In what has become an early candidate for worst show of the year, the event featured Samoa Joe vs. Roman Reigns, AJ Styles vs. Shinsuke Nakamura, Carmella vs. Charlotte, and a show-stealing performance featuring Seth Rollins vs. The Miz.
John and Wai run down the entire card, take your Café feedback (featuring a record setting rating for the show) and have a heated debate about the teaser for the upcoming season of Total Bellas.
WWE doesn’t deserve the roster it has. It goes to show money can’t buy quality. This card alone as noted by Wai contains
Rollins
Bryan
Joe
Aj
Nakamura
Charlotte
Keven Owens
Sami Zayn
Do you realize what kind of show that would produce about anywhere else in the world! This isn’t a difference between wrestling and entertainment because this show wasn’t entertaining. I feel bad for the roster who knows there is a higher level of wrestling out there but must decide what is most important - artistic fulfillment and achieving greatness in a profession or
So, just to chip in to the super important Total Bellas discussion on the podcast…the scene that you guys are arguing over was definitely aired in a trailer before they announced the break-up, so you assumed that they weren’t actually going to break up when you saw it first.
Now, it obviously seems way more dramatic, because they are really broken up (or is nothing real?!). So I’m going to assume that they don’t actually break up at that point in the show, but maybe they rework it? Aren’t Total Bellas/Divas are usually about 6 months behind reality when they air normally?
To be fair, as much as I love watching both shows I’m definitely more of Johns skeptical opinion about how real they are!
Navigating these kind of shows is what separates John and Wai from the rest for me. Anyone can give a recap, anyone can shit on a product. John and Wai are thoughtful in discussing less than stellar shows and I appreciate them giving good thought and analysis where others may go off the deep end.
I’ve enjoyed John going from saying he hates the coverage of the breakup when it was announced to now looking forward to a documentary on everything that happened.
Now I understand how it feels to be a beautiful model turned into successful wrestler whose a role model to thousands around the world.
Wait no I don’t…I can’t relate to Nia’s plight in the slightest.
More importantly than the true facts surrounding this storyline is the execution. Long promo’s are the death of WWE. Even the people who are GREAT at them (Cena and Miz) only make for passable tv when they drone on for 10+ minutes.
WWE needs a new rule:
All current day promo’s are cut down by 80% MINIMUM. If your promo is 10 minutes then figure out how best to get the point across in 2. Nia’s speech here could have been summed up in the last line alone and the crowd would have reacted favorably while understanding the point.
Confirmed: Nakamura is no longer a great wrestler.
Nakamura has wrestled maybe 3 good matches since joining Smackdown with only one being considered great (match with Cena).
If you want to defend Nakamura then so be it…he’s a legend and among the best wrestlers in the world but WWE will NEVER let him perform. I could make the same argument today about Jinder Mahal and feel just as confident about it.
If you never let your performers perform…it turns them into