Credit: Julie and Prowrestling.net
We really enjoyed the show, but one thing that was different and not in a good way was the fact that they didn’t show any matches on the Titantron. As soon as someone came to the ring, it went back to the WWE logo with flames around it. When your seats are on the first level it is not easy to see the screens on the scoreboard, which is way up in the center of the building even with the top level. It’s like trying your trying to look at the ceiling through the lighting. I heard a lot of complaints on that throughout the night.
The opening six-man tag got more of a response than expected and it was great to see all the support for Cesaro, who was the clear favorite of the match.
John Cena being the opener was a surprise and so was Zeb Colter’s return. A lot of people expected Jack Swagger, some thought it was a debut of someone new, but I don’t think a person there expected Alberto Del Rio’s return. To say the crowd went crazy is an understatement. He had chants going for him through the whole match and the majority of the crowd was more than happy to see him win the title. I don’t know how they will use him this time, but I will say bringing him back in L.A. was smart because he had a huge fan base there.
It was a surprise to see the first Hell in a Cell match come next and Bray Wyatt had almost all the support at the start. Roman Reigns came out to what I call the Cena treatment with people booing and starting “Lets Go Roman, Roman Sucks” chants, but by the end of that match that changed. People came out of their seats cheering when he hit the last spear and got the pin. After the match, he went to every corner to do his pose with his fists raised and overall there may have been a few people still booing in one corner, but the overall response to him was positive, so it seemed like he turned the crowd in his favor for one night anyway.
As far as the tag match, one thing I will say is they may want to rethink the whole Unicorn idea because New Day puts their index finger up on their foreheads but the majority of the crowd either didn’t do it or held up a different finger and I’m sure you can guess which one it was. Unless, of course, they don’t care about giving the bulk of the fans the opening to all raise their fingers at the same time to flip off their tag champs. When Kofi Kingston did the Eddy spot by tossing the trombone to Bubba then dropping to the mat, no one was happy at the idea that this could have been yet another DQ finish. It was a relief to see the match keep going. I’m not sure how it came across overall, but in our area, a lot of people seemed shocked or disappointed in New Day retaining again.
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The women’s match was what it was. I was curious to see if the Diva’s match would get any more attention with Charlotte as champ, but it was no different than any other show I’ve been to there. There was some response to Becky Lynch and Paige running out after the match, but most of it was confusion as to why Paige was even out there. After the lights went down, all three women went over to the three out of four MMA Four Horsewomen who were ringside for the whole night and exchanged hugs before going to the back.
Kane vs. Seth Rollins didn’t seem to get much reaction, and outside of the Spanish announce table not breaking and the Eddy chant after Seth hit the frogsplash, I think the fact the outcome of the match was pretty obvious killed the interest level in it.
Kevin Owens vs. Ryback, all I can really say is the crowd loves Owens. Ryback had some fans, but even they seemed to turn on him when he got out of the way of the cannonball. Everyone booed the fact we didn’t get to see that one connect, but were happy to see Owens keep the title.
As soon as the Cell started to drop for the main event, the crowd was literally on their feet until the match started. I can’t even tell you who was cheered more because from where I was sitting I heard cheers for both men when they walked out. While the build this month for the match was lacking, you wouldn’t know it sitting in that building. From start to finish live, that was the most reaction and the most invested I’ve seen a crowd in ages.
The doctor seemed afraid to even touch Brock Lesnar at the beginning, not that I blamed him. He stood on the stairs forever before he hesitantly went to Brock to clean him up some. I don’t think they ever touched Taker because when he hesitantly came back into the cell the second time Brock ended up shoving him over and I didn’t see him again after that. When Brock missed Taker and slammed the top step to the mat it looked like something went flying off the step and I would guess that was how he got the hole to rip up the mat later on. I haven’t seen the replay on the network yet to know how it looked, but when Lesnar tried to hit Taker with the top step again and Taker kicked the step and Brock went down it looked like part of the step may have hit him on the head. Again, without the Titantron for a replay it was hard to tell.
I think a lot of people wanted to see Taker win by the end, but I didn’t hear anyone complaining about the outcome. The standing ovation Taker got was great to see and went on for so long that it was a shock to everyone when the Wyatts showed up. They found a way to have the crowd absolutely hate the Wyatts and boo them, but I think a lot of people were just as annoyed that no one came out to help Taker. Hopefully we get more from this ending than we did when they hauled Kane off the same way at SummerSlam in the same building a couple of years ago.
