The WWE Week in Review #2 – 3/13-3/19/16
The WWE Week in Review – 3/13-3/19/16
Hey there, ladies and gents, the one and only Jordan Bass is here once again to bring you the WWE Week in Review! In this blog I recap and review that week in WWE.
This week kicked off with Raw on Monday night. The show started with the New Day making their entrance, cutting a quick promo, and then we actually kicked Raw off with a match for once, and a rather big one at that. Big E and Xavier Woods of New Day defended their titles against Rusev and Alberto Del Rio of League of Nations. This was a fine match; I liked the story told of Woods being a real underdog here. The finish came when Rusev was distracted following a dive from Kingston to Barrett on the outside and Woods snuck in with a roll-up with a handful of tights for the win. League of Nations looked extremely dominant for once after the match with a brutal beat down on the New Day. Good segment and setup for their match at Wrestlemania. This was an excellent way of getting New Day over as faces.
Dean Ambrose came out and cut a promo on Triple H and talked about how close he was to winning the WWE Championship at Roadblock. Out came Lesnar and Heyman and Heyman talked Lesnar vs. Ambrose at Wrestlemania. As they were leaving, Ambrose pulled out a crowbar. Lesnar looked as though he would enter the ring, but then changed his mind and left. This leaves a lot more intrigue heading into Mania and whether or not Ambrose will walk away as the victor. After this, Ryback quickly defeated Sin Cara, who was sporting a new all black look, and then challenged Kalisto to a match at Wrestlemania for the United States Championship. I’m honestly perfectly fine with this taking place. The match they had on Smackdown back in November was fantastic and Kalisto getting a win over Ryback at Wrestlemania would be huge for the Lucha Dragon.
Stephanie McMahon and Triple H talked (yawn) and were interrupted by Dolph Ziggler to little to no reaction (more yawn). Ziggler trashed Steph and Hunter and this led to a big match being made for later between Ziggler and The Game where if Ziggler were to win, he would get any match he wanted at Wrestlemania with the exception of a WWE Championship match. Sami Zayn then defeated The Miz in a good but sadly short match-up. It still seems as though they’re building to some sort of multi-man match for the Intercontinental Championship. If it does happen, Miz will clearly be involved. I would assume they’d add Styles and Jericho and quite possibly even the likes of Ziggler or Tyler Breeze. Brie Bella and Alicia Fox came up short against Team BAD of Naomi and Tamina due to another distraction from “The Ravishing Russian” Lana. This leaves more speculation that they will be doing a multi-diva tag team match at Wrestlemania.
Dolph Ziggler took on Triple H in a really good match. Lots of near falls here and Ziggler held his own. Hunter got the win following the Pedigree after blocking the Zig-Zag. Post-match, Roman Reigns made his return to Raw and entered from the stage to massive boos. Reigns and the WWE Champion got into a brawl that Reigns controlled most of the fight that eventually was carried to the back. Reigns was pulled away from the brawl by the likes of The Usos, Mark Henry, and Jack Swagger and that was the end of that. I just don’t understand how WWE is just so okay with a guy that gets nothing but loud boos with a few girly screams sprinkled in that’s supposed to be a babyface main eventing Wrestlemania against the top heel for the WWE Championship. They can’t be THAT stupid to not realize the reaction he’s getting. I don’t even have anything against Reigns but the majority of fans just don’t want him to be the top guy. Dean Ambrose or Cesaro would be much more solid options. Heck, even a returning face Seth Rollins would be a really good option too if they decide to have him return as a face.
Chris Jericho took on Neville and about 4 minutes into the match, Neville twisted his ankle off a slide and followed up by doing a spin kick and a perfect hurricanrana before going down and leaning against the ropes. At this point it was pretty clear Neville was hurt. Jericho went to roll up the Man that Gravity Forgot, but the referee stopped counting before the 3 count and Jericho got frustrated and shoved the referee, causing a disqualification that Jericho was noticeably legit upset about. AJ Styles made his way out, nailed the Phenomenal Forearm, and stood over Jericho. Short but fine progression this week in the feud between these two.
Finally on Raw, Vince McMahon made his way out and welcomed out the Undertaker. Vince tells Taker to never lay a hand on him again and Vince begins getting frightened by the Deadman and starts apologizing. Shane McMahon shortly after made his way out to a big pop and botched a line or two towards Taker but recovered from it. Undertaker ended up Chokeslamming Shane, standing over him, and staring down Vince. This segment was fine and it was good to finally see interaction between Shane and the Undertaker. Overall, this episode was good and we got some decent progression in storylines this week as we got a few more matches set for Mania.
Main Event this week was a so-so show. It started off with a match we’ve seen at least 43 times, the Lucha Dragons took on The Ascension. If you’ve seen this match once, you’ve seen them all. It was fine, the two teams work well together, but I don’t care to see them wrestle each other anymore. Kalisto and Sin Cara got the victory here. Paige faced my love Summer Rae and defeated her. Lana was at ringside here and attacked Paige post-match. I’m still not sure how I feel about Lana entering the Divas division as a wrestler. The main event saw Sami Zayn face Stardust in a rematch from Roadblock and the match seemed as though it was just as lengthy as their match at Roadblock. This was good and I actually liked it more than their Roadblock match. Overall, Main Event was okay this week. Not the best show this week but it was still a fine wrestling show.
