I wasn't sure whether I was going to dedicate an entire post to Money In The Bank or not, but I always wait now until after I watch these things before I decide. MITB left me feeling a bit tired, as I actually fell asleep during the MITB match itself. I tweeted that "MITB" stood for "Man, this is boring" and I stand by that still. There should be some decent aftermath from this show, but the show itself was blah aside from the cash in by Dean Ambrose to close the show. I guess if Kevin Owens wasn't going to win the MITB match then it was best to go with the predictable route, which Dean Ambrose actually outlined on the Ambrose Asylum with his former Shield members as guests. It reminds me of how Raven used to do commentary on Sunday Night Heat and all of his PPV predictions came true.
Raw opened with Dean Ambrose, which brought out Roman Reigns, then Seth Rollins and Shane McMahon set the Number One Contender match for tonight with Rollins vs. Reigns. It was billed as a Wrestlemania worthy match, which was also said the night before and yet here are having it again. I mean, Raw is three hours but I doubt they're going to give this one enough time to feel like we're watching Wrestlemania.
Sami Zayn defeated Kevin Owens and then the feud continued on backstage. If these two don't fight in a Hell in the Cell soon I'd be rather surprised. But remember when Shane first came back and I thought there might be a match between Shane O'Mac and Kevin Owens? I think it'd be funny if Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn both go on whatever brand Shane runs and they do the reluctant tag team partners angle. They could even be champions together like HBK and Stone Cold. Imagine-- Sami Zayn's first gold in WWE and he has to share it with Kevin Owens. Just think about the possibilities here.
Enzo & Cass defeated The Vaudevillains but the Hulu replay didn't show us that or Baron Corbin's win over Zack Ryder. But in between, AJ Styles tried to apologize to John Cena, which lead to a match between Cena and Karl Anderson, which lead to The Club beating down Cena again. Man, John Cena needs some friends.
Charlotte defeated Paige to retain the title but I was more interested in what the least relevant of all the women Becky Lynch was up to... Haha, just kidding. After the match, Dana Brooke and Charlotte attacked Paige which lead to the return of Sasha Banks. Well, enjoy having the title while you did, Charlotte. It's time for The Boss to take it from you.
The Wyatt Family returned to Raw only to be confronted by New Day which was kind of funny, I guess. What would happen in a tag team title situation here though? Would Bray Wyatt send in Rowan and Astroman? Or would he team with one of them to try and get the titles himself? This is when we need Luke Harper back because Harper & Rowan were such a great tag team.
Though it was not shown on the Hulu replay, Titus O'Neil attacked Rusev so apparently that feud is not over yet. In the main event, both Seth Rollins and Roman Reigns got counted out so there was no Number One Contender. Dean Ambrose told Shane McMahon he'd face them both at Battleground and then Shane booked it as a triple threat, though it was implied Dean wanted two matches. The commentators would then go on to say how crazy Ambrose was for booking himself in a triple threat. Ugh. Ambrose hit Dirty Deeds on both men and, well, it is better than when Roman Reigns was champion so I'll give WWE that.
After Raw we all found out that Roman Reigns had been suspended for 30 days for violating the WWE Wellness Policy. You have to ask yourself questions like whether or not WWE will continue the push of Roman Reigns when he returns- and how this could impact him becoming WWE Champion again because at two strikes WWE will pretty much bury talent... But then again, Randy Orton has something like twelve strikes against him so I'm not too worried about The Big Dog.
Impact opened up this week with Drew Galloway calling out EC3, which brought out Lashley and let's just say that Galloway & EC3 ended up defeating Lashley & Eli Drake in a tag team match which earned Drew Galloway a title shot against Lashley at some point in the future.
The Decay called out Bram and when he refused to join them they beat him down. Meanwhile, some kid on Twitter wondered why 90% of the guys in TNA have long hair and beards and TNA replied to ask why 90% of his tweets were stupid. Yeah, TNA... Not the type of working on creative we need right now.
Marti Belle and Jade fought next. I wish these two would have the type of feud in TNA that the Hardyz are having right now. I don't really want to see these Matt vs. Brother Nero matches any more, but seeing these two women fight every week in a different type of match appeals to me greatly. I'm really only kind of watching Impact this week because I read this match was happening via Jade's Facebook page. This was a decent match but they really should have had more time (like the whole show) Plus it was then soured by an outside interview with Mike Bennett and Maria. Dixie Carter also told Lashley backstage that next week he'd defend his title in a triple threat match. Gah. Make it stop.
