FlaeBlazer Posted October 19, 2018 Share Posted October 19, 2018 Oftentimes, we lament the times that great wrestlers are put in badly structured or booked matches where they don’t get to showcase their talent to the fullest. What are some examples of matches that were structured excellently but were let down by mediocre to bad performances from the wrestlers? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AxB Posted October 19, 2018 Share Posted October 19, 2018 Triple H vs Shawn Michaels. Rock vs Cena. This one, but I think Hansen gets hurt or something, because he suddenly doesn't want to do anything after the DDT at 4:30ish: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FlaeBlazer Posted October 19, 2018 Author Share Posted October 19, 2018 4 minutes ago, AxB said: Triple H vs Shawn Michaels. Rock vs Cena. Can you elaborate on this? I always thought the issue with those matches was how ridiculously long they were more so than the wrestlers themselves. Rock/Cena II was a great example of bad match structure, it’s basically the go to example of a bad finisher fest. Triple H/Shawn matches were all ridiculously long and slow. I thought the match structures for those were bad. What makes you think it fits this case? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AxB Posted October 19, 2018 Share Posted October 19, 2018 The match structures were fine, if Triple H was Ric Flair and Shawn Michaels was Ricky Steamboat. It's a clear case of an attempt to have an epic match, with two Wrestlers who are incapable of working at that level. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sydneybrown Posted October 20, 2018 Share Posted October 20, 2018 Taker/Lesnar at WM30. The ending itself is an all-time "I know where I was when it happened" moment. Everything leading up to it was pretty awful. Taker usually had classic or great matches on the prior 5 WMs, but he got his bell rung five minutes in, and the match is an absolute chore to sit through. It would easily have been the most forgettable Taker/Lesnar match ever if Brock didn't end the streak. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brian Fowler Posted October 20, 2018 Share Posted October 20, 2018 2 hours ago, sydneybrown said: Taker/Lesnar at WM30. The ending itself is an all-time "I know where I was when it happened" moment. Everything leading up to it was pretty awful. Taker usually had classic or great matches on the prior 5 WMs, but he got his bell rung five minutes in, and the match is an absolute chore to sit through. It would easily have been the most forgettable Taker/Lesnar match ever if Brock didn't end the streak. When I rewatched it, I liked it more than live. But, yeah, Taker wrestled like 15 minutes with a concussion that hospitalized him. Wrestling needs a better way to end matches when that happens. See the Liv Morgan match a few weeks ago for an example of how little progress has been made. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spontaneous Posted October 21, 2018 Share Posted October 21, 2018 Lesnar/Ambrose at wm32. Lesnar needed to actually try. I know some people hate Ambrose but you cannot defend Lesnar's lazy performance in this one. It was set up to be Ambrose using weapons to try and level the playing field. Felt like a glorified house show street fight. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Edwin Posted October 21, 2018 Share Posted October 21, 2018 45 minutes ago, Six String Orchestra said: Lesnar/Ambrose at wm32. Lesnar needed to actually try. I know some people hate Ambrose but you cannot defend Lesnar's lazy performance in this one. It was set up to be Ambrose using weapons to try and level the playing field. Felt like a glorified house show street fight. Didn't Ambrose actually bring a chainsaw like he's Leatherface? Not to be nitpicky, but what's the point of bringing a weapon you clearly won't be using? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HumanChessgame Posted October 21, 2018 Share Posted October 21, 2018 2 hours ago, Six String Orchestra said: Lesnar/Ambrose at wm32. Lesnar needed to actually try. I know some people hate Ambrose but you cannot defend Lesnar's lazy performance in this one. It was set up to be Ambrose using weapons to try and level the playing field. Felt like a glorified house show street fight. You could say this about a majority of Brock's matches over the past few years tbh. The Ambrose match in particular could have been a decent WWE-style hardcore match telling the story of Ambrose using plunder to try and overcome Brock's intensity, but the whole thing was a massive stinker. