That might be the worst Meltzer rating I've ever seen

becky natalya rating blows my mind

Are we sure that wasn't 0.325?

Lynch vs Natalya was just a "take one for the team" match put in the worst spot on the card. Outside of the main event, nothing could have possibly topped or even equaled a predictably great match in the great Owens/Zayn feud. Don't think it was worth 3.25 stars but there were good reasons why the crowd was dead that weren't related to how good the work in the match was, and the match did what it was designed to do.

That sounds like a good argument for giving it 2.5 stars instead of 2. Maybe.

I would probably give it two stars or so as well. Basic cooldown spot on the card match in a basic feud with simple booking designed to keep the heel credible for more matches in a weak, thin Smackdown women's division. They were asked to bunt the runner over to second and got the bunt down.

I remember the work in that match being really bad from Nattie's end, and I always want to like her and tend to view her a bit more charitably than others do. It never felt like the dead crowd was the whole reason that match sucked.

What I saw was a match that was methodical/slow on purpose, not a match filled with botches or mistakes.

NXT TAKEOVER: BROOKLYN II

No Way Jose vs. Austin Aries: Well-worked match. Really liked Austin's suicide dive in mid-match, loved the finishing combo…it's almost as if combos like that one and the superplex --> falcon arrow should win matches and stuff. Solid opener. **3/4

Billie Kay vs. Ember Moon: They didn't do anything wrong, but didn't draw me in at all. Ember Moon's finisher is pretty great though, so there's that. **1/4

Bobby Roode vs. Andrade Almas: I was entertained. Noted in the sweat thread, but I didn't expect Roode to give up so much offense in a debut match that seemed to have the primary purpose of putting him over…so in terms of doing what it set out to do, I guess I'm not sure it was great in that regard? But again, I was entertained. I'm still just putting it in the middle of the curve. **1/2

Tag Team Titles - The Revival (c) vs. Gargano & Ciampa: Loved the match. Got quite invested in the challengers' attempt to win the titles. Kept falling for more false finishes than I should have, and even thought the last submission spot might not be it. Was a really engaging story on top of the action being strong. ****

Women's Title - Asuka (c) vs. Bayley: I liked the match, but not nearly as much as their encounter at Takeover: Dallas. The underdog story of Bayley in this match was just missing a little something…I think most of my investment in pulling for her was purely based on past great work. But again, I think it was a good match. ***1/4

NXT Title - Samoa Joe (c) vs. Shinsuke Nakamura: I liked the way they worked this match, but sort of like with Asuka-Bayley, the match story never went anywhere all that interesting. The musclebuster kickout legitimately drops the rating of this one by at least a quarter-star, and then the kickout by Joe a moment later on the running knee, with Nakamura ****ing announcing to the crowd "hey this isn't the real finish" (with his body)…that whole 90 seconds or whatever, right before the end, put me off of this. In general I still probably liked the action of this slightly better than Asuka-Bayley, but I liked the booking of that one better enough that I'm dropping this in below it. ***

NXT Takeover: Brooklyn II

Austin Aries vs No Way Jose: * * 1/2

A solid opener. Nothing overly special, nothing bad, just a perfect example of an average/2.5 star match. The most surprising aspect to me was that NWJ looked pretty solid. Excited to see how his development goes.


Ember Moon vs Billie Kay: * * 1/4

It's not that it was bad really. Just nothing really exciting. Felt like the whole match was just waiting for the cool finisher we all knew was coming.



Bobby Roode vs Andrade Almas: * * 3/4

I liked this. It was a glorified enhancement match (though Almas did get more offense than I expected) and the finish with the pumphandle slam was a little weak, but the crowd was into it from the start and both looked good. I think Almas is actually pretty solid and as he gets more comfortable with the WWE style I think he'll start to excel. Entrance for Roode was GLORIOUS.


Tag Team Title Match
The Revival (c) vs Gargano & Ciampa: * * * * 1/2

I am a huge fan of what the Revival are able to do. They excel at doing the small things that make tag team matches really work. They cut off the ring, they isolate opponents, they try and prevent tags, and they do it with a viciousness that just works. I feel like the WWE has a lot of tag team matches that are basically just each individual coming in and doing their cool spots and at some point one of them wins and it never feels that different than various 1 on 1 matches. The Revival are different. Can't forget about Gargano and Ciampa here either. They did an awesome job as the faces and I loved that it was Ciampa getting a lot of the isolated beatdown trying to tag in Gargano. There were a number of believeable near falls, a fantastic story told in the ring, and the ending made you feel for the faces. Just an all around excellent job by all involved.

