Thursday, March 28, 2024
EditorialWWE WrestleMania 37 Night One Review and Match Ratings

WWE WrestleMania 37 Night One Review and Match Ratings

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Bobby Lashley (C) def. Drew McIntyre – WWE Championship

Wow. If I do say so myself, that result was legitimately surprising. Yes, on paper, someone like Bobby Lashley shouldn’t be losing his first major WWE Title defense. But the story going into this match was Drew McIntyre wanting to get the moment that was stolen from him last year, at WrestleMania is the place where feel good moments happen. I suppose that this just goes to show that WWE can always throw us a curveball and that things that appear obvious aren’t so obvious.

With that said, the match was pretty damn good, and one of the best WrestleMania openers in recent memory. It wasn’t a masterclass like Owen and Bret, this was just a good, physical match that saw plenty of drama and solid sequences. Drew’s consistent reversals out of the Hurt Lock was also pretty solid as well. We even saw Drew bust out the Kimura Lock, a signature move of the man he defeated for the title last year, Brock Lesnar.

I wasn’t a fan of WWE prematurely breaking up the Hurt Business, because it primarily revolved around the story that Bobby was afraid of Drew and that he couldn’t handle anything on his own. That story shouldn’t work for a man who looks like Bobby Lashley. With that said, this was a pretty big win for him, and I do kinda feel for Drew. What I do probably know is that these two aren’t done yet, and WWE will have big moments for Drew down the line. Tonight wasn’t his night, but with that, a great opener for an eager crowd. ****

Natalya and Tamina Win Tag Team Turmoil

Wasn’t really feeling this one, nor was I feeling the winners. It was a bit rough around the edges, and botched a-plenty, even by the ring announcer. I will forgive some of the errors though, seeing as how everyone is sort of operating weirdly with the rain delay. Natalya and Tamina are a weird choice, because I don’t think they are established faces or heels. So when they challenge Nia Jax and Shayna Baszler tomorrow, who does the crowd cheer for? There really is no heat for either team, so I hope it doesn’t suffer too much. I was really thinking The Riott Squad was going to win because they had the crowd going.

Anyways, I suppose you could call this inoffensive at best, but it got a little rough around the edges at times. **

Cesaro def. Seth Rollins

Some very, very, VERY good stuff here and a lot to like. The story of Rollins avoiding Cesaro’s swing and Cesaro’s bad arm preventing him from doing the swing itself was pretty good and I loved how they played it up. In addition, some of the reversals in this match were just incredible. The amount of upper body strength to perform what Rollins and Cesaro were doing to each other in this match was incredible. But what I probably loved most of all was the ending sequence. Cesaro realized that he could use his arms to swing Rollins around, so instead he decides to hoist him on his shoulders where he’s strong enough to use his arm and give his arm time to recover for the finish.

This match was just unbelievably well-done, and most of all, the right guy won in the end. Rollins doesn’t look any weaker or lose any of his stock based off of this lost and putting Cesaro over here was absolutely the right call. But now is the time to follow up on this victory. Last time when WWE attempted a Cesaro push after winning the Andre The Giant Memorial Battle Royal at WrestleMania 30, his push and pairing with Paul Heyman effectively ended within a few months. They gotta make Cesaro look like a big deal on SmackDown and build the credibility up for him to potentially challenge for the Universal Title down the line. But tonight was a great start, and the match was well done. I would have liked the match to go about 3-5 more minutes, though. ****

AJ Styles and Omos def. The New Day (C) – RAW Tag Team Championships

This match felt more like a Handicap Match as I had anticipated. Dave Meltzer had reported that there were not-so encouraging reports on Omos’ training. Fortunately, they kept a formula for Omos so basic that he would have to be completely beyond help to screw up. Just stand still, give some menacing looks, toss them around a few times, and execute a couple of backbreakers, and get the one legged pin.

r3Simple enough, and they did just that. I did feel as though they padded a bit of time in between sequences, but Omos’ inexperience will get better with time. The crowd popped when he got the tag, so over time, he can build his confidence and work on his mobility. The match was just basically AJ bumping himself around and trying to tag Omos. It was okay for what it was. **1/2

Braun Strowman def. Shane McMahon – Steel Cage Match

Hey guys, so I’ve been called stupid before and I don’t feel that Braun Strowman’s victory tonight did anything for me. How about you guys? If anything, I must say that Braun is stupid for not having a contingency plan for Jaxson Ryker and Elias and Shane is stupid for not just dropping to the floor when he had the match won and Braun was knocked out. Hell, this entire feud was stupid.