NXT this week saw a lot of short matches, which I wasn’t a fan of. Sami Zayn came out at the start of the show and talked about wanting to be a 2 time NXT Champion. He wants a big match at NXT Takeover: Dallas. General Manager William Regal made his way out and announced that Zayn will have a big match at Takeover, against NXT’s newest signing. Regal left and we waited in anticipation as Shinsuke Nakamura then showed up on the titantron and told Zayn that he’d see him in Dallas. I cannot wait for this match. These two are bound to have a killer match with each other as they are two of the very best wrestlers in the world. The Hype Bros quickly defeated Angelo Dawkins and Kenneth Crawford. Emma beat Deonna Purrazzo following a very lame backstage segment. I love Emma but Deonna and Dana both delivered their lines very poorly. Tommaso Ciampa squashed former TNA wrestler Jesse Sorensen. It’s good to see Ciampa picking up some victories; I’m a big fan of his and have been for a while.
Bayley and Asuka defeated Eva Marie and Nia Jax in a rather short match that ended when Jax (in very cartoony fashion) leg dropped Eva by accident. Bayley got rid of Jax and then hit the Bayley to Belly on Eva for the win. Post-match, Regal once again came out and announced that Asuka will take on Bayley for the Women’s Championship at Takeover: Dallas. I would’ve much rather had the match between Asuka and Emma next week be a #1 Contender match so that way Asuka could’ve legitimately earned a shot. Emma has been on a roll with wins for a while so it would only make sense that she gets in a #1 Contenders match.
In the main event, American Alpha of Jason Jordan and Chad Gable defeated the Vaudevillians to become the #1 Contender to the NXT Tag Team Championship. This match was decent but very short, only 8 minutes long. NXT shouldn’t be having 5 matches on one show; that takes away time from certain matches that should have more time. NXT is only an hour long show. Overall, NXT wasn’t that great this week, it was actually pretty dull, definitely the weakest episode in a while.
This week on Smackdown, Roman Reigns kicked off the show, entering from the stage again, and cut a subpar promo on Triple H. Dolph Ziggler then beat The Miz in a good competitive match with a Superkick. In a segment that should’ve taken place on Raw, Charlotte, Sasha Banks, and Becky Lynch had their “face to face to face” confrontation. The only one who cut a good promo was Sasha as I still think Charlotte is very awkward and Becky isn’t that good. A brawl ended up breaking out as Banks and Lynch teamed up to take out Charlotte. Kofi Kingston beat King Barrett in a pretty good match that was a throwback to their encounters in early 2011, late 2012, and early 2013. The Social Outcasts came out and cut a humorous promo and announced they were entering the Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal. Dean Ambrose interrupted and took them all out with a kendo stick and then talked Lesnar’s appearance on Smackdown next week and said he’ll be there too. In the main event in an excellent match, AJ Styles took on the Intercontinental Champion Kevin Owens. This was a great match but not as long as I was hoping. Jericho interrupted the match near the end, causing Styles to get distracted and that allowed Owens to hit the Pop-Up Powerbomb on Styles for the big win. Jericho then came down and hit a Codebreaker on Styles as revenge from Raw. Good episode of Smackdown with three fun matches.
Superstars this week was a tremendous show. It started off with a solid Divas match between Summer Rae and Natalya. Summer really impressed here and did a lot of great submissions. The match ended when Natalya locked in the Sharpshooter and Summer almost instantly began tapping out. I suggest checking out that match, it was a good Divas match. The main event this week was a phenomenal encounter between Tyler Breeze and Zack Ryder. These two put on another memorable match that was better than the match they had last week on Main Event. Ryder hit a Broski Boot against the barricade on the outside on Breeze at one point in a very creative spot, but my favorite spot of the match was Breeze reversing a missile dropkick from the top rope attempt from Ryder into a vicious Powerbomb that got a very close near fall. The finish came when Breeze went for the Unprettier but Ryder countered with an Inverted DDT into an elbow drop and then went up top and hit the ElBro Drop for the victory. Ryder with yet another win this week over Tyler Breeze after an excellent match-up. Definitely go check this one out, a must-see match here. This was a great episode of Superstars this week, a tremendous episode.
Good week for WWE this week. We had some high-quality matches and segments and I enjoyed the week as a whole. Some of the standout matches were Styles vs. Owens from Smackdown, Triple H vs. Dolph Ziggler from Raw, Sami Zayn vs. Stardust from Main Event, and my match of the week:
Match of the Week: Zack Ryder vs. Tyler Breeze from WWE Superstars 3/18 (***1/4)
Until next time, this has been the second edition of the WWE Week in Review! Thanks for reading; I hope you all enjoyed it. Make sure and let me know what you thought as well as any questions you may have below and if you have any suggestions for future blogs comment those too. Make sure and follow me on my social media:
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