Fun fact: Revival were the only heels to actually get heat during the Takeover. They are amazing at their job.




Women's Title
Asuka (c) vs Bayley: * * *

I though the match was good, but much worse than their previous affair.



NXT Title
Samoa Joe (c) vs Shinsuke Nakamura: * * * 1/4

It's funny to say I was disappointed by a match I rated 3.25, but here we are. The entrance was incredible, the action was good, and the result was nice, but I kept feeling that it was missing ... something. I still can't figure out what that something was, but I just never got into it the way I should have.

Summerslam 2016


JeriKO vs Enzo and Cass: * * * 1/4

A great start to the night. I love both these teams, they had good chemistry, they got the crowd hyped and into it, the pop up codebreaker is a sweet idea, and the in ring banter was top notch. "Dont let him tag in the big one! He hits too hard!" and the Enzo shuffle by KO being my favorites. It was a bit sloppy at times, but thats ok.



Women's Title
Sasha Banks (c) vs Charlotte: * * * 3/4

A few sloppy spots brought it down from the 4 I almost had it at (the turnbuckle drop and the huracarrana spot where Sasha landed on her head). It told a good story with the focus on the back of Sasha, ring work was good apart from those two spots, and hell even the ending is something I'm ok with now that I know it wasn't the planned ending according to Meltzer until Sasha decided she needed to rest up. Not as good as the Mania match (nor the Raw match a couple weeks ago) but still one of the best matches on the card.



IC Title
The Miz (c) vs Apollo Crews: * * 1/2

This was fine. There wasn't really anything wrong with it. It was just a bit bland and I had no investment in it. Crews can be solid in the ring but it's hard to care about him. Miz is great.


AJ Styles vs John Cena: * * * * *

That's my first fiver I believe. I loved everthing about this one. It had the big match feel that you really only get with Cena or Lesnar in the WWE over the last couple years. Crowd was crazy into it. Announcing was surprisingly acceptable during it. The story of each of them progressively busting out bigger and bigger moves trying to put the other away was done extremely well I think. STF and Calf Crushers didn't work, so Cena busted out a sunset flip and AJ busted out some move I've never seen him do before that was like an AA into a neckbreaker with his knee. Neither of those worked so AJ hit the forearm and Cena hit a top rope leg drop. Those didn't work so Cena dug down and hit the top rope AA that has ended so many matches/feuds (including beating AJ at battleground) and AJ flat kicked out. The disbelief on Cena's face was done great, the announcers put it over great, and AJ hitting a clash into a forearm for the clean as a whistle win was great.

Sometimes I feel that "line up bigger and bigger moves until one wins" is done pretty crappy like a spotfest with no real psychology around it, but this one meshed perfectly with the entire feud/specific match story being told. Just amazing. I've watched it 3 more times since Sunday. It's Tuesday. It's my match of the year so far thanks to the combo of ring work, psychology, announcing, and crowd involvement.



Tag Titles
New Day (c) vs The Club: *

This was just really bad on all fronts. The Jon Stewart intro wasn't good, his involvement wasn't good, the entire premise wasn't good when Big E is there ready to wrestle, and the feud leading up to it wasn't good. Very disappointed given I like both teams well enough. Gallows and Anderson are people I hope don't start floundering now that AJ was taken away.




WWE Title
Dean Ambrose (c) vs Dolph Ziggler: * * *

This one got bumped up a bit after rewatching. It was rather flat crowd wise and I felt flat watching it, but I think part of that was just being exhausted after AJ/Cena and then getting the garbage before this. Dean wrestled pretty interestingly as a heel. Was more aggressive and his mocking Ziggler spots were solid. Crowd was completely dead here though and the finish left a lot to be desired. It felt a lot like the Ambrose/Lesnar disappointment, as the entire build up was about what its going to take to put away the challenger and the result was "the same finishing move that put away everone else no big deal". I do think watching it a second time made the thing more enjoyable though.



Natalya, Alexa Bliss, and Nikki Bella vs Becky Lynch, Naomi, and Carmella: * * 1/4

For a 6 women tag match in a cool down spot, and for a match that involved essentially a stinkface, the rest of this was actually pretty decent. Liked becky's quick suplexes, Alexa was pretty decent, and Nikki was pretty good. Much better than I thought itd be.




