to a bar together. Jillian hammers away in the corner and hits a crossbody. McCool’s face is put into Jillian’s chest (JBL: “If she had done that move with me, I wouldn’t have had to fire her.” Hall misses a running flip legdrop and Michelle grabs a rollup with feet on the ropes for the fast pin.

Chavo Guerrero joins us on the Titantron to say that he only owes Rey Mysterio an explanation. He’ll be here next week to explain the true meaning of a Guerrero.

It’s time for King Booker’s coronation, including trumpeters, a flower girl, a red carpet, and a carriage to bring Booker and Booker and Queen Sharmell to the ring. Balloons fall and it takes a long time for the two of them to get in the ring. Booker handles his own introduction but here’s Rey Mysterio to seated senton him through the throne. A 619 drops Booker as well and referees finally break it up.

William Regal and Finlay argue a bit about their rematch tonight, but they both seem to be looking forward to the fight.

US Title: Finlay vs. William Regal

Regal is challenging in a rematch from the Bash. Finlay takes him down by the leg and stomps on the finger a few times. A sunset flip doesn’t work for Regal as Finlay sits on his chest and grabs a chinlock. Finlay sends him face first into the apron but Regal is right back with a catapult into the post. Back in and Regal grabs his own chinlock, followed by a suplex for a few near falls. The exploder suplex gets three two counts in a row but here’s the Leprechaun to go after the turnbuckle pad. The referee fixes it, allowing the Leprechaun to hit Regal low. A rollup with trunks retains Finlay’s title.

Rating: C. It wasn’t what they did on Sunday but it wasn’t supposed to be. This was about two people beating the heck out of each other until the rather busy ending. What mattered here was having the Leprechaun get involved again and they had a nice fight cut off in a hurry. Finlay retaining was fine too, as it’s not like he should be losing anytime soon.

Raw Rebound.

It’s time for the Diva Search girls to play musical chairs. Miz, who rather misses Maryse, handles getting rid of the chairs. JT wins as I miss the days of Eugene running Raw and having people like Flair, Lawler and Stacy in the same game.

Paul Heyman comes in to see Teddy Long, who he wants on ECW next week. Long can even bring a Smackdown wrestler to face Big Show. That’s fine with Long, who picks Batista, which Heyman didn’t expect.

The debuting Elijah Burke introduces Sylvester Terkay.

Matt Hardy vs. Sylvester Terkay

Terkay takes him down and hammers away as JBL lists off Terkay’s MMA/amateur credentials. An armbar sets up a belly to belly for two on Hardy and Terkay backfists him in the head. Another armbar makes Hardy tap in a hurry. Terkay looked good in a short burst.

Smackdown World Title: Rey Mysterio vs. King Booker

Booker, with Queen Sharmell, is defending. Rey gets hammered into the corner to start but a sunset flip sets up a basement dropkick to rock the king. It’s too early for a 619 though as Booker bails to the floor and we take a break. Back with Rey slugging away in the corner and hitting a dropkick to the floor.

Rey misses a dive to the floor and the knee is banged up in the process. The sidekick lets Booker hammer away at the mask, followed by a side slam to cut off the comeback. We hit the armbar on Rey but he’s back up with a headscissors. Three Amigos have Booker down but here’s Chavo Guerrero to pull Rey off the apron. Rey is sent into the barricade and the ax kick retains the title.

Rating: C. This was just a quick way to get something in for the sake of writing off the rematch and getting it out of the way. They did almost the same ending as Sunday, minus about fifteen minutes of setup. That isn’t exactly a great way to go, but it is the necessary step to take to get things to Summerslam.

