Friday, March 29, 2024
EditorialMoney In The Bank 2018 Review and Match Ratings

Money In The Bank 2018 Review and Match Ratings

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Daniel Bryan def. Big Cass

“So we’re clear that you’re gonna have to carry me again, right?”

Daniel Bryan can try all he likes, but he’ll never be able to get something better than average out of Big Cass. These two just do not work at all. 100 percent of the problem can be attributed to Big Cass having absolutely no personality. He’s just bland and his gimmick is his height. Watch how Cass was selling Bryan attacking his left leg. No emotion. No passion. All he does is put his hands over his face and remains silent. Did you see his half-assed attempt at what was I assumed to be a Torture Rack? Watching him try to perform that move probably inflicted more damage than Cass just shaking Bryan’s beard a little bit. I forget what their match at Backlash was like, but I couldn’t imagine that it was much different. This was about as basic as it can get. Cass was really tall and hit some moves, Bryan was really short and he used his quickness, which is a fine and harmless formula.

If Cass is gonna be a top heel for the blue brand, he has to work on his character and work on his credibility. This is twice now that he has tapped out to someone who is much shorter than him, and he didn’t even look like he hurt Bryan at all, which is another issue with him. Ultimately, a fine, but dull opener. Between the match and the entrances, this was 22 minutes, which is far too long for something this average. **1/4

Bobby Lashley def. Sami Zayn

Barf.

We sat through weeks of men dressing up as women and Instagram DM hopping just for an extended squash? Yet miss me with this BS. This match was just as embarrassing as the feud, and certainly, nothing that they couldn’t have done on RAW. It really takes a lot for me to get angry watching something, even if the quality is poor, but considering how utterly pointless this feud was just to lead us to Lashley squashing one of the best in-ring performers in the world was an absolute embarrassment. Anyone involved in the booking of this feud and this match will hopefully be terminated tomorrow. Let us never speak of this feud ever again. DUD

Seth Rollins (C) def. Elias – Intercontinental Championship

Good stuff.

The pacing of the match had me a little concerned to start the match, but once the two started to settle down and pick up the pace a bit, the match gained a lot of traction. Seth Rollins, in particular, thrives when the energy and pace of the match are high. I also dug the little 2015 throwback with his attire. I thought the two started as basic as they could, with them trying to outdo each other and Elias focusing on Seth’s neck. I saw Elias grasping at his knee a little bit at one point during the match, so I thought they were going to have clashing psychologies with the neck and the knee. In the end, it was Seth who was selling both his neck and his knee, which was a good touch since Seth typically does a good job at selling injuries from start to finish in his matches.

I really think the match started to take a great turn when Elias side-stepped the suicide dive and started to dictate the pace of the match, and he almost got it done. I also loved the finish of the match, because Seth retains his title, and Elias looks strong because a guy who’s been on fire like Seth had to be reduced to being desperate and using underhanded tactics to get the win over Elias. Best believe that this feud is far from over and the two will continue to fight over the IC strap. I believe the next PPV is Extreme Rules, so maybe the two have a stipulation referencing this finish. Overall, while I didn’t think this match by Seth reached the levels of title defenses he had with The Miz and Finn Balor, this match was another high-quality outing while holding what has to be considered WWE’s most important title at the moment. Good job for both men. ***3/4

Alexa Bliss def. Charlotte, Lana, Ember Moon, Becky Lynch, Sasha Banks, Naomi and Natayla – Women’s MITB Ladder Match

Good job from the ladies.

Well, you can color me surprised. I was sure that Nattie was winning the briefcase to set up a feud with Rousey, but Bliss was something that I mentioned as a possibility because she’s a very dynamic character that can make the briefcase interesting. Just feels kind of cheap that Bliss was chosen to win even though she probably did the least work in the match. And she’s been pushed majorly over the past couple of years and she certainly doesn’t need the briefcase. I wonder what the infatuation is with her. But I’m not complaining. The issue with many of these ladder matches is that it suffers from the formula for setting up a specific spot and then resting. Sometimes it works, but other times it produces a very slow pace that makes the match kind of dull. Here, I thought the women worked a great pace, a bit quicker than usual and let things flow naturally. There were barely any rest spots, though I thought Sasha and Alexa did a lot of resting on the outside for extended periods of time.