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt D Posted October 22, 2018 Share Posted October 22, 2018 I've thought about this and struggled a bit. Generally, if a match is bad I tend to blame how it's put together more than the execution. For instance, what's a bad example of a southern tag? In order to be a southern tag, you need certain elements, a shine, but not too long of one, a longer heat segment with comebacks by the face in peril and cutoffs, probably some ref distraction and heel double teaming, an earned hot tag that leads to a finish. So in this case, the southern tag in question has to have all of those elements to a degree. It would disqualify a lot of 80s WWF tag team matches which run unbalanced lengthy heel-in-peril beginnings or early 80s AJPW tags where often isn't really a face-in-peril and heat building to a hot tag. You need the elements, just with people not capitalizing on them. I think that's hard to find unless you're just picking a match with terrible wrestlers. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spontaneous Posted October 23, 2018 Share Posted October 23, 2018 I think of matches like Warrior/Hogan at WM6 or Goldberg/Lesnar at WM33 and think how their match structure hides any flaws. A bad structure kills any positive attributes. Wrestlemania 34 had two that come to mind. Daniel Bryan/Shane McMahon vs Sami Zayn/Kevin Owens had a bad structure. Fans wanted to see Bryan back so he immediately gets taken out. Reigns vs Lesnar has Reigns take multiple F5s and survive, bleed, start a comeback and then... eat another and lose. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John from Cincinnati Posted October 23, 2018 Share Posted October 23, 2018 On 10/20/2018 at 2:11 PM, sydneybrown said: Taker/Lesnar at WM30. The ending itself is an all-time "I know where I was when it happened" moment. Everything leading up to it was pretty awful. Taker usually had classic or great matches on the prior 5 WMs, but he got his bell rung five minutes in, and the match is an absolute chore to sit through. It would easily have been the most forgettable Taker/Lesnar match ever if Brock didn't end the streak. I think it goes beyond Taker's bell being rung. I don't think anyone believed Lesnar stood a chance. And after all those years, I think that lack of buy in had an adverse impact on audience investment. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
username Posted October 23, 2018 Share Posted October 23, 2018 I think the only true answers to this question are matches where one participant is just too bad to make anything salvageable (think like Trish/Bradshaw vs Gayda/Nowinski level bad) or matches where a participant suffers a legit injury with enough time left in the match that it can't be effectively covered up. Even the Orton/HHH match mentioned above, it really wasn't because of a bad performance (I mean, I thought it was but let's ingore that for now) but because the crowd just wasn't buying what they were selling which is a different issue altogether. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brian Fowler Posted October 23, 2018 Share Posted October 23, 2018 6 hours ago, West Newbury Bad Boy said: I think it goes beyond Taker's bell being rung. I don't think anyone believed Lesnar stood a chance. And after all those years, I think that lack of buy in had an adverse impact on audience investment. I don't know. People bought in during the previous five years. Part was the story just kinda seemed tossed out there though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.T. Posted October 23, 2018 Share Posted October 23, 2018 I had high hopes for Lesnar / Angle at WrestleMania XIX but the SSP botch to the F5 finish was embarrassingly business exposing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt D Posted October 23, 2018 Share Posted October 23, 2018 What I come back to is the Midnight Rockers vs Rose/Somers December cage match, but again, it's not due to any performance but because Michaels takes too much of the early part of the match, so it's structural. Actually, here's the answer: Michaels vs Hogan from Summerslam. Structure's fine. Michaels goes out of his way to make it ridiculous. EDIT: Loss from PWO reminded me of another of my personal bugbears: RVD vs Benoit, where Benoit works over a limb for minutes on end and RVD just drops the selling completely anytime he gets a hope spot or is back on offense to get his shit in. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BurningBeard Posted October 25, 2018 Share Posted October 25, 2018 On 10/23/2018 at 2:38 PM, J.T. said: I had high hopes for Lesnar / Angle at WrestleMania XIX but the SSP botch to the F5 finish was embarrassingly business exposing. It wasn't that bad, especially in comparison to Austin's roll-up at Summerslam 97. I don't let it mar my thoughts on what is one of the best WM main events Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rehabilitated Rick Posted October 25, 2018 Share Posted October 25, 2018 The last Omega/Ishii match sucked hella balls, which surprised many, given their G1 match was out of this world good. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jiji Posted October 25, 2018 Share Posted October 25, 2018 Sucked hella balls seems very harsh. But, yeah, the G1 match is one of my favourites of all timez. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kang Posted October 27, 2018 Share Posted October 27, 2018 Most raw tv midcard matches. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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