- Oct 15, 2000
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While The Royal Rumble may have given us the directions, we officially begin down the road to WrestleMania tonight. After last night's Elimination Chamber PPV, many of the top matches for Mania on April 3 are set including The Miz vs John Cena, Edge vs Alberto Del Rio, Randy Orton vs CM Punk. We also have seeds set for Jerry Lawler vs Michael Cole and Trish Stratus & Kelly Kelly vs LayCool. It's kind of sad that Jerry Lawler and Michael Cole may very well be the most anticipated match on the show at this point, but it has been building for months and months, so fans are dying for the eventual payoff. It just goes to show how simple it is. You can take two guys, one who is far past his prime and another who has no wrestling experience, and when you slowly build a program, the payoff can be huge. Just imagine if they put this kind of time and effort into matches with their top stars and titles.
The Elimination Chamber PPV was last night, and it was a very strong show. Like we talked about in last week's thread, it was by no means a surprising show. Most of us guessed the outcomes correctly going in, but WWE chose to do what was right for business and not give us any silly swerves. The wrestling itself was excellent. Both Chamber matches were great. The Miz and Lawler delivered. Kofi and Del Rio had a very good match despite my disagreement with the booking of it. Even Santino & Koslov vs Slater and Gabriel was an acceptable match. Let's get into a rundown of the card.
~Alberto Del Rio d Kofi Kingston - The two put on a good match. Kofi wasn't as sloppy as he usually is. I said I disagreed with the booking because Del Rio sold way too much. Many of you argued that Kofi is the Intercontinental Champion, so he should not have been buried. WWE never even mentioned Kofi being the Intercontinental Champion. He came out wearing the belt, but that was it. If WWE doesn't care about the title, then there is no reason to protect him. Del Rio got the clean win, but I felt he should have gone over stronger.
~Edge d Rey Mysterio, Kane, Drew McIntyre, Wade Barrett, and The Big Show in the Smackdown Elimination Chamber to Retain the World Heavyweight Championship. The Big Show was Dolph Ziggler's replacement. I honestly forgot Barrett was in the match, and it's not surprising because he was squashed. Since leaving The Nexus, Barrett's stock has dropped almost as much as Sheamus's. He's forgotten about on Smackdown, and no one cares about The Corre. The last 10 minutes of this match when it was down to Edge and Mysterio were excellent. I haven't seen Edge work so well in a long time. Alberto attacked Edge after the match setting up the surprise return of Christian to make the save which got a huge pop.
~Trish Stratus returned and was announced as one of the trainers for Tough Enough. The segment died a horrible death as she attempted to do The Rock's catchphrases.
~Heath Slater & Justin Gabriel d Santino Marella & Vladimir Kozlov to win the WWE Tag Team Titles. The match wasn't terrible. That's a compliment for these guys.
~Vickie Guerrero begged for Dolph Ziggler to be re-hired. Teddy Long came out and said he re-hired Kelly Kelly. Kelly came down and attacked Vickie. LayCool came out to attack Kelly. Trish came out to make the save. Unfortunately, she was wearing stripper spike heel boots which made is almost impossible for her to work. She botched a hurracanrana, but thankfully hit a double Stratusfaction on McCool and Layla. It wasn't Trish's night.
~The Miz d Jerry Lawler to retain the WWE Championship. No Alex Riley interference. No Michael Cole interference. Of course we weren't going to get a 5* match here, but it still delivered. The fans were very behind Lawler. I still can't decide if I would have booked a title change or not, but regardless, I would have had Cole interfere to further set up their match for Mania.
~John Cena d CM Punk, John Morrison, Randy Orton, Sheamus, and R-Truth in the Raw Elimination Chamber Match to become the #1 Contender for the WWE Championship. Another very good match. Maybe not as good as Smackdown, but nothing to complain about. Morrison had some great spots, but the big spot where he climbed the dome of the chamber and dropped down onto Sheamus came off as really stupid and preplanned. That's the danger with all these Morrison spots. They have to have some semblance of believability, or else you might as well join the trapeze act in the circus. The match seemed to run long so the finish seemed rushed with Cena hitting the AA on Punk onto the steel grating to get the win.
Overall, a very strong show. I'd give it a 7.5/10. Having Booker T on comentary rather than Matt Striker was a welcomed change. It will be very interesting to see how Mania's called if Cole and Lawler actually do have a match.
Above I said Cole and Lawler may be the most anticipated match heading into WrestleMania. That of course depends on what they do with The Undertaker who is scheduled to return tonight as the reveal in the 2 21 11 video packages. The reports are it will be The Undertaker putting his WrestleMania streak on the line against HHH putting his career on the line with Shawn Michaels as the special guest referee. If this program had been ongoing the way they built Michaels vs Taker, it would probably be a big draw. But I just do not see how you can build a match like this over the next 41 days to make people care. What motivation does HHH have for putting his career on the line? He's been out of action for nearly a year, and now he's just going to come back and gamble his career against a man who he has no recent feud with? With HBK it made sense putting his career on the line. The Undertaker refused to offer him a rematch, and the only way Michaels could get it was by putting his career at stake. My guess is they will have HHH come back to avenge Michaels' loss, but I just don't see it having anywhere near the juice that a match like this should have. They should have just gone with the original plans of The Undertaker vs Wade Barrett and HHH vs Sheamus. You had natural storylines for both of these matches. Sheamus put HHH out of action for almost a year, and Barrett was involved with The Undertaker being buried alive. With the way things are now, Barrett and Sheamus will be lucky to even make the card.
With the 2 21 11 packages concluding tonight, the buzz about Sting should finally come to a rest. While many of us originally thought the video package may have been for him, after the second week, it was clear it was designed to promote The Undertaker's return. The conspiracy theorists among us persisted that Sting was in the video and would be facing The Undertaker at WrestleMania, but that isn't the case. Yes, WWE tried to sign Sting to bring him in for WrestleMania and induct him into the Hall of Fame, but it never happened. So hopefully all of the rumors will come to an end tonight.
The Rock returning to Raw last week was the news that had everyone buzzing (as evidence by the size of last week's wrestling thread). The Rock cut the greatest promo in arguably years covering the topics of his return, his role at WrestleMania, Michael Cole, The Miz, and John Cena. He went 20 minutes and spoke like he never missed a beat over the past seven years. The Rock talked about never leaving WWE again. This was an interesting line because I really don't see The Rock being all that involved with WWE going forward. He isn't going to wrestle, and other than his appearance last week and his role as the host of WrestleMania, I don't believe anything else is planned for him. Yes, of course WWE would love to book a Rock vs Cena match, but right now that isn't happening. Reports from last night's show were that fans were very disappointed that The Rock was not there. Unfortunately, fans need to get used to this because The Rock will not be appearing on Raw on a weekly basis.
It's probably too soon tonight, but we should also start to get an idea of what the remainder of the card is going to be doing at WrestleMania. I'm praying they put Daniel Bryan in a one on one match at Mania against someone competent, give them 15 minutes, and let them tear the house down. There is still no official word if there will be a Money in the Bank match at this year's WrestleMania. I would much prefer the MITB match only took place at WrestleMania and they did away with the PPV, but if they are keeping the PPV, they shouldn't do the match twice a year. If MITB doesn't happen at Mania, it will be very interesting to see how they fit in guys like Morrison, Truth, Sheamus, and others.
