*Official* Pro-Wrestling Thread II

[OverratedSanity]

 

[sledger]

Good show on the whole, really enjoyed it but agree that the war games match itself was a bit of a cluster

 

[Athlai]

Say my name

What a cool mini feud that was

 

[Mike5181]

Velveteen Dream has all the tools to be a massive star. That match with Black was one of WWE's best this year.

 

[sledger]

It's been a lazy dog-dangling afternoon, so I watched ECW Heatwave 98 today.

First thought. What a fantastic show. Probably the greatest PPV ECW ever put on I would say.

Second thought. ****ing hell, some of the bumps some of the wrestlers took during this show are absolutely insane. Not even the ones related to the hardcore stuff, but the actual wrestling. It's no wonder that so many of the people who worked in this promotion are now either crippled or dead.

Chris Candido, Mike Awesome, Tanaka (amongst others) all absolutely mad ****s.

Also, not said this for a while, but Jerry Lynn was an absolute boss. 90s Jerry Lynn would fit in so well today in NXT

 

[Niall]

Opening Shield match was functional, nothing wrong with it, but they can do much better,

The ladies match was the utter pits, botches and Tamina showcased in 2017. Have mercy.

At least Asuka was showcased nicely.

 

[Athlai]

Tamina isn't terrible, but in the sense she should be a lower card heel threat/enforcer that should only be on screen for 3-5 minutes at a time. Presumably they wanted to save Asuka moments with the legit competitors in some ass backwards booking there.

 

[Niall]

Tamina is a really bad, average worker (zero memorable matches or moments in her 46 year WWE career), can't generate heat and beating her means nothing. The only reason she still has a job is the Rock connection. I don't really like Nia, but clearly has some tools to work with.

Miz match wasn't the ****fest that I expected, decent heat and despite some bad selling from Corbin, enjoyable enough match.

 

[Athlai]

She has a good superkick (at times) and a better samoan drop than Nia (most of the time), she also has a decent look and has half convincing strikes and isn't a terrible seller. Shes definitely not good or great but shes hardly a disgrace.

 

[Niall]

New Day match was good stuff.

The ladies champ match was a mess, having Charlotte as underdog in that match against the all conquering er Bliss is just silly even for wrestling. I like Bliss but she had have been face in that match. A mess really.

Ultimately its been a so-so show, some decent matches, but hard to argue that any match has merited more than 3 stars out of five.

It doesn't help matters when its bloody obvious who is going to win all matches also

 

[Niall]

Jinder isn't as awful as some think, but watching that match so glad we got AJ in that match. Twas quality and easily the best of the night despite the obviousness of Brock winning.

Main event time, either Owen/ Sami or Jordan or Alexa (hits finishers on everyone and stands tall to close the show)to interfere.

 

[sledger]

Wish I had just watched Takeover for a second time instead tbh. Very underwhelming show for mine..

Aj v Brock was fine, but nothing special. Standard Brock match.

Main event I thought was poor. All the interesting guys jobbed out early leaving Cena, Ortin and Haitch to doninate the match. Yawn.

 

[Niall]

3 of the last 4 in that match are dudes close to 50 and part timers grim. The FU to Owens and Zayn pretty ****** as well. A nice opening few minutes, but a cluster**** of a match ultimately.

A pretty average PPV really,,the two tag matches I could give them 3/5 , ladies elimination match is at best 1/5 due to at least a sensible ending making up for a mess of a match . Charlotte v Alexa was booked wrongly, Charlotte should have been heel or at least it should have been shorter, 1/5.

AJ v Brock 4/5 as despite obvious winner, it was great fun, main event as stated above 2/5 possibly lower if I am stupid enough to re watch.

Poor PPV really, not enough matches delivered and the format made it very predictable.

 

[sledger]

Also, did anyone else find Michael Cole constantly referring to Nakamura as "Shin" really irritating?

 

[sledger]

3 of the last 4 in that match are dudes close to 50 and part timers grim. The FU to Owens and Zayn pretty ****** as well. A nice opening few minutes, but a cluster**** of a match ultimately.

