WWE EXTREME RULES

Philly

THE BRAWLING BRUTES (SHEAMUS, RIDGE HOLLAND & BUTCH) vs. IMPERIUM (GUNTHER, LUDWIG KAISER & GIOVANNI VINCI) "GOOD OLD FASHIONED DONNYBROOK MATCH" (17:50): The WWE is pretty hot these days. They packed the Wells Fargo Center on a Saturday night for this show. Triple H hasn't reinvented the wheel yet since taking over from Vince, but he has rehired some people like Bray Wyatt, Karrion Kross, Johnny Gargano, and Braun Strowman. They also hired Gallows and Anderson who showed up with AJ Styles on RAW. This sudden surge in popularity for WWE has caused a few of AEW's wrestlers to want to quit and go to the WWE. Andrade got into a fight with Sammy Guevera because he's attempting to get fired. Buddy Matthews and Malakai Black both wanted out of their contracts and have been given leave of absences. I can't really say that AEW is falling apart, since they just had a sold out PPV in Chicago and a packed Arthur Ashe stadium show. Besides those shows, though, the crowds have been pretty small lately. Is it because WWE is more kid friendly, and thus more families go to their shows? Or is it just that WWE has been around for so long and anything with longevity is ingrained in one's head? Who knows? AEW is consistently more entertaining and has been since its inception. The big problem with this WWE PPV was the fact that it didn't have a men's championship title match. Stupidly, the WWE gave Roman Reigns the unified title and then signed him to a limited date contract. On Smackdown the night before this show, Logan Paul and Roman Reigns had a face off before their title match...which is next month in Saudi Arabia. Nice. The WWE cares more about Saudi Arabia than Philadelphia. At least there was one good match on this show...this opener, which was a wild, entertaining brawl. The crowd was rapturous for this match. This was basically a weapons match, although they had a bar table at ringside and some barrels at ringside because I guess barrels represent Ireland. The show went downhill fast after this match. I would've loved to have watched this show live but not only was it going against college football games like Texas A&M vs. Alabama and Notre Dame vs. BYU but it also went against the Phillies playoff game. This is the first time the Phillies have been in the playoffs since 2011. So, yes, I wasn't going to miss that. *** 

RONDA ROUSEY vs. LIV MORGAN "EXTREME RULES MATCH" (12:05): Rousey was once a huge star in the WWE. What happened? Maybe it's because she's kind of a heel now? Or maybe her UFC fame has curtailed. Considering her and Charlotte and Becky Lynch were the 3 big women's division stars a year or two ago...what happened to Charlotte and Becky Lynch? Are they injured? Either way, they were sorely missed on this show. This match was God awful. Liv Morgan didn't know how to pull a table into the ring or sandwich a chair into the corner. Do wrestlers not practice things? They also used a baseball bat and dealt some of the fakest looking blows you'll ever see. Everything was sloppy. Somehow Ronda won with a submission and won the title. Ugh. The raucous crowd was pretty silent for this mess. -No Stars-

KARRION KROSS vs. DREW McINTYRE "STRAP MATCH" (10:20): CM Punk and MJF had a strap match earlier this year and it was a bloodbath but also fairly boring. It was more memorable than this, though. This was just a bore. Karrion won after his female manager sprayed pepper spray into Drew's eyes. I get that Kross is new (Vince fired him but HHH rehired him) so they want him to get a win, but Drew just lost last month to Roman. Strap matches are always bores, so I'm not sure why they even bothered doing this. 1/2*

BIANCA BELAIR vs. BAYLEY "LADDER MATCH" (16:40): They didn't do any crazy, suicidal ladder spots. That made the match kind of just okay. This was shockingly the first women's title ladder match in WWE. Maybe don't do another one. Belair retained the title. I love ladder matches, but there wasn't much to this one. Maybe I'm just spoiled by all those awesome ladder matches AEW has done in the last few years. **

FINN BALOR vs. EDGE "I QUIT MATCH" (29:55): This was super boring for twenty minutes. Then they did the classic, WWE interference gimmick at the end that made it entertaining. Damian Priest, Rhea Ripley, Dominic Mysterio, Mysterio, and Beth Phoenix all showed up at the end to interfere. Before that, Finn and Edge brawled around the arena for like fifteen minutes. Edge finally quit when Rhea Ripley was going to hit Edge's wife, Beth Phoenix, in the head with a chair. She did it anyway afterwards. The interference stuff was great at the end and the crowd was on fire for it. **1/2

MATT RIDDLE vs. SETH ROLLINS "FIGHT PIT MATCH" (16:35): This wasn't very good. They did this type of match once in NXT. I don't remember that too much so maybe they shouldn't do this again. A fight pit match is a cage match with no door and no ropes but, oddly, a scaffold walkway above and around the ring. I guess it's supposed to be like a UFC cage match. Riddle used to be in UFC, so I guess that's why they did it. UFC's Daniel Cormier was the ref, though considering he didn't do anything besides referee, I'm not sure why he was there. Riddle did one jump off the scaffold onto Rollins on down on the mat. That was cool. The rest of this was dull. After this match, Bray Wyatt made his re-debut. They did a bunch of weird videos and had some people in masks around the arena and then Wyatt came out through a smoke-filled door holding his lantern. The crowd popped big for this. I wonder...do they remember how dumb Bray Wyatt was when he was fired? Remember those silly Fiend matches with red lighting? And Randy Orton set The Fiend on fire and killed him? Do these people remember how stupid all of that was? This all reminds me of how the comic book industry realized that people love debuts...so comic book companies now re-launch books as a #1 every few years just because people will buy new debut issues. Are we that dumb? AEW debuts are the same. Whenever a new face debuts, people pop like crazy...then a month later it's nothing special. I expect the same thing to happen to Bray Wyatt. Sure, people are excited for him showing up again now...but is anyone going to give a shit when he's randomly wrestling Ricochet on Smackdown on two months? Nope. *1/2