WWE MONEY IN THE BANK

 

02 Arena, London

DAMIAN PRIEST vs. BUTCH vs. LA KNIGHT vs. LOGAN PAUL vs. RICOCHET vs. SANTOS ESCOBAR vs. SHINSUKE NAKAMURA "MITB LADDER MATCH" (20:27): This is my favorite WWE PPV every year. We used to get two men's ladder matches and two men's championship matches. Those days are long gone, sadly. Roman Reigns wasn't even on last year's MITB show and this year didn't even defend his title. This show turned out okay. The super hot London crowd definitely helped the show, although they were only super hot for the ladder matches. They didn't seem too into the actual wrestling in the non-ladder matches. This match was by far the best match on the show. Richochet did the move of the match by leaping through a ladder to the floor. That move was so spectacular they didn't even bother to show a replay. The one surprise was how much the crowd cheered for LA Knight. I don't watch Smackdown too often, but I do know that they turned him into a good guy for some reason. I thought he was great as a heel. Either way, he's pretty boring and not exactly great in the ring, so I'm baffled why anyone would cheer him for anything. The big spot of the match was botched, which was a shame. Logan Paul and Richochet were supposed to fall off a ladder and land on the ropes where Richochet was going to give Logan Paul a Spanish Fly from the top rope down onto two tables at ringside. Why they even attempted to do this is beyond me. Can anyone pull that off ever? Logan Paul slipped on the ropes twice but Richochet just did the move anyway and they both looked like they landed on their heads on the table. Damian Priest won, which I (and probably everyone on Earth) predicted. ***

LIV MORGAN & RAQUEL RODRIGUEZ vs. RONDA ROUSEY & SHAYNA BASZLER (9:02): This was for the women's tag team titles, titles I vaguely remembered existed. I wondered why Rousey wasn't the big star in any big programs lately, but I found out she was filming a reality show called Stars on Mars where a group of celebrities go to Australia and vote each other off the show. I'm not entirely sure why it's called Mars. Does the Australian Outback look like Mars? Maybe I should watch it. Are there, like, extras dressed up like aliens? And a UFO in the background on the set? Sounds like a new low for TV. It's probably more entertaining than this match, though. Shayna turned on Rousey during the match, causing them to lose the tag titles. Huh? Why not have them lose the tag titles and then Shayna is frustrated with the loss and turns on Rousey. You know, actually have a reason for the turn. Plus it makes Liv and Raquel look like non-champions because they didn't really win, they just lucked out. I thought the WWE would get a lot better with HHH in charge but it hasn't and I'm baffled at people that think it has. 1/2*

GUNTHER vs. MATT RIDDLE (7:44): Case in point: this match. Matt Riddle is perhaps WWE's best wrestler. You wouldn't fucking know it from watching most of his matches, though. Why? Because they gave him 7 minutes to get squashed by Gunther. What was the point of this? I was expecting a hard hitting, exciting, 20 minute, dramatic match. We didn't get that. Why did they do that with Shaemus & Gunther but not with Riddle & Gunther? I can't figure out why they haven't pushed Riddle to the main event picture. He was recently in rehab, but that's not the reason. Previously they had him in a comedy tag team with Randy Orton. Riddle should really go to AEW or New Japan. He's being wasted here. Drew McIntyre came out after the match to beat up Gunther to set up a match. Gunther is still great and all, just not as great as when he wasn't stick-thin. *1/2

CODY RHODES vs. DOMINIK MYSTERIO (8:38): Who ever is in charge of writing for this company needs to be fired. Brock Lesnar broke Cody Rhodes' arm last month yet somehow he's wrestling a few weeks later. Makes sense. Dominik on the mic is hilarious but nobody wants to actually see him wrestle a singles match. And the big problem with Rhea Ripley is they keep having her get in the men's faces as if the WWE would actually do a man vs. woman match. They do it in Japan so I still can't figure out why they don't do it here. 1/2*

JOHN CENA SEGMENT: Cena came out to tell the crowd that Wrestlemania should be in London. Okay. Are they jealous of AEW selling 60,000 tickets to All In at Wembley? This show supposedly had 18,000. Grayson Waller came out and Cena beat him up. Cena's a great talker and all but I don't know what the point of this was. Wrestlemania is in Philly next year by the way, not London. Will Roman Reigns finally lose his title then? 

IYO SKY vs. BAYLEY vs. BECKY LYNCH vs. TRISH STRATUS vs. ZELINA VEGA vs. ZOEY STARK "MITB LADDER MATCH" (18:04): This match wasn't fantastic or anything, but at least it was entertaining. They really shouldn't have put Trish Stratus in this match. She is too old to be doing this, but also she hasn't been an active wrestler in years. It was sad watching the other women trying to sell Trish's moves like they weren't terrible. The big spot was Zelina doing a Sunset Flip to Zoey off the top of the ladder onto a ladder bridge. They mentioned that The Amazing Red made this move famous and that he's Zelina's cousin. What? Really? I saw him wrestle in CZW at the ECW Arena like twenty years ago. He was awesome. Zelina is not awesome. I can't even picture her standing next to her husband, Malaki Black, because he's like four feet taller than her. Iyo Sky probably saved this match, as every jump she does looks flawless. She won, which is good, but I really doubt they'd give her the title. The finish was kind of clever, so maybe the writers shouldn't be fired. Iyo Sky handcuffed Becky Lynch to Bayley (Bayley turned on Iyo Sky earlier) on the ladder then climbed up to grab the briefcase. **1/2 

SETH ROLLINS vs. FINN BALOR (12:31): I can picture an epic, 30 minute, high intensity match with some great near falls by the end with these two. Sadly, those type of matches don't occur in the WWE. What we got was a 12 minute bore. It's hard to even care about this new championship title when we've been battered over the head by Roman Reigns' long title reign proclaiming him the top dog. That means that this title is basically the 2nd tier belt. And nobody thought Finn was winning, especially since Seth just won it a month ago. This wasn't terrible or anything but it could've should've been much, much better. *1/2

THE USO'S vs. ROMAN REIGNS & SOLO SIKOA (32:05): This was yawn inducingly terrible. The final five minutes or so were pretty entertaining, but that was after 25 minutes of nothingness. After Sami Zayn didn't beat Roman for the title (which would've been the perfect ending to The Bloodline storyline), then Cody didn't beat Roman for the title, I'm completely checked out of this Bloodline storyline. It's going to keep going forever, though, because it's the reason the ratings are up in the last year. We still have to get Solo turning on Roman and eventually Paul Heyman turning on Roman. I'm fucking done! The Uso's have always been a heel tag team, right? And now we're supposed to cheer for them? That's hard to do. This match wasn't even for a title or anything. By the end we got the ref bump and the announce table break. Roman got pinned and lost which I thought was kind of a surprise. Do we really need a 32 minute tag team match? I mean, c'mon. *