Matt D

This feels like Hogan in the Dungeon of Doom.

Apparently on only one of these counts.

This is what they think is art, old friends.

Congrats to everyone who did NOT vote for either of these two for the WON HOF.

Blame HBK for the NXT main event bullshit. Blame Edge and Orton for this.

I bet you all sure miss Otis now.

The thing about "they could fix this!" is that we have a match like this every year! We hit this point every single year. We start screaming at each other just wishing for the cold release of death during one match ever year. This is what they want. This is what they think is good. It's like childbirth (but less severe, right? I mean it has to be). We have a survival instinct that makes us forget the pain, every year. But this is what they want!

Orton keeps walking under that ladder and giving US bad luck.

They should have had Mauro call this one, but he'd only be allowed to make 2009 pop culture references.

I'd like to see Edge vs Reigns. Let's see if Reigns can carry him like Cena could.

This of how much better this would be if it was Christian vs Orton.

Why do they have to punish us like this every year?

This match would have been so much better if it was at that WWE warehouse with the In Your House set and everything.

I liked Orton throwing Edge head first into all of the PPVs he missed.

I wonder if they can blade with those boxes of paper.

I saw none of the build, but I saw a lot of people really into it. But this was always leading to Edge vs Randy Orton actually wrestling. Didn't people realize that?

I'm really worried this match is going to kill the crowd.

My biggest takeaway so far is that this match doesn't just need, but also deserves, Shane McMahon.

I'm not on board with Randy hiding himself in plain sight when there's literally no one there. Edge literally had nothing to look at but the camera men.

Ziggler's biggest problem as a heel is that he can't compellingly control when he's on top. The contrast was better than usual in that regard, I guess. Yeah, this was fine. At least there was a story and some emotion behind it. I bet more people watching this now will remember this one decades from now than Lashley vs Black.

Caught up on Flair vs Ripley. I don't think it was as good as Becky vs Shayna for this setting just because I think the quick strike sprint intensity there worked better with the lack of crowd. Here they worked it more into the animosity and the trash talking. I think the trash talking was a good solution to the lack of a crowd (and a lot of different matches have tried different things, which I really appreciate) but I'm not sure if it worked in execution all the time. It did some of the time and that's probably enough, though. Some great spots. I loved the kick cutoff on Charlotte's flip up and over in the corner, and the mare from the apron out was nice. Charlotte can work over a leg (The forearm/chop block was especially good) and Ripley's selling was exactly what it should have been. I particularly liked her roll over writhing sell after the belly to back pancake and when she was actually landing kicks or the short clothesline on her initial comeback. There are a lot of wrestlers twenty years ago that wouldn't care enough to sell like that on a comeback. I thought it went a little long in the stretch maybe, and knowing the response hurt it a little.

I mean, you can't say Lashley's stuff didn't all look really good. That's the same takeaway I had as a casual watching his match with Balor whenever that was (last Mania, I don't even know?). But a crowd would have been just as silent as the empty seats were on this one.

Ok, I'm just going to watch from here on in, with times apart for parenting. Because I have to do that. This one needs some stakes. Winner gets an IC title shot or something. The look on Black's face as he overshot the moonsault was pretty funny.

I forget this was on. No way I'm going to be able to follow along/catch up like I did last night now.

I went back to watch the ladder match, got through the choreographed missed kick and monkey flip bit to them all being on the ladders hitting each other and gave up. I'm going to leave this thing happier not having seen that.