Battleground:
Bayley/Sasha vs Charlotte/Dana: * * * 1/4
It started with a solid feel good moment to see Bayley make her debut (which was enhanced by the crowd going nuts and Sasha being so happy for her), went immediately into a pretty good heel heat moment when they attacked her from behind, had good action throughout, and ended with Sasha making Charlotte tap out to huge cheers yet again. I do think the crowd being so into this one made me score it a bit higher than it would otherwise, but I enjoyed it from start to finish.
New Day vs Wyatts: * * *
This is mostly due to the wonderful job Xavier did selling the match. It gave a serious side to the New Day, enhanced the mystique of the Wyatts (which hasn't happened in a while), had a good story with Xavier facing his fears and going ape****, and then had a good result for the heel going to smackdown that needed some sort of credible win. Plus, Big E doing some form of overhead suplex throw (I am not a technical person
) on Rowan was sweet.
Rusev vs Ryder: * * 3/4
Another good in ring story about someone that Rusev wasn't giving respect taking him further than he thought. Some good offense from Ryder and a good end sequence with Ryder escaping the Accolade only to get put into the super Accolade. Post match segment was weird though.
Sami Zayn vs Kevin Owens: * * * 3/4
The start was a little sluggish (though that could be due to shaking off an early botch) but the last 10ish minutes were awesome. I'm a broken record tonight, but there was another good in ring story going on here with Sami finally mustering up the kill shot needed to beat KO. I wonder if they got new road agents recently. Some great spots, crowd was into it, and a nice result for Sami finally putting KO down.
Becky vs Natalya: 1/4 *
I like Becky a lot but this was bad. Crowd didn't care, tons of rest holds, one sided domination that made little sense, and nothing special that stands out. Props to her for selling her leg later with an ice pack in the locker room shots. I think we can all piece together the problem in the womens division lately. Triple threat at mania? Great. Charlotte vs Natalya? Bad. Charlotte/Sasha stuff tonight? Great. Becky/Natalya? Bad. tsk tsk.
Miz vs Darren Young: * *
I don't think there was anything in the ring that was
bad, but nothing really excited me either. Add in a super weird ending that was confusing and you're left with just meh. I don't think it's a bad look on Young (who I like with Bob) nor on Miz (who I like a lot since becoming IC champ). I just don't think the meshed great.
The Club vs Cena/Enzo/Cass: * * * 1/4
Opening promo was insane. Enzo is just tops on the mic right now. Some good (albeit choreographed) action throughout. AJ getting turned inside out by the big boot from Cass was great. I kind of enjoyed both teams kind of ****ing up and hitting teammates (which never happens in these matches despite it being chaotic). The string of finishers sequence seemed a bit "raw-y" but meh. Enjoyed Enzos offense be "getting thrown into people by Cass". Ending spot was done well as instead of having someone corpsing from the top rope, AJ was fighting it all the way to the AA.
Ambrose vs Reigns vs Rollins: * * * 1/4
I think this match had two problems overall: first that the expectations/hype for this match was incredibly high due to people waiting for it for 3 years and so it was hard to live up to it and second with all the locker room/gm's out there everyone was just waiting for nonsense to occur. Even though none did occur, it kind of took me out of a couple near falls throughout because I was waiting for something to happen (and was also kind of surprised when it did end).
With that said, the match was still good. Reigns wrestled well (minus his no selling of a move that put Sting out). Ambrose was good and looked more vicious (like he used to be) rather than having the weak shane-like punches. Rollins was awesome as usual. I really enjoyed the powerbomb tease into the powerbomb spot into the chair shots. Was a nice walk through Shield history. There were also some pretty good spots throughout. The ending worked for me. Dirty Deeds is being protected like no other finisher in like a decade. Shane/Dbry putting over Ambrose was unlike how any authority figure has treated a wrestler in a long long time and is hopefully the first of many like that. The locker room coming out to celebrate was a nice little touch of making the title seem like a big deal again.
I'm not the biggest Ambrose fan but I don't think I'm his biggest hater either. I am all aboard the WWE running with a face champion that large swashes of the crowd doesn't completely despise. If you ignore the one month reign pre injury from Bryan and ignore Brocks reign where he wasn't around much and was more of a heel/tweener than a face, you have to go back to around 2011-2012 for Punk for this. Run with it. We all know how hard it is to find a well liked face these days. It helps that his overall crowd enjoyment has happened organically instead of being manufactured too. Always coming so close and yet failing (survivor series tournament, royal rumble 2nd place, good match with HHH, the dusty finish vs rollins) made most of the fans rally behind him and be thrilled when he won it.
Totally cool with seeing where this goes.
Overall, really enjoyed the show. One of the better worked/booked ppvs in a while.