Maria and Mike Bennett come out and say Maria was assaulted by Dixie Carter in the slap heard around the world.... Well, if Pop TV didn't shit the bed on you last week. Anyway, when it comes to professional wrestling it feels hard to take anything such as "assault" seriously when it happens in a wrestling ring. Dixie Carter comes out with Billy Corgan and I'm thankful we recently saw Teddy Long on Raw because I could not handle a tag team match, playa. Maria says Dixie Carter should leave TNA and Billy Corgan tells her to take a week off for the good of the company. Looks like it's time for a Dixie vs. Billy feud. Wow. And the place goes mild! Billy Corgan calls Mike Bennett "Miracle" as if it's his first name and it just sounds rather odd. Bennett says he wants an X Division Title shot, but mainly for Option C. This whole thing wreaks of something and it's not awesomeness. Mike Bennett then had a match with Eddie Edwards which I was unsure of while watching whether or not it was for the title and when Bennett won he grabbed the belt so I guess so. Geez, TNA, you couldn't have built that one up a little bit better?
Braxton Sutter was about to face Balam (?) who I legit thought was Shark Boy at first, but Rockstar Spud came out and wanted to start a feud with Sutter. Needless to say Braxton Sutter gets the win because a W over Rockstar Spud on Impact is a lot better than a PPV win over James Storm, right? Right?? Sutter tries to shake hands after the match and Spud hits a low blow on him. Braxton Sutter should have known better.
I tend to find a lot of what TNA does to be pointless, but the video package they showed for Sienna was actually well done. It is announced that she will defend the KO Title next week against Gail Kim as well. Sounds like fun.
Now, the problem I have with this Jeff Hardy-Matt Hardy feud is that there seems to be no end to it. Jeff beat Matt once though they both got taken away by medical staff and the match was technically a no contest. But then at Slammiversary they were supposed to finish all of that. That was supposed to be the end. And if Matt had cheated to win somehow, sure, it can continue. But now, Jeff Hardy is throwing weapons into a cage while his awful theme song plays because this looks like it might take Matt winning for it all to finally end. I really like this Broken Matt character, but it'd be so much better if he was off torturing someone else. I'd actually kind of like to see Broken Matt vs. Mike Bennett.
Lucha Underground opened this week with Daga vs. Mascarita Sagrada in a match for one of the medallions. After Daga defeated Sagrada, Famous B got into the ring and began beating Sagrada with his shoe. It was only a matter of time before Famous B went full heel. Could we see another Mascarita Sagrada come to The Temple since El Torito was released from WWE? Famous B driving the battle of the mini's would be interesting to say the least.
After an in office segment with Dario Cueto and Dragon Azteca Jr. we go to our next match which is a trios match and the winning trios team will each be given a medallion. Joey Ryan, Mr. Cisco and Cortez Castro were the first trios team while the second was Sinestro, Killshot and Marty The Moth. Marty The Moth offered up a peace offering by giving Killshot his dog tags back. It makes sense to have Marty The Moth and Killshot on a team here because they could face each other next week or whenever if they win, but having The Crew team with Joey Ryan just seems too friendly. Killshot hit a Coup De Grace to win the match but then Marty The Moth stole back the dog tags so the feud must continue! So, as of right now, we have these three going into a match with Daga for the Gift of the Gods Championship, which you can cash in for a title shot. I'm voting for Daga right now, but I'm really enjoying the work of Killshot as of late as well. I feel like Killshot is the breakout star of Season Two thus far.
Up next was a tag team match with each of the two team members getting a medallion if they win. Mariposa and Sexy Star were a tag team for whatever reason and they took on the team of Ivelisse and Taya. This makes sense given that the two enemies would go into a match against each other next week, so thus why it's not the standard rudos vs. technicos. Taya and Sexy Star should be a tag team though. I know them both from Lucha Libre AAA and it's kind of a toss up on any given day which one I dislike more. Mariposa and Sexy Star won to the delight of no one because I really want to see Ivelisse as champion.