This was also a coming out party for certain superstars as well. Naomi had arguably her best showing here as she displayed tremendous energy and athleticism. Lana also surprised me as well as I was highly concerned for her safety, but she was able to relax and let the match come to her. It could have been a career showing for Naomi, but unfortunately, she had a pretty bad botch as she went full Jack Swagger, and was all alone with the briefcase and intentionally had to pretend to bobble it because she wasn’t winning. The announcers tried to play it off as her being too far away, and that excuse would work if she wasn’t, you know, holding the briefcase with both of her hands. That botch was a product of the one thing that I actually think hurt the match from reaching the next level. I think they might have worked too quickly. At one point, there were two superstars or so coming into the ring every couple of seconds and I didn’t really have any time to digest the transitions into the next spot. Overall, it was a very nice showing and a MUCH better effort from last year’s performance. It just didn’t quite reach that upper echelon of MITB ladder matches for me. ***3/4

Roman Reigns def. Jinder Mahal

Whole lotta meh.

As expected, this the match that the Chicago crowd was going to hijack. From beach ball mania to the wave to NXT related chants, the crowd couldn’t give a rats ass about the match. A quick word about the attempted hijacking. I get that its Roman Reigns and Jinder Mahal in a pointless PPV match, and trust me, I don’t like it better than the next woman. But honestly, at least wait until a match gets bad before you decide to go in full hijack mode. At least at WrestleMania, when the crowd made it clear that Roman Reigns was going to kick out of multiple F5’s and make him look like Superman on steroids, they trashed it. They waited until it got to that point when it deserved it. Chicago was chanting “THIS IS AWFUL” 3 minutes into the match and not even give it a chance. It was clear that they weren’t even planning to focus on the match and just try to do anything to pleasure themselves. Not cool.

That being said, while the match wasn’t awful, it sure was dull. I mean, it’s Jinder freaking Mahal. He has about as charisma as a Subway sandwich with extra bread. His matches all follow the same formula. Get your ass beat, rely on Singh brother interference to gain the upper hand, dominate for 5 or so minutes, come back and whether or not the face is able to overcome the interference from the Singhs determines the outcome. It’s literally the same thing every single time with him, but in different forms and with different competitors. This was no different. Aesthetically speaking, it was a fine match that I would have been okay with on RAW, but on a PPV that had 10 matches or so, this wasn’t necessary. We all knew what was happening from the get-go, and we just had to get through predictable gymnastics to get there. Okay match, but dull more than anything else. **1/4

Carmella (C) def. Asuka – Smackdown Women’s Championship

This picture is every Carmella match ever.

Carmella has now defeated Charlotte and Asuka in two straight PPV matches. What kind of bizzaro world are we living in here? Can you imagine what the NXT writers are thinking right now? Spending over two years to make Asuka look like an unbeatable force resembling Goldberg in the prime of his WCW career, just to lose to Carmella off of a distraction finish from Ellsworth? How lazy can one get? Anyways, I guess you could say this was Carmella’s best match ever, and trust me when I say that’s not saying much. The thing with Carmella is that she tries to make matches longer and better than they actually are by stalling, taunting, walking out the ring and letting time flow by without doing anything for extended periods of time to make up for her talent deficiency.

That said, I thought she showed some signs of promise here against Asuka, taking some of Asuka’s physicality in stride and even getting in a nice suicide dive in. But she really needs to shut up with all that high pitched screaming. My ears can only take so much. I don’t want to lower the bar for Carmella because she is a champion and since she’s beaten Charlotte and Asuka individually, she has to be held to a higher standard. Charlotte and Asuka had arguably the best pure wrestling match at WrestleMania, and if Carmella is going to have the privilege of beating both of those women, she’s going to have to step her game up and show WWE that they are making the correct investment. She’s a great heel and plays her character well, but Asuka and Charlotte shouldn’t be forced to lower their skill level to adapt to Carmella’s. She just has to get better, plain and simple. The match was, again, ok, but I really felt as though Asuka needed to carry the load and have to try to make something out of nothing, and I shouldn’t have to get that feeling from a champion. **

AJ Styles (C) def. Shinsuke Nakamura – WWE Championship (Last Man Standing)

I guess you could say this was a pretty ballsy performance.

What pissed me off about the AJ/Nakamura matches before in WWE was the pacing of the match. It was far too slow. Here, they were pissing me off even further? Why? They started out the first 15 minutes or so working basically a regular one fall match and trying to translate it into a Last Man Standing match. It got frustrating because I knew that nothing they did to each other was going to keep them down for a 10 count. It really wasn’t until the two decided to take the fight outside by the announcer’s table when the match ascended to the heights we all thought this match could reach. Before I go any further, I must state, and please don’t get freaked out by this, that AJ had a pretty noticeable bulge in his pants the entire match, and I thought that something cup-related was going to influence the outcome for a while.

Once they got past the regular match routine and kicked it into high gear, it was very awesome. While I thought the counts were a bit too quick for my taste, the action was certainly intense, and Styles just saying “F it” and kicking Styles square in the dick before sending him through a table with a super Phenomenal Forearm was perfect. I also liked how Nakamura complemented Styles here with his facial mannerisms and attitude towards the match, which helped carry the story along. I just wish we didn’t have to go through all of the formalities to start the match to get to this point, but once we got there, it was definitely awesome. This was probably the only match between Styles and Nakamura that resemble what it’s like when they reach their true potential. Now here’s to hoping that they never see each other again for a while. ****1/4

Ronda Rousey def. Nia Jax (C) by DQ – RAW Women’s Championship

Alexa Bliss def. Nia Jax (C) – RAW Women’s Championship

Ronda’s legit, y’all.

So, a lot to digest here, but to start, Ronda Rousey is the real deal. Let’s just get that out of the way. Ronda passed her first major test at WrestleMania, but I believe this was an even bigger test because she was in the ring with somebody with less star power and it was her first singles match. I just wasn’t sure if she was going to able to succeed in a different environment, but I was wrong. Nia held up her end of the bargain by making it seem believable that Ronda couldn’t overcome her power. Nia started by dominating with her big physique and using that to her advantage. However, Ronda was able to use her mixed martial arts skills to get her on top, and it worked. Some of the ways Ronda was just able to dictate the pace of the match and get on top was amazing to see. The biggest selling point with Ronda is her believability, and she showed how legit she was tonight That said…

Alexa Bliss is once again champion. I suspected we might have had a run-in with one of the women’s championship matches, but I wasn’t sure which one it was going to see. I have to believe Alexa might be sleeping with somebody because the pushes she has been getting is unprecedented. She beat 7 of the top women in her division in a ladder match, took out Ronda and won her 5th Women’s Championship on the same night. I’m not sure what enticed WWE to give her all of these accolades, but she’s definitely racking up the accomplishments. It looks like Ronda/Alexa will be the feud for the summer, and while Alexa’s in-ring ability leaves a lot to be desired, I think Ronda can find a way to make it work. Overall, the match exceeded my expectations, and I’m very interested to see where the division goes next. ***1/4

Braun Stromwan def. Kofi Kingston, Kevin Owens, Finn Balor, Bobby Roode, The Miz, Rusev and Samoa Joe – Money In The Bank Ladder Match

Eh, I guess.

This really wasn’t a ladder match so much as it was a 7 on 1 handicap match. The literal entire story of the match was everybody ganging up on Strowman but to no avail. I don’t have an issue with Strowman holding the briefcase, because he’s Braun Strowman. The issue with not only him, but Alexa holding the briefcase is that two people who didn’t need the briefcase took it. Alexa Bliss and Braun Strowman have enough credibility to get title matches without needing to run down the aisle in a briefcase in hand. Couldn’t superstars like Becky Lynch, Rusev, Samoa Joe or others get the briefcase to stir the pot a bit? I mean, look at Stroman’s size. Look at what he did in this match. He ran through the entire competition. So why does he need to have a briefcase to carry along? And RAW’s top champion is Brock Lesnar, and he barely appears on RAW, so what good is the briefcase anyway unless it’s on a PPV?

Overall, like I said, the ladder match really wasn’t a ladder match and nobody else really did anything. Yeah, you had Owens take a dive and Finn fly for a modified version of his finisher, but I probably didn’t enjoy this as others may have. It wasn’t horrible or anything, and the formula was quite good. I just wanted some of the other superstars featured a bit more in the match. ***1/2

Conclusion:

This show could have benefited from trimming the fat a bit. The Lashley squash, Cass/Bryan, and Roman/Jinder were all completely unnecessary and just made this PPV longer than it really needed to be. I felt like if WWE just stuck with both women’s title matches, the WWE Title match, both ladder matches and the IC Title match, this show would have been a good recommendation. But this was just too long for me to get through and I’m tired of WWE insisting on this philosophy that more content equals a better show. Overall, there was more good than bad, so I can say thumbs up, but this really could have used 1 to 1 and a half hours removed from the show. Until next time, y’all.

 

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