A pretty average PPV really,,the two tag matches I could give them 3/5 , ladies elimination match is at best 1/5 due to at least a sensible ending making up for a mess of a match . Charlotte v Alexa was booked wrongly, Charlotte should have been heel or at least it should have been shorter, 1/5.

AJ v Brock 4/5 as despite obvious winner, it was great fun, main event as stated above 2/5 possibly lower if I am stupid enough to re watch.

Poor PPV really, not enough matches delivered and the format made it very predictable.

Yeah, the problem with these types of brand v brand matches is that you know it's going to be even going into the main event, otherwise there would be no point having it. Like you say, this makes most of the last few matches before the main event very easy to predict.

EDIT: this would have been so easy to get around as well. All they had to do was ditch the stupid score counter thing, and say that the only match "for dominance" (whatever that means anyway), was the main event. The rest of the matches were just showcases for the two shows or something.

RE: AJ v Brock, I think the absolute most I could give it would be 3/5. AJ of course did all of his usual cool stuff, and bumped like mad, but eh, it was just every Brock match we've seen for what seems like forever now.

Match starts, Brock dominates early exchanges, suplexes begin, Brock toys with opponent, Brock then does something stupid and runs into ring post/turnbuckle and injures himself, opponent fights back and gets in a bit of offence, commentators say "wow, opponent is really taking the fight to Brock, nobody expected this!", opponent hits several signature moves, Brock kicks out, F5, Brock wins.

Yeah, I get Brock is meant to look like this dangerous ass-kicker, and have no problem in him being booked so strongly, but the matches themselves just have the exact same formula over and over. To be fair I'm not even sure how you could it differently and get the same outcome, but the above way of doing things is just so tedious to watch these days. Brock has it in him to actually wrestle properly without having to just rely on "Suplex city", so maybe just him using a few other moves would help change it up. Though I note he used one belly to belly suplex today, but then it was back to the norm.

 

[sledger]

Also, another thought this time was that Kurt Angle did not look good at all. Without all the smoke and mirrors of the TLC match, tonight was the first time I really realised that this truly is not the Kurt of old. My enthusiasm for seeing a 1 v 1 match with him vs Haitch (or anyone) has just taken a huge nosedive.

 

[Mike5181]

They don't look great, but Angle can sort of get through his old repertoire. It's really the in between, the general walking and stuff, where he looks like a geriatric. His knees must be in even worse shape than his neck or something. It's really jarring seeing this shrunken man hobble around when you've got fit dudes like Balor, Orton, etc. smoothly doing stuff.

Honestly, Triple H looked his age as well, which makes it all the more annoying that he's found a way to make it all about him again.

 

[sledger]

I'm torn on that.

On the one hand, Haiytch vs Shane is one feud I am legit intrigued by. But in the other hand, McMahon family feud AGAIN, ergh.

 

[Niall]

Also what a low key return for Cena, didn't even wear blue

Thinking on it, the main event was just a mess when you consider that, and how so many people were booked as afterthoughts bar the old dudes. The crowd were dead at the end also, so the cluster**** was not even over to justify it.

Regarding Brock,I am bored of him, he can vanish once he finishes jobbing to Roman unless he plans to actually lose to non part time people. However still loved that match, but AJ is just an incredible worker. I hope he keeps the title for Mania, because if its going to be a part timer special, he in a throwaway match does not appeal.

I dunno what combination of matches the dudes near 50 who stood tall will end up at Mania and tbh I can't think of many that would appeal.

I like Shane, but wish he would **** off, and fear Kurt has lost a lot of steps these days. Kurt v Trips would probably be over, but fear it would be a dog of a match.

 

[sledger]

I thought Cena and Orton's involvement was the worst part of the match tbh. Neither of them looked like they gave a **** (but tbf, why would they?), but they all hung around longer than the guys who actually seemed interested in actually doing something entertaining. I thought Cena in particular really did not look interested at all. Crowd turned off massively as soon as Naka and Roode were gone, so about a quarter into the match in other words.

First thing I thought of after all the nonsense at the end was that it reminded me of a bit of Russo booking. Just one swerve/fake swerve after another. Crap.