Prince Puma came out and cut a promo about how Konan told him one day he could be better than Rey Mysterio. Prince Puma challenged Rey Mysterio to a match and out came Mysterio. Rey says not only does Prince Puma want to know if he's better than Rey Mysterio, but Rey Mysterio wants to know if he's still the best and the match is on. When is Ultima Lucha Dos anyway? Is it next week? And who was the new debut they kept hyping? Was it the guy in the opening moments in the bear mask? This episode has left me confused and more importantly it has left me hoping that Killshot or Daga wins the Gift of the Gods Championship because the rest of the talent leaves something to be desired. Granted, I love Joey Ryan but it's not quite his time yet. According to some website when I googled "When is ultima lucha 2" it will be in three parts and begin on July 6th, which means one more episode before it. I also believe this will serve as the season finale, so we have four more episodes of Lucha Underground this season and then I'll use this time to catch up on SHINE Wrestling.
NXT opened up with a match between Oney Lorcan and Tye Dillinger. Immediately after Tye Dillinger lost this match, Corey Graves was saying that he dropped to a 5 and I was saying that during the brand split he needs to go up to the main roster. Also, Oney Lorcan was once Biff Busick and while I'm not a fan of the name Biff Busick I think that WWE has possibly gone one step further by calling him Oney Lorcan. I said "Oney Lorcan is a stupid name", which Quentin repeated and then Gina told him not to say the word "stupid" but I told him that in this case it is okay. Why can't he just go back to being Chris Gerard?
No Way Jose defeated Josh Woods, who was an interesting looking jobber. After the match, Austin Aries came out and they danced together before Austin Aries hit him with a brutal attack of sorts. So... Let's figure this one out, shall we? Austin Aries defeated Baron Corbin with a quick rollup in his debut and now Baron Corbin is on the main roster. Austin Aries lost to Shinsuke Nakamura, who is now going into a match with Finn Balor, which will likely see Finn off to the main roster and Nakamura off to a title shot against Samoa Joe. It appears as if Austin Aries is just being used as the "old, seasoned veteran" to put other younger talent over, much like Goldust was for a bit. Remember that brief feud Goldust had with Tyler Breeze on the main roster? But really, Austin Aries needs some wins and some big ones at that. Bring in Roderick Strong already and bring back Generation Next.
William Regal was in the back telling Shinsuke Nakamura how we will have his match with Finn Balor in three weeks and Buddy Murphy barged in saying he was the only one of them to hold gold in NXT. This set up a match between Nakamura and Murphy because that's going to help us tell them apart.
Bayley made her return to NXT after being beaten up by Nia Jax and she defeated Deonna Purrazzo because giving Bayley a gimmick where she comes back and isn't quite 100% yet after being beaten by both Asuka and Nia Jax, causing her to lose matches would just make too much sense. So yeah, more of the same.
Nia Jax defeated Liv Morgan because no one likes New Jersey. What I found funny (and confusing) was that before this match they showed a lot of the Nia Jax-Asuka match including the entrances which made me think that the two of them were fighting again. This episode of NXT had five matches in total and yet they still had time to show us almost that whole match as well. Crazy.
In the main event, Shinsuke Nakamura defeated Murphy and why not. I *think* that Wesley Blake (Is that his name?) is injured and so we won't be seeing him for a while. Corey Graves played it up like no one had seen Blake since the tag team split, so I'm taking it he's been written off of NXT TV for a while. So my new system now is whenever I see one of the BAMF tag team I'll just assume it's Murphy, which I kind of always do anyway. But yeah, next week American Alpha returns and mostly right now I'm in CWC mode so I'm pumped.
Ring of Honor announced this week that Roderick Strong would be leaving them soon and odds on favorite are that he is on his way to WWE and it's about time. He's one of the best wrestlers in the world today and he hasn't really been given a fair shot in TNA or WWE. I will miss him in EVOLVE to an extent, but maybe he can still work there too, who knows. All I know is if WWE signs some of the talent from the CWC and then we somehow get Roderick Strong vs. Zack Sabre Jr. it will be a dream come true.
Without Smack Down! and a new episode of ROH TV yet this is where our week ends, though oddly enough our week now runs from Monday through Wednesday, as we dabbled a little bit on Sunday with MITB, but then it's Raw, Impact and Lucha Underground and NXT on the same night. Once we hit July though, LU will begin to end its second season while Smack Down! will go live so we'll begin watching that again and the CWC will start so things will get busy for a few weeks while all of that is happening. Though I fully expect the CWC to have its own column. In any case, I'll enjoy the peace and quiet of three days again next week, hopefully a new episode of ROH TV and, yes, the ROH Best In The World PPV is tonight, which might get its own review depending upon how good (or bad) it is.
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