Overall Rating: D. I’m going to write this one off as the Stephanie Just Had A Baby Show, because this was a mixture of rematches from the pay per view (with rather similar finishes), the nothing lower card stuff and musical chairs. Assuming that is what happened, this was just a one off misfire, but if not then we could be in for a rather long next few months.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s Complete 2004 Monday Night Raw Reviews (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/08/26/new-book-and-e-book-kbs-complete-2004-monday-night-raw-reviews/

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6

Smackdown
Date: July 21, 2006
Location: American Bank Center, Corpus Christi, Texas
Commentators: Michael Cole, John Bradshaw Layfield

It’s the go home show for the Great American Bash and that means it is time to put the finishing touches on everything. The show is looking pretty good on paper and if they do everything else well tonight, we could be in for a nice pay per view. That’s in theory of course, as you never know around here. Let’s get to it.

Here are last week’s results if you need a recap.

Teddy Long is in the ring to open things up and gets straight to the point: Mark Henry is injured and has undergone knee surgery. Therefore he is of course out the #1 contenders match at the Great American Bash, so we have a replacement. Before Long can make the announcement, here’s Mr. Kennedy to interrupt. Long won’t let him have the mic but Kennedy has his own and challenges Batista for the pay per view. Cue Batista to tell Teddy to book the match (Teddy nods) because he needs someone to take out his six months of anger on. Kennedy offers a handshake but pulls it again and leaves. Quick and easy here.

Brian Kendrick vs. Kid Kash

They run the ropes to start with neither being able to hit anything until Kendrick armdrags him into an armbar. Kash gets smart by going after the knee and a running clothesline gets two. It’s back to the leg with even more kicks, followed by something like a reverse figure four to send Kendrick bailing to the ropes.

A snapmare sends Kendrick’s legs into the ropes to stay on the legs but Kendrick is back up with right hands and a clothesline. Jamie Noble offers a distraction but gets knocked down by mistake, allowing Kendrick to grab a rollup for two. The referee goes to yell at Paul London, allowing Noble to come in to help set up the Dead Level for the pin.

Rating: C. The leg work was a wise way to go and it made sense to have the champ lose here, but at the same time there is only so much to be gotten out of the singles matches for the Tag Team Champions. I’m not exactly buying the idea of the Pit Bulls winning the titles on Sunday, but at least they’re trying something to set it up.

Chavo Guerrero is in Teddy Long’s office when King Booker and Queen Sharmell come in. They don’t like being disrespected by Rey Mysterio and demand satisfaction in the form of a match tonight. Chavo doesn’t think much of this and tells Teddy to ignore them, but he’ll take it under advisement. That’s too much for Chavo, who storms off.

Post break, Rey accepts the match with Booker for tonight. Chavo doesn’t like this.

Michelle McCool/Kristal vs. Jillian Hall/Ashley

Jillian slams Kristal down to start and hits a cartwheel elbow as JBL goes into a rant about Jillian not taking the easy path to wealth. Michelle comes in and beats on Ashley as a lot of screaming ensues. It’s back to Kristal for a rollup but Jillian makes the save, ripping Kristal’s top off in the process. Ashley rolls her up for the fast pin as the point was obvious again here.

Great American Bash press conference video.

Here are Great Khali and Daivari to say that Undertaker will be destroyed in the Punjabi Prison. It won’t be for the first time either, as we see a clip of Khali mauling Undertaker at Judgment Day.

After looking at a clip of Finlay stealing the US Title from him last week, Bobby Lashley says he is ready to fight tonight.

US Title: Finlay vs. Bobby Lashley

Lashley is challenging and they go straight to the brawling. Finlay gets powered down early on and claims an early elbow injury. Naturally he’s goldbricking and forearms Lashley down for two, causing the referee to chastise him a bit. One heck of an uppercut sends Lashley into the corner and a very hard clothesline puts him down. Finlay hammers away in the corner and a jumping seated senton sets up the chinlock.

Lashley fights up and they head outside with Finlay being sent head first into the apron. That earns Lashley a knee first whip into the steps though and it’s time to crank on the leg back inside (JBL: “It’s the Achilles Heel of a gigantic monster.”). Finlay cannonballs down onto the knee, ala Ric Flair, which Cole calls unorthodox for some reason. Lashley fights up again but here’s William Regal for a distraction.

