WWE MONEY IN THE BANK

Intuit Dome, Inglewood, California

NAOMI vs. ALEXA BLISS vs. GIULIA vs. RHEA RIPLEY vs. ROXANNE PEREZ vs. STEPHANIE VAQUER "MONEY IN THE BANK LADDER MATCH" (25:11): This is my favorite WWE PPV of the year because I love ladder matches. It used to be that you'd get two ladder matches and two men's championship matches on the show. That usually made it a stacked show. Those days are long gone. The main event of this show was just a typical RAW main event match. The only championship match on the show was for the women's Intercontinental title. CM Punk and Roman Reigns, two of the bigger stars in the WWE, weren't even on the show. The big, "shocking" return was...R-Truth. Okay. So this PPV, apparently, isn't much of a big deal anymore. That's a shame. Some of this show was entertaining but the three non-ladder matches were mostly boring. This match was uber-sloppy, which was expected. Giulia and Stephanie Vaquer are from Stardom and CMLL, so maybe it's just because they never wrestled with ladders before, but early on it seemed like they were baffled at how ladders even worked. Roxanne Perez was also in this mix, as she's new from NXT. At one point, two of the women wanted to slam the ladder shut onto their opponent and didn't realize you can't do that because of the slats in the middle holding it up. Do they, like, not even practice this stuff? Or, like, study how to work with a ladder? They also tried to throw a ladder on someone and it bounced off the top rope instead of hitting the person. Ugh. With all of these fresh faces, you'd think they'd throw a bone to one of them. Nope! Naomi won. Even Seth Rollins won the men's ladder match. Ladder matches are at least entertaining no matter how sloppy and fucked up they turn out, so this was at least watchable. Vaquer gave one of the women her trademark maneuver on a ladder bridge, which was cradling their head between her thighs and slamming her head down onto the ladder repeatedly. The crowd loved that. Rhea Ripley was also very over. Match was fine but nothing special. **

DOMINIK MYSTERIO vs. OCTAGON, JR. (4:55): TKO bought the Mexican wrestling promotion AAA for some unknown reason. They ran their first co-production show before this show at another location (I haven't watched it yet, but the main event was Chad Gable vs. Vikingo). Apparently they set this match up during that show, as this was previously unannounced. Considering Dominik quickly beat AAA's Octagon, Jr...maybe they wish the WWE hadn't bought them. They're just going to bury all their talent! There truly wasn't anything to this match, although Dominik playing heel to the crowd is always amusing. *

BECKY LYNCH vs. LYRA VALKYRIA (15:20): This match was boring. Considering they just had this match on the last PPV, it was fairly obvious Lynch was going to win. Lynch won by pulling Lyra's tights. Their last match was better. 1/2*

SETH ROLLINS vs. ANDRADE vs. EL GRANDE AMERICANO vs. LA KNIGHT vs. PENTA vs. SOLO SIKOA "MONEY IN THE BANK LADDER MATCH" (33:35): This was a typical, clusterfuck, everyone-runs-out-from-the-back type of WWE main event match...but it wasn't the main event. Some of it was wildly entertaining but it definitely went on way too long. El Grande Americano won a 3-way on RAW to be in this match instead of CM Punk. Why would you not have one of your biggest stars on one of the supposed biggest shows of the year? Baffling. By the end, Seth Rollins' heel group ran out to beat everyone up and then Solo's group ran out to beat everyone up. Jacob Fatu turned on Solo, though, and slammed him through a ringside ladder bridge. Eventually Seth Rollins won, which was expected. Penta gave Andrade a Canadian Destroyer on a ladder bridge in the ring. Penta also suplexed Seth off a ladder onto another ladder leaning against the ropes. This was by far the most entertaining match on the show, but when everyone started running out from the back the actual ladder match stopped for, like, ten minutes. Good match but it went on too long. ***

CODY RHODES & JEY USO vs. JOHN CENA & LOGAN PAUL (24:00): For twenty minutes, this was a dull slog. First off, this is a RAW main event to set up a title match at best. This isn't a PPV main event. I guess Cena doesn't wrestle on RAW and it's his last year so that means it's a bigger deal. Finally the match got exciting when Logal Paul did a second rope moonsault onto Jey on the Spanish announce table. I thought he'd given up doing big, suicidal spots so it was nice to see him back doing them. Cena hit Cody with the belt when the ref wasn't looking. Then a masked figure ran into the ring to lay out Cena. He unmasked and it was R-Truth! R-Truth was supposedly fired from the WWE last week. Apparently, he signed a new deal since then...but it kind of begs the question: was his "firing" just to make this surprise even more surprising? Or did the WWE actually notice that everyone was mad they fired him and re-hired him? I kind of feel bad for all the others they've fired recently, like Braun Strowman, Shayna Baszler, Dakota Kai, and Carlito, because they're not coming back like R-Truth. And considering R-Truth just wrestled Cena for the title on Saturday Night's Main Event a few weeks ago...what's the point of re-igniting that storyline? Does anyone really want to see another Cena vs. R-Truth match? At the end, Cody pinned Cena. The next big show is the 2-night Summerslam at the New York Giants stadium. I figured this means Cody vs. Cena for the title there but then I remembered they just fucking did that at 'Mania. The next actual PPV is the King of the Ring finals in Saudi Arabia. Ugh. They're still going there? Jesus. *1/2