Universal Title
Finn Balor vs Seth Rollins: * * * 1/4

The crowd was completely out of it for this one thanks to being more focused on the belt. I was kind of checked out as well in real time after hour #8 of wrestling over the previous 2 nights. But rewatching this the match was actually pretty solid. Rollins was great (Gods last gift!) as always and Finn was fine for what he is. I definitely think its one of Rollins' worst matches in a while and put the blame on Finn, but hell it still was pretty enjoyable.



Brock Lesnar vs Randy Orton: * 1/2

Idk. I'm probably in the minority, but I just don't give a damn about Brock anymore. Come in, suplexes, take a little offense, kill someone was fun two years ago but that's all it is still. I'm also not a huge fan of the ending. Not just from a show perspective, but conceptually as well. We don't need to have him busting people open the hard way for us to know he's a bad ass. We know he's a bad ass. Just don't really need to see Brock elbowing people in the head until they bleed in my wrestling. The table spots were cool though.

SUMMERSLAM 2016

JeriKO vs. Enzo & Cass: Was a reasonably fun little opener. Jericho and especially Owens kept the heat segment entertaining, liked the finish even though it didn't have the best execution. **1/2

Women's Title - Sasha Banks (c) vs. Charlotte: This was great. The early botches actually helped the match story after that early rope spot that Sasha looked to be potentially be legit hurt on. It told the story of a champ in trouble who couldn't get back on the rails. Eventually she did, and then they pull out a great ending spot. Strong booking to give Charlotte the belt back and also keep it looking fluky to prolong the feud beyond the auto-rematch idiocy. ****

IC Title - Miz (c) vs. Apollo Crews: This wasn't the most compelling match, mostly because Crews just was not a believable title contender, but it was well-booked and the ringwork was decent. **

AJ Styles vs. John Cena: As much as I don't like the match model of escalating superman kickouts, and upon further reflection do agree with the criticism that this occasionally felt spotfest-like, the action here was tremendous, a huge step up from their prior matchup, and it feels like they used the first-ever super AA kickout well after all this time; it was sort of a meta-rub from prior Cena feuds that had turned formulaic. Loved the match. ****

Tag Titles - New Day (c) vs. Gallows & Anderson: This was trash. I'll be generous and keep it above zero because of Kofi's beastmode tribute on the backward dive over the top rope. 1/4*

WWE Title - Dean Ambrose (c) vs. Dolph Ziggler: Complete and total bust. Should have stuck with my initial reaction to them setting this up as a WWE Title match for SummerSlam. Really pretty surprised that they didn't even attempt to do anything interesting from a character standpoint, but…whatever. 1/2*

Six-Woman Tag: More garbage. Kinda cool to see Nikki Bella back, but nothing in the match entertained me. 1/4*

Universal Title - Finn Balor vs. Seth Rollins: Honestly I didn't watch closely enough to really give a rating to this one; I was fatigued by this point in the night. N/A

Randy Orton vs. Brock Lesnar: The usual Lesnar match model has gotten a bit tired, but I wasn't totally bored by this…I'll just land it in the middle because it was watchable in its own unique way despite not being particularly good. **1/2

Brock/Orton: Brock matches are difficult to rate because the bulk of his matches are the heat segment until the comeback. And those are always the same and are very boring.

The reason his match with Roman was good was because of everything that happened after his ring post shot.

With Orton, the match was same old, same old until the RKO on the table. I actually believed Brock could lose after that, which is not something that often happens in his matches. So of course they ruin it by having a non-ending, without the possibility of the feud continuing (both because they are on separate shows and because Brock is part-time).

So do you rate it based on the 1.5 star squash portion? Or the 3.5 star Orton portion? Or the nonsensical ending? I don't know. 2.5 stars, I guess.

Cena/AJ was a solid 4.25 to 4.5 star match. Since I shouldn't waffle, I'll round up to 4.5 because of the clean ending.

Finn/Seth was disappointing for a Seth match. But still pretty good. 3.5 stars.

I didn't catch anything before AJ/Cena and the other matches aren't worth rating.

After watching the major matches I think the best match of the weekend (hot take alert) was Asuka/Bayley. It actually felt like a back and forth fight, not a scripted "you kick out then I kick out" fest. AJ vs Cena was good but I don't think it will hold up as much over time and then didn't fully exploit possible storylines with Cena in the twilight of his career and as described above was the "escalating Superman kickouts" model. Bayley/Asuka storytelling was superb.

