10. Triple H (C) vs. Shawn Michaels vs. Goldberg vs. Chris Jericho vs. Kevin Nash vs. Randy Orton – World Heavyweight Championship (Summerslam 2003)
In the midst of Triple H’s stronghold over the RAW brand from 2002-2005, he would often go prolonged stretches with the World Heavyweight Championship with Evolution in tow. The overarching story of this Chamber match was the emergence of Goldberg as a threat to the World Heavyweight Championship. Seeing Goldberg dominate the competition in such brutal fashion was very entertaining to see, as he laid waste to Orton, Michaels, and Jericho in rapid succession.
The pacing of the match was solid, as we started with Jericho and Michaels, and a very young Orton getting involved in the action with his athleticism, followed by Kevin Nash laying waste to everyone. The reason why the match is ranked so low is that I am not a finish of Goldberg running through essentially everyone just to have him get one-shot by Triple H’s sledgehammer. Despite that, I thought this accomplished the job of establishing Goldberg as a monster while giving exposure to RAW’s other marquee names.
9. The Undertaker vs. Batista vs. MVP vs. Finlay vs. Big Daddy V vs. The Great Khali (No Way Out 2008)
This is admittedly a bit of a guilty pleasure of mine, simply because I loved the ending sequence with Undertaker and Batista, essentially culminating their rivalry that was boiling over from the previous year. This Elimination Chamber match is a bit unorthodox in its style because of its abundance of super-heavyweights with Big Daddy V and The Great Khali. This is definitely a much slower paced chamber match that others, but I think it worked in the context of the match.
You had multiple superstars work together to try and get the bigger guys out, and you even had high spots such as Undertaker chokeslamming MVP from the top of one of the pods right onto his back. Finlay was also game for a physical outing, as he always is. This certainly isn’t one of the more memorable chamber matches you’ll see, but it outshined its RAW counterpart on this night, and it did a good job of shielding the clear weakness in star power by starting out with Batista and Undertaker, and ending with those very same 2 with a main event WrestleMania match against Edge up for grabs, which The Undertaker would claim in the end.
8. Randy Orton vs. Chris Jericho vs. Jack Swagger vs. Kane vs. Daniel Bryan vs. Mark Henry (Elimination Chamber 2013)
This is another unorthodox Elimination Chamber match as you had the tag team champions at this time, Kane and Daniel Bryan, enter as separate competitors. The winner of this match had a World Heavyweight Championship match at WrestleMania against Alberto Del Rio lined up for them, and since Swagger was the only heel that made sense to fight him, it seemed everything was lined up for him to win, and he did. How we got there was very well executed. Mark Henry was entering another heel run, and he established dominance early by eliminating Daniel Bryan and Kane in rapid succession. It also took help from Chris Jericho and Randy Orton in order to eliminate him.
Then, Jericho and Orton had a pretty sweet sequence of reversals before Orton got the better of Jericho in knocking him out with an RKO. Then, Swagger takes a page out of Carlito’s book by quickly rolling up Orton after that elimination to secure the victory. It was a clever way to protect Orton while giving the victory to Swagger, who, at the time, was the rightful victor. Of course, this also led to a snoozefest between Swagger and Del Rio at WM 29, but this match was filled with solid storytelling moments and great action all around.
7. Edge (C) vs. Rey Mysterio vs. Drew McIntyre vs. Kane vs. Wade Barrett vs. The Big Show – World Heavyweight Championship (Elimination Chamber 2011)
This would be Edge’s 2nd to last PPV match, and it was quite the doozy. Looking at this match, it’s hard to believe how much Drew has changed from 8 years ago, eh? He looks like a college graduate. Anyways, the match for the middle part is not all that special. Kane and The Big Show came in and do what they normally do in Elimination Chamber matches, and that is to usually dominate for a solid while before being eliminated by the contributions of multiple competitors.
What carries this match is the first and last two competitors in the match, Edge and Rey Mysterio. These two developed tremendous chemistry as opponents and as tag team partners over the years, and the sequences involving them were absolutely electric. You could absolutely buy any of the false finishes to end the match, and it took multiple efforts by Edge just to put Rey Mysterio away. If I were to tell you any arbitrary reason to watch this match, it is just to see those two go at it and kill each other. It wasn’t likely that anyone other than Edge was winning anyway. So seeing the journey getting to the finish was great to see.