The distraction lets Finlay pull out the Leprechaun, with Finlay tossing him at Lashley for some actual unique offense. The leglock goes on again but Lashley fights up with the variety of suplexes. That’s enough for the referee to check on Finlay, allowing Regal to get in some cheap shots. Regal throws Finlay a chair, which is kicked into his face, setting up the spear. Not that it matters though as Regal comes in for the DQ.

Rating: C+. This was about taking a couple of heavy hitters and letting them beat the heck out of each other for about fifteen minutes. It’s a good preview for Sunday’s triple threat title match also involving Regal, and I’m glad they didn’t do a surprise title change to give Lashley another two day reign. Finlay can get a lot out of being the champion and retaining here was the smart move.

Post match the beatdown is on with the Leprechaun getting in a shillelagh shot to keep Lashley down.

Here’s Miz to recap the Diva Search so far, all two weeks of the thing. Tonight’s contest is a Diva Dance Off so they all dance for thirty seconds. Some of them are a bit more skilled than others (Maryse just kind of walks around) and Milena wins. This was exactly as you would have expected.

Matt Hardy, Funaki and Tatanka are in the back when Sylvan comes in to pitch a Quebec vacation.

Super Crazy vs. Psicosis

Gregory Helms is on commentary as he will be defending the title at the Bash against an opponent to be determined. Psicosis takes over with an armdrag to start and stomps away but Crazy sends him into the corner for some stomping of his own. A reverse Boston crab has Crazy in trouble and Psicosis makes it even worse by turning it into a Rocking Horse. We go to a more conventional camel clutch but Crazy slips out and dropkicks him to the floor. Crazy hits a middle rope moonsault but walks into a spinwheel kick for two back inside. Not that it matters as Crazy grabs a crucifix for the fast pin.

Rating: C. Much like the Lashley vs. Finlay match, this was all about taking two people who are good at a certain style and allowing them to do their thing for a bit. I’m not sure how big of a surprise that Crazy winning was, but at least they got a few minutes to do their thing. Crazy vs. Helms at the Bash feels like a pre-show match, but it’s nice to see the title defended every now and then.

Post match Crazy and Helms shout at each other a lot.

Vito went shopping. Again.

Great American Bash rundown.

Rey Mysterio vs. King Booker

Non-title with Sharmell handling Booker’s entrance. Joined in progress with Booker taking him to the mat with a knuckle lock but Rey fights up and kicks at the leg (popular move tonight). A flying headscissors looks to set up the 619 but Rey knocks him outside instead, setting up the running seated senton off the apron.

Back in and Booker chops away, followed by an elbow to the face for two. A pair of clotheslines into a superkick gives Booker two and the armbar goes on. That doesn’t last long so Booker grabs a slingshot suplex for two more. The chinlock doesn’t stay on long either, meaning this time it’s a World’s Strongest Slam for another near fall on Rey.

Back up and Rey grabs the sitout bulldog and thanks to the referee checking on Sharmell, Rey baseball slides Booker for a low blow. Sharmell offers a distraction though and it’s a Book End for two as Rey puts his foot on the floor. Cue Chavo to trip Booker though and it’s the 619 into Dropping The Dime to put Booker away.

Rating: C. Kind of a boring match but you can tell that these are both people who can have a fine match almost in their sleep. I’m not wild on having the pay per view main event two days before the show, but it’s not like it is the focal point in the first place. Mysterio’s days are numbered and it seems obvious, especially with Guerrero running around on the floor like he was here. Fine main event, but still a weird way to go.

Overall Rating: C-. This show suffered from the same kind of problem that so many other go home shows face: the show is built up as well as it’s going to be, leaving this show as little more than a two hour filler episode. There was nothing of note added here, other than replacing the injured Henry, so while it was a perfectly watchable show, it was also a perfectly skippable show.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s Complete 2004 Monday Night Raw Reviews (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/08/26/new-book-and-e-book-kbs-complete-2004-monday-night-raw-reviews/

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6