Yeah I don't disagree

I think the Cena/styles match was very good and entertaining devolved into a finisher kickout fest too quickly

I liked the storytelling in Sasha-Charlotte quite a bit better than either, but I agree that on storyline alone, Asuka-Bayley was better than Cena-Styles.

Meltzer's ratings:

Summerslam
Smackdown Tag: **3/4
Zayn/Neville vs. Dudleys **
Jeircho/Owens vs. Enzo/Cass **3/4
Charlotte vs. Sasha **3/4
Miz vs. Crews **
Styles vs. Cena ****1/2
Club vs. New Day **
Ambrose vs. Ziggler **3/4
Smackdown Womens Tag **
Balor vs. Rollins ****
Orton vs. Lesnar ***

Takeover
Aries vs. Jose **3/4
Moon vs. Kay *1/2
Roode vs. Almas **3/4
Gargano/Ciampa vs. Revival ****1/2
Asuka vs. Bayley ****
Nakamura vs. Joe ****1/4

Definitely can't get on board with the notion of Sasha-Charlotte only being the seventh-best match of the weekend, but individually none of those ratings is completely outrageous I guess.

I assume he downgraded Sasha-Charlotte for the botches that I thought actually helped the match story along.

I'd like to see Jim and LKJ argue about the Ziggler match for a half hour, I feel like that would be good entertainment.

There are people who can enjoy a match that occurs in front of a crowd that doesn't give a ****, and there are people who can't. I imagine, just based on our disparate ratings, that Jim is in the former category and I'm in the latter.

Yeah, basically in real time I was dead for it just like the crowd. Then when I rewatched fresh I thought the match itself was enjoyable even if the crowd didn't give a **** and it didn't follow the build up at all (similar to ambrose/lesnar at mania). I enjoyed seeing heelish Dean being a dick and mocking Ziggler as well. I'm glad it was a one of though.

On a related note, the crowd being good does add a ton. I think they were a big part of why I went full five to AJ/Cena even if it did evolve into a couple big kickout spots (though I do think it turning into that made a lot of sense for the build and they told the story of it progressing to that extremely well).

I did not like Dean's dickishness during the match, because, like with the promo build to the match, it felt like it was foreshadowing some sort of interesting character payoff for Ziggler that never came. Dolph's reaction to getting clowned on like that before being beaten convincingly was to get mad enough to...attack AJ Styles the following Tuesday night. And then lose to him. And now Dolph's back exactly where he was, when the whole interest in that match should have been that they might make him interesting again.

Like, people gripe about Stephanie slapping wrestlers and never getting her comeuppance as "burying" them, but I've never seen an instance of that that compares to the way Dolph got his balls clipped off during that feud.

Whole build was a good variation of
Dolph: "I'm going to beat you."
Dean: "No you're not. You're just some guy who bounces around the ring. You're not that good."

Then the match was Dean winning convincingly while not even taking the match seriously, and Dolph doesn't snap or anything. They've managed to not make me care about Ziggler anymore anyway, but if I actually still did then I would be quite angry about that incredible level of burial. "Bury" gets thrown around way, way too much, but that was a true burial, particularly in combination with him just getting beaten cleanly again two nights later.

It's for that reason that, while I enjoyed their promo work, I pointed out at the time that it's not great to have Dean saying actually true **** like that about Dolph if they're not going to pay it off with Dolph either overcoming those words or turning heel or something. Admittedly something like that could still happen, but right now it all looks awful to me.

Smackdown did have a lot of mentions of him failing in his last chance again at the end vs Styles, so I am hoping for something to come from that as well. Do agree that if this is the end of it with no further development from Ziggler the promos kind of buried him. There was a tweet I posted in the summerslam thread that was basically saying "when you're reaching down for that one last move, digging deep for one last thing to do ... youll just casually hit the dirty deeds and ill lose" which kind of hit that point pretty well.

Though I do think Ambrose took it seriously. Thought it wrestled a lot more aggressive than usual (and I'm hoping it's not just because he was supposed to be heelish and now he'll go back to doing his terrible rope spots and punch sequences).

I equate the clowning with not taking it seriously. Through his taunting, etc., he kept basically non-verbally repeating his same "you're not good enough" promos. And then Dolph wasn't good enough. I suppose that's semantics about seriousness though.

I think that DWetzel was kidding or something by the way, but here we are.