By CJ Blaze Part 5 - Holding Gold on the Road to WrestleMania Daniel Bryan did the unexpected, and cashed in his MITB contract on Big Show at TLC. Show finally beat Mark Henry, but 45 seconds later, his reign was toast. This point in Daniel’s career had success written all over it. Since Bryan was still a babyface at the time, many wondered what would happen between the Daniel and Big Show. Since none of their matches ended in clean fashion, Teddy Long was forcing Daniel to defend his title against Big Show and Mark Henry in a steel cage triple threat match at the Royal Rumble event. David vs. Goliath vs. Goliath ended in about nine minutes with Daniel Bryan retaining his title. Bryan had officially turned into a heel at this point, and he was getting over quickly with his “YES!” chants. At Elimination Chamber, Daniel Bryan outlasted Santino Marella, Cody Rhodes, Great Khali, Wade Barrett, and Big Show to retain his title once more. After the match, the 2012 Royal Rumble winner, Sheamus, came out and attacked Bryan, giving us a clear direction for ‘Mania.
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By Carson Koschik After what was a pretty damn good Extreme Rules PPV, WWE is going to have to try once again to avoid the WrestleMania hangover. While the Chicago crowd will definitely be loud and ravenous and usual, it is up to WWE to provide quality matches and story-lines. Although we can certainly get an idea on what the card may look like, it's usually pretty to hard to predict what a PPV card will look like (especially since nothing in WWE is set in stone). Well, I'm going to try to take a crack at it and construct the Payback card using logical thinking and hopeful dreams. Here we go! Kofi Kingston vs. Cody Rhodes (Pre-Show) The WWE pre-show is basically 25 minutes of video packages and 5 minutes of a meaningless match. The tradition will continue at Payback, where former United States Champion Kofi Kingston will face Cody Rhodes. Is there any logic behind this match? Nope. Has there been any logic in any other pre-show match? Not really. The Miz vs. Jack Swagger Jack Swagger is most definitely out of the World Heavyweight Championship picture for a while, and he is most certainly not facing Alberto Del Rio again. The Miz just came back from filming what I'm sure will be an Oscar-quality film for ABC, and recently cut a promo at Extreme Rules about how he's sick of being in the pre-show. Well, why not pair the two together? Colter and Swagger can target Miz for being a superficial hollywood type ("not a real American"), and the Miz can, you know, defend himself. I wouldn't expect the most intense feud, but it'll give these two guys something to do.
The debuting Curtis Axel takes control of Triple H.
By Graham "GSM" Matthews Great promo from Ryback to kick off the show. This was the best mic work Ryback has shown since turning heel and garnered good heat from the live crowd. He challenged WWE Champion John Cena to an Ambulance match a WWE Payback next week while also targeting the audience, which was long overdue. The feud between Cena and Ryback was lacking something prior to Extreme Rules, so here's hoping this segment was a sign that the rivalry will be improving from this point forward. Throwaway tag team match with The Miz and Chris Jericho defeating Intercontinental Champion Wade Barrett and Fandango. If my memory serves me correctly, this was the first time Jericho and Miz have teamed together in over three years, so I was excited for their pairing. However, the in-ring work left a lot to be desired, as Fandango's distraction at ringside was more obnoxious than it was effective in getting him heat. Miz pinning Barrett was logical in putting him back in title contention, but the thought of Barrett being buried and treated as an afterthought once again this week is disconcerting. Speaking of Barrett, the intro to his new entrance music is awesome, but the rest of the theme sounds rather generic. Nice match between Sheamus and Titus O'Neil. It looked like it was going to be a squash match from the start, but O'Neil more than held his own against Sheamus. Not only that, but the fact that O'Neil also received an entrance made him look like an equal to The Celtic Warrior. Sure, the former NXT Rookie ultimately came up short, but he definitely had an impressive showing against the former World Heavyweight Champion. Brilliant booking with Paul Heyman revealing Curits Axel as his latest client. I realize that many people (myself included) were hoping that the newest client would be a returning Rob Van Dam, but what good would that have done? As great as that would have been, RVD is a veteran and doesn't need Heyman to get over in WWE. There's always another place and time for RVD to return, whereas putting Axel in this role helps build towards the future. The repackaging of the former Michael McGillicutty has been highly anticipated for a number of years now, so I'm happy to see it finally come to fruition in such a fashion. We weren't able to hear from Axel all that much during his confrontation with Triple H, but any issues he has on the mic (similar to Brock Lesnar) can be covered by Heyman. Decent match between Big E Langston and Alberto Del Rio. The match wasn't anything special, but highlighted Langston's in-ring abilities nicely. I was pleasantly surprised to see Langston score the upset victory over Del Rio, which should be treated as a major deal. Being a former World Champion, Del Rio loses nothing from losing to Langston and has enough to credibility to quickly rebound from it. By Carson Koschik While it was almost impossible to follow the Extreme Rules/WrestleMania wombo combo that WWE put on last year, this year's "extreme" event definitely put on one hell of an effort. With no filler and a lot of good wrestling, this year's Extreme Rules surprised many in just how good it was. And while every match and wrestler was great, it's time to focus on who did it best. Best Match Award Winner: John Cena vs. Ryback As much as I, urm, WE like to crap on John Cena, the guy can definitely put on one hell of a match. In another instance where the leader of the Cenation was sure to silence his critics, Cena faced off against Ryback in a brutal Last Man Standing match. Tables were snapped, barricades were broken, fire extinguishers were extinguished, and stage sets exploded. It was pretty damn awesome. But let's not forget that Cena wasn't the only who proved himself to the IWC. The so-called "green" Ryback also put on one hell of a performance, and showed us that he very well can hang at the top. |
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