I guess the reason why I couldn’t get into the match much is because Braun just isn’t believably as a sympathetic underdog babyface against a 50+ year old co-owner of the company he works for. Does that make a little bit of sense? The match was really just a lot of gimmicks and weapon shots that was all building up to the big bump we were anticipating Shane to take. Truth be told, it was underwhelming. Like, I knew he was probably going to get chucked off the cell, but I thought they’d have something more creative. Hell, I’d take a running powerslam from the top rope. Oh well, at least Braun won. **

Bad Bunny and Damian Priest def. The Miz and John Morrison

This was seriously better than any right it had to be. Triple H lauded Bunny’s devotion and commitment to his training and taking WWE seriously, and it showed here. He seriously looked fantastic. Now, I know a lot of people will inevitably get upset that a celebrity all of a sudden starts coming in and performing Canadian explorers and pinning a 2 time WWE Champion at WrestleMania. However, we must also understand that this is the business of sports entertainment. This is a regular thing. It happened with Stephen Amell, and it’s happened here with Bunny as well. But did you hear that crowd reaction? They were eating him up.

Then, there’s Damian Priest, who also looked very good as well. As for Miz and Morrison, we need to make sure we give them their flowers and respect for making Bunny look like a million bucks. They kept the formula simple, but Bunny brought great energy. Damian Priest was a perfect tag partner for him. I thought it was interesting they decided to have Bunny be the face in distress and let Priest get the hot tag as opposed to the other way around since Bunny has less experience. But he looked like an absolute pro. I suspect this won’t be the last time WWE utilizes Bunny, and I’m actually expecting this to continue and perhaps build towards a singles match between Bunny and Miz. Maybe at Summerslam. That said, very well done and surprisingly entertaining tag team match. ***3/4

Bianca Belair def. Sasha Banks (C) – SmackDown Women’s Championship

All things considered, the end result never really was in question the moment this was announced as the main event. Overall, I thought this was a very well-worked and very good main event. These two absolutely came in ready to kill it, and they showed why they earned the main event slot for night one. This was a battle of Sasha’s technical prowess and heel tendencies against Belair’s power and athleticism, and it made for a great combination.

That hair whip by Bianca sounded absolutely brutal, like a gunshot going off, and it showed with the nasty looking scar that Sasha got. Seeing the emotion that both women were going through right as the bell was about to ring wa also a nice choice, as it goes to show how much this main event means to them.

I didn’t have any gripes with the match specifically, but I would have liked to have seen more instances of Sasha almost winning, because throughout the match, Sasha’s offense never felt like it was going to put Bianca away past the Bank Statement attempts. I think if it was a bit more balanced in that regard, it would have been a bit better and more drama-filled. But even with that, Sasha was great in controlling the flow, and Bianca’s countering with her strength was well done. Very, very solid main event with the right one going over. ***3/4

Conclusion:

Night One of WrestleMania essentially had everyone running like chickens without their collective hearts with the rain delay, and as you can see, there were moments sprinkled throughout the night where everyone wasn’t in sync. In spite of all the confusion and the on-the-fly improvising that had to be done, I think everyone handled it about as well as possible.

As for the matches themselves, it was a very good night with nothing I inherently hated. W had some very, very good performances in the opener, Rollins/Cesaro and the main event. However, the surprise of the night by far was Bad Bunny and Damian Priest going out there and killing it in their first WrestleMania match against an experienced tag team in Miz and Morrison. I don’t think anyone can complain about anything from an in-ring perspective, and Night 1 really set a great tone and anticipation for what is coming on Night Two. Great stuff all around. I’ll give my final thoughts on the entire show after the conclusion of Night Two.

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