6. Randy Orton (C) vs. Daniel Bryan vs. Sheamus vs. John Cena vs. Cesaro vs. Christian – WWE World Heavyweight Championship (Elimination Chamber 2014)
The drama of this match was a bit weighed down due to the fact that WWE had Randy lose to every other competitor in the match not named Christian in the weeks leading up to this bout. This all but guaranteed that Orton was walking out the champion. At this point, Daniel Bryan was white hot in his career, and many wanted him to win the title here. It was the right call to have Randy retain simply because the payoff was worth it and it meant much more that he lost here. However, he wasn’t even confirmed to be in the WrestleMania main event anyways, so I understand the concern from that perspective.
Getting to the actual match, it was very well done, as Orton wanted to get away from any competition and Sheamus had to force him out. You had some pretty neat wrestling sequences with Cesaro and Bryan, and Cena did what Cena does. Also, Christian pinning Sheamus with a top rope frog splash was especially precious to me because I vividly remember Sheamus always going over Christian one on one just before this match. Sheamus was just also especially annoying as a face.
The interference to end this match was a bit much, especially considering the Elimination Chamber is designed specifically to prevent such things from happening, but I did understand why they did. Bryan needing 2 RKO’s to put him away also made him look very strong in the process. Some great drama towards the end here.
5. Triple H (C) vs. Shawn Michaels vs. Chris Jericho vs. Rob Van Dam vs. Kane vs. Booker T – World Heavyweight Championship (Survivor Series 2002)
This match is particularly memorable for a variety of reasons. Not only was this the first ever Elimination Chamber match, but this was also the last time (believe it or not), where Shawn Michaels would win a World Championship and Rob Van Dam collapsed Triple H’s throat with a Five Star Frog Splash gone awry. So, it’s safe to say that this was a pretty eventful match. Initially, I always look to this chamber match when I talk about which one is the greatest of all time, and while it is still great, hindsight tells me I may have overrated it a bit slightly.
I was not exactly a fan of how telegraphed some of the spots were, especially with guys like Booker T and Rob Van Dam. It had the pacing of a RAW match at times. Van Dam’s elimination was also kind of anti-climatic, as all that was needed to eliminate him in a chamber match was a top rope flying dropkick. However, as the match went on, we got to see more of the brutality of the chamber given to us. Triple H and Shawn Michaels especially took quite the beating here. Kane was relatively dominant in the time that he was in, and Chris Jericho played a great third party to HBK and Triple H. Sequences with Shawn and Triple H seldom fail, and it didn’t here, as HBK won the title looking like a bloodied soccer mom.
4. The Undertaker (C) vs. Chris Jericho vs. Rey Mysterio vs. CM Punk vs. R-Truth vs. John Morrison – World Heavyweight Championship (Elimination Chamber 2010)
Historians will remember this as the match where The Undertaker was nearly burnt alive before the match as a terrible botch with Undertaker’s entrance pyro caused him to suffer some pretty bad burns and needed bottles of water to douse himself while waiting in the chamber pod. If you ever doubted how professional and tough as nails he was during his peak, look no further than that moment.
As you can probably tell from the personnel in this match, there was a bit of a quicker pace here since Undertaker was the only big man here. John Morrison had an especially impressive showing here, as he thrives in environments where he is forced to utilize his parkour training to the test. R-Truth was sort of an addition just for the sake of having a sixth man. The interactions between CM Punk and Rey Mysterio were pretty neat as well, as they were embroiled in a feud at the time (though if you asked me, they shouldn’t have had a decisive pinfall between these two since they were fighting at WrestleMania).
Then we go to the winner of the match, Chris Jericho, who carried things along nicely throughout the duration of the match and held his own with The Undertaker towards the end. Of course, Shawn Michaels found a literal loophole in the Chamber, escaping from underneath, knocking Undertaker on his ass, and costing him the World Title, which would lead to their clash at WrestleMania 26. Everything about this match from the utilization of the chamber to the storytelling and perpetuation of feuds makes this a rock solid Chamber match.
3. John Cena (C) vs. AJ Styles vs. Bray Wyatt vs. Baron Corbin vs. Dean Ambrose vs. The Miz – WWE Championship (Elimination Chamber 2017)
This was the first chamber match to feature the brand new structure where the original, circular chain-linked floor design was nixed in lieu of a square design with no chains on the floor, probably to adjust to the new era that they were in. At first, I was really pissed off at the new design because nothing about it reminded me of what the Elimination Chamber was supposed to be about. However, at the time, they had some of the top superstars in the industry doing some of the best work of their careers, including AJ Styles and The Miz.
