Mark For War: Marked Out/Missed the Mark, Summerslam
Summerslam was an all-around entertaining show. I liked the four-hour broadcast and mega-show vibe, giving it the legit Wrestlemania of summer feel.
Here’s what I thought of the PPV in an organized outlined fashion.
Marked Out
Four Team Tag Match
Awesome match. I like New Day. I wish that they had more of an evil streak in them. They’re a little too nice for a heel team looking to make waves. They need to get that to truly succeed as a heel faction. Annoyingness will only take them so far. Los Matadores and the Lucha Dragons are becoming interchangeable. They remind me of when the Powers of Pain and Demolition of the 80s. Eventually, Demolition ate the POP and moved on to greatness. Frankly, I don’t see either of these teams moving on to greatness, but one needs to go for the other to take the next step. As for the Prime Time Players, they’re fucking awesome, and good for them. A year ago, all but the final nail was driven in their coffin. A miraculous second coming.
Wyatt’s vs. the Neo Shield
Another awesome match. Here’s the problem: Rollins winning his match with Cena pretty much cements him in the main event mix at Mania this year. My pipedream was for this feud to continue all the way to Mania with new members of both factions coming in, old members coming back, and an insane brawl happening at Mania. Leading up to it, Reigns and Ambrose would, almost against their will, spend time trying to recruit Rollins for the brawl. He would eventually agree, because Wyatt would screw him over or something. But Rollins going in to the match still wouldn’t be on the same page with Reigns and Ambrose. During the match, in the middle of fighting the Wyatt’s all around Cowboy’s stadium, Rollins would also be fighting with Reigns and Ambrose, who he still hasn’t made a total menz with. It would be an insane, schizophrenic brawl from hell.
Cena vs. Rollins
Dope match. Match of the night, actually. I didn’t like the Rollins outfit change. Doesn’t really make any sense for his character. Cena ruled, as usual. The ending with Jon Stewart was actually slightly botched. You could tell he made his way over to Cena with the chair before heading back towards Rollins. Also, great job on WWE’s part on playing up the Rollins/Stewart feud that existed for months prior to this earlier in the show (I’m saying this with massive sarcasm). It would have been better if Rollins and Stewart had a run in earlier that night, leading to the second interaction during this match. I would have also preferred if Rollins looked confused upon Stewart striking Cena. He almost looked like he expected it to happen. All that said, again, an awesome match by basically the two best in the company.
3x3x3 Diva’s Match
I was down with this match. It’s sad that Sasha Banks is beyond over and the crowd didn’t seem to give a fuck about any other Diva in the match. But we get awesome chants from an awesome crowd in the process. Not.
Kids Starting to Get Pissed Off at Asshole Adult Fans
Have you noticed that the “LET’S GO CENA” chants are getting louder, more aggressive, and noticeably snarkier? The kidults that like John Cena are noticeably pissed at the A-holes that chant “Cena Sucks,” would chant such just to spite them. The chants are now equal in volume. Within a year, the “Let’s Go Cena” chants will make the “Cena Sucks” chants their bitch.
Missed the Mark
Jerry Lawler’s Commentary
Lawler said two things during the broadcast that made my skin crawl.
The first was during the four-way tag match (a match that happened to feature 12 minority superstars, and not one white superstar). Lawler, referring to El Territo, said something to the affect of, “I wonder if he went to visit his relatives at the Brooklyn Zoo earlier.” I’m fairly certain Darren Young and Big E were locking up at the time. If you didn’t hear El Territo was the subject, you would have thought that Lawler just made a blatantly racist comment. Secondly, during Neville/Stardust/whoever the fuck match, Lawler called Neville, “The man who forgot gravity.” A lot of men have forgotten gravity in history, Lawler. The vast majority of which died from it.
Uninterested Blonde Front Row Center
Did anyone else noticed the totally uninterested trophy blonde front row center that didn’t care about a damn thing that was on in the ring the whole night? Some dude was trying really really hard to get laid I assume. More than likely it was the guy next to her who wasn’t in her league. Men and Women, a lesson to you all: excluding family events, funerals, and work obligations, never drag anyone anywhere they don’t want to be. They’ll act like a-holes once they’re there.
Dolph Ziggler Still Being on the WWE Roster
This past week I was in Vegas. I sat at a bar for 20+ minutes across from a douche from California in denim frantically making out with his girlfriend. Keep in mind, the bar was a hotel and the couple was staying at the hotel. All they had to do was get in the elevator and go bang in their room in peace. Said A-hole’s reminded me of Dolph Ziggler and Lana. Ziggler’s a dipshit of a character. People throw Cena under the bus for being the frat-boy of the WWE, but it’s really Ziggler. He’s like Zac Efron meets Zack Morris. If he were a heel, I’d probably get behind hating him. I can’t stand how he is getting pushed as a face. Who in their right mind would buy a shirt with this guy’s asinine pink logo on it? He needs to be a full-fledged heel. Until then, I can’t get behind anything he does.
Kevin Steen/Cesaro Wrestling
If Steen had a main event match the night before in the same arena, why are they crowbaring him to an already overbooked PPV? Pointless. If Cesaro was left off the PPV, it wouldn’t have been the end of the world either. He was the guy who wrestled the two finalists on Tough Enough finale this week. Less is more. This match was unnecessary.
Lesnar vs. Taker
Here’s the problem: when you wait too long on heels without making them more and more dastardly, they organically become faces (See the Rock, Chris Jericho, and million other examples). Now we have a Brock Lesnar/Undertaker feud where the crowd is split. This is the result of a really fucked up booking where this match is occurring six months after it was supposed to (Wrestlemania 31). Instead we got Lesnar/Reigns at that event, the birth of Suplex City, and Lesnar essentially turning face behind people not being 100% sold on Regins. Taker looks insanely weak right now. He tapped out to Lesnar and still won the match, which makes him look worse than if he lost. Just so we’re on the same page, really the only thing WWE can do with Taker this year at Mania is have him fight Lesnar one more time. Taker CANNOT and WILL NOT lose another Wrestlemania match his entire career UNLESS it is to BROCK LESNAR. If he does lose to someone other than Lesnar, the entire streak is wiped away as if it never happened. However, if Lesnar were to beat him again, the streak essentially still exists with an asterisk next to it: Taker is unbeatable at Wrestlemania, unless he faces Brock Lesnar. If Taker beats Lesnar, then all is right in the world. I don’t understand why this match went down this past weekend. It made no sense in the context of their feud and the Wrestlemania streak.
Let me know your thoughts on the PPV and what you think is coming down the pike.
Match of the Week: Wyatt and Harper vs. Reigns and Ambrose, Summerslam, Aug 22nd, 2015, Brooklyn, NY
Rewatch this match and lock in on the chemistry that Reigns has with Wyatt. They are the perfect opponents for each other. Reigns does his best work when he’s facing a dude similar in size to him. I compare Reigns to Goldberg, except with way more wrestling skills, potential, and upside. Goldberg lacked quality opponents in his WCW career because he lacked opponents of a similar build and quickness to him. If he was facing a big dude, it was a past his prime Kevin Nash or Hulk Hogan. If he was facing a young buck, it would be a guy like Chris Jericho, and it came across out of context. It wasn’t till Goldberg got to WWE that I believe we saw some of his best feuds with a guy like Batista or a youngish Kane. Not trying to put Reigns in the same bus as Goldberg, but you can tell that Wyatt and him are ring soulmates. He should be capable of having a great feud with Cesaro down the line as well.
