Rehabilitated Rick

The Ibushi/Alexander match hit on all cylinders, almost a perfect showcase of cruiserweight wrestling solidified by the closing moments of the show with Trips acknowledging the crowd's demands and signing Cedric on the spot, fuck. The CWC was great huh? On the strength of that match, the Kendrick match and his overall showing in the tournament, it's hard to vote against Ibushi. Cedric being turned into a simp for Alicia Fox makes me so sad

The 4-way post Mania Raw, perhaps.

Pentagon Dark fuckers. Owens has had too many weeks mailing it in.

Marty has a cool spot he does in every match where he dislocates his own fingers to make it seem like he's breaking his opponents. Reigns.

Jericho being a huge mark for himself in a not so tongue-in-cheek way like lasting 60 minutes in the Rumble doing fuck all but laying around so he could put himself over on his podcast just annoys me, but I love his character and his feud with Owens will most likely be regarded as his greatest work when he retires, whether the match will be good remains to be seen. That being said, to be able to reinvent himself after being Mr. Diminishing returns is nothing to be sniffed at, match quality, he's lacking behind Barbaro, personality, he just tips it. What do i watch wrestling for? Personality. Jericho by a finger nail.

Meditating on it, this may have been my favorite wrestling moment in the time period Shid I'm going to watch that match again right now. Whether you watch wrestling for matches or moments, DIY have had both at a canter

Orton either knew his Rumble win was iron clad and chanced luring Bray into a false sense of security AND the GM of the company promoting a battle royal for HIS title shot, or y'know, he's a dumbass. This storyline is garbage. Luke f'in Harper has basically been used as a bridge to get to Wyatt/Orton AND AJ/Shane and looked like a complete goober in the process, poor bloke. Fuck this company at times.

I'm so over Ospreay's overly contrived bullshit, at least Mandrews saves his spots for the right moments, plus y'know, selling and stuff.

There's like three guys on Smackdown alone that's better than Orton (AJ, Cena & Harper). To say Orton is better than Bret is absolute madness and I like Orton

Ali is great but I can't get past how nausea inducing his entrance theme is. I could watch Kendrick being the grizzled young pissed off vet winning in innovative ways every week.

Dunne/Andrews was fucking great as expected, Dunne really needs to be on NXT going forward, he's Regal reincarnated. Hero returning in fake yeezys, Kanye inspired merch and kneepads under his jeans made him look like the biggest goober in Full Sail and that takes some doing, outside of looking like he was spun in some fuccboi laboratory his return was pretty good.

Has a AJ/Harper match happened before? It's one of those matches I didn't know I really wanted until it was announced. Also apparently Harper chipped AJ's tooth on the lariat.

I wonder if Vince's monitor has been hardwired to show past episodes from like 2008 that he's forgotten about or something as Harper being pushed and protected in this way is so bizarre. Could you imagine if that was the plan all a long? have Orton win the rumble to be Bray's enforcer and have Harper win the belt at Mania? If that was the case then Harper not winning the rumble was pretty dumb so the triple threat makes the most sense but this is really strong booking and has my full attention, I can see those 'Luke' chants catching on fast too. Luke fucking Harper is almost guaranteed to be in a WWE title match at WrestleMania, this is cool and there's a strong case you could make for Harper winning if his momentum continues. Yeah whatever the 'so's were on during that seg I want a kilo of it.

I can see Harper being the last one in the battle royal but being laid out by Orton for attacking Bray in the title match, a triple threat between all three Wyatt members at Mania would be all kinds of great and a way better prospect than just Orton/Wyatt alone. I'm not having the criticism of Orton at all, this is the most I've been invested in him in at least ten years, if not ever. There's so many avenues they can go down with this and I have faith it'll be some good shit. On talking smack AJ furthered his animosity with Shane for not granting him his rematch first so I imagine he won't be winning the battle royal and AJ/Shane is a lock for Mania which is a waste of AJ to me but it is what it is.

eh I dunno, Shane almost decapitating himself at Survivor Series made me never want to watch another match of his again.

Enzo isn't quite as bad as Shane is but yeah, he's pretty bad. He had some decent outings in NXT but he's been totally found out on the main shows, total liability.

Out of all the things to moan about Bayley's finishing move that she's established for years isn't one, it's one move in Bayley's arsenal that looks the most impactful, plus she executes it really well too, such a weird thing to complain about.

@Fallacy! um.. yeah and it's awesome. The last hour might have been one of the greatest hours in Raw history.

and this

I'd have been more invested in the chamber if Bray winning wasn't such a formality but the match was decent for what it was. Harper/Orton was the clear match of the night, good shit between those two again.

http://streamable.com/bj1ae ''Are you okay?'' Joe asks, ''I hope so'' Rollins responds, watching it back, Rollins lets out an audible grimace during the takedown into the coquina clutch. Can't help but feel for Rollins. As much shit he gets from some dudes here for being a crappy babyface (it's not like he writes the material he's given), no one should have to endure having to sit out the biggest show of the year two years in a row.

Hey, work. But at least it may mean Joe doesn't get killed dead his first month in.

Did plans change for AJ? you could say following the Reigns feud Vince saw gold but even taking that into consideration he debuted at the Rumble and had a good showing, beat Jericho the following month at Fastlane, won the tag titles, yes he lost to Jericho at Mania (which was dumb) then the following night was the number 1 contender pinning Jericho (thus winning the feud) and then put Reigns over strong at the next two PPVs but looked arguably more competitive than anyone else at that point in the Reigns superman era. He beat Cena clean twice after turning heel and has been the figurehead of Smackdown ever since. I'm sure over time he won over the WWE brass and was positioned in a more credible main event role, but he hasn't been a bit part player at all during his WWE run. I don't believe Trips lobbied for Joe to be called up to the main roster after being the NXT ace for a year only to be in a pawn in his feud with Rollins then to be lost in midcard mediocrity, I see Joe being protected just like Balor and initially Owens was when he was called up. I still envision Cena/Joe happening in some cross promotion type match too.

Fastlane card looks good, Mania does not. I hope they're doing a ladder match gimmick at Mania but just with the cruisers, that sounds awesome and frightening at the same time.