They began the match dynamic with John Cena and AJ Styles and had Dean Ambrose come along from the ride. I instantly recognized them recycling spots that they had from their triple threat match at No Mercy the previous year, but I still appreciated it because it looked cool as all hell.
Baron Corbin was essentially the “Kane” of the match. This is the big man of the match who imposes his will early but doesn’t last long enough in the match to make a real impact. In this case, he loses via rollup, and then does what Kane or a Kevin Nash would do, and attack everyone else in the match after his time is over.
Everyone played their roles well, but we will all remember this as the day that Bray Wyatt broke through the glass ceiling and won the WWE Championship. It’s a shame that his win was predictable due to the winner of that year’s Rumble, Randy Orton, having one obvious competitor. However, the sight of Bray pinning Cena and Styles back to back, clean, will always be engraved in my memory. A shame where he’s at now.
2. Triple H vs. Edge vs. Chris Jericho vs. Chris Benoit vs. Randy Orton vs. Batista – World Heavyweight Championship (New Year’s Revolution 2005)
If it wasn’t for this chamber match, New Year’s Revolution is easily the worst PPV in WWE history if you ask me. No seriously, if you want to prank somebody for this year’s Halloween, just show them what the undercard for this show was. Anyways, this match is something I never get sick of because it is probably the most star-studded Elimination Chamber match ever. Every man in this match has main evented a WrestleMania, won a World Title, and three of them are Grand Slam Champions. What I also fell in love with to a great degree was the balance of the competitors here. You had the smaller, technical wrestlers in Jericho and Benoit. You had the athletic, taller guys in Orton and Edge, and you had the powerhouses in Batista and Triple H. All of their abilities combined to create a unique experience.
The number of sub-plots in this match carried things along as well. Would Batista take the opportunity to turn on Triple H and win the title for himself if he had to? Would Triple H turn on Batista? Could Benoit or Jericho actually go the distance and steal the title? Can Randy Orton overcome Evolution’s influence in the match? Was this Edge’s big break after months of chasing the World Title? What about the unpredictability of guest referee, Shawn Michaels? I like matches where there are more questions than answers, and this one had a bunch of them.
I also loved the pacing of this match and how each segment took its time. It started out with Jericho and Benoit knife chopping the ever-loving hell out of each other. Then, Triple H came in and was instantly double-teamed by the two Canadians and was holding on, waiting for Batista to make the save. Then, you had Edge come in and spear everyone in sight before HBK cost Edge the match after he missed a potential pinfall on Orton.
At the end, Orton couldn’t overcome Evolution, Batista proved to Triple H that he had his back for now, but Triple H had no problem watching Batista get eliminated, because deep down he knew he probably couldn’t take him, leading to the perfect prelude for their WrestleMaina match. Story-telling, memorable moments and superstars busting their ass. A great showing here.
1. John Cena (C) vs. Rey Mysterio vs. Chris Jericho vs. Kane vs. Mike Knox vs. Edge – World Heavyweight Championship (No Way Out 2009)
We all know this as the match where Edge lost via roll-up to Jeff Hardy in the first Elimination Chamber match of the night and then came back to forcefully insert himself into this match despite not being on the RAW brand at the time. Edge is my favorite superstar ever, so of course I marked the hell out, and while Kofi Kingston got a raw deal here (no pun intended), this is exactly the kind of thing you’d expect Edge to do and why he was always my favorite character.
The MVP of this match is Rey Mysterio, bar none. He carried most of this match, and had beautiful sequences with Chris Jericho and Edge towards the end, outlasting the former. Kane and Mike Knox were the big men of the match and they were able to inflict some damage here as well.
I was kind of surprised that the World Champion coming into this match, John Cena, didn’t really play a prominent role in this match, as he didn’t last nearly as long as we are accustomed to seeing. Of course, he was heavily protected as three finishers were needed to put him away for good. But, we didn’t really get the Super Cena like performance that we were accustomed to seeing in Cena’s hay-day. That, of course, is fine by me. That’s what made Edge, a man not even in the match to begin with, being the one to pin Cena, shocking.
Edge and Rey had a tremendous final sequence towards the end, just like their edition in 2011. Edge would win once again, but Rey pushed him to his limit and it took Edge sending Rey face-first like a torpedo into one of the pods in a brutal looking spot and one final spear to do the trick. It was a great swerve and a great end to what I believe to be the best Elimination Chamber match yet.
What was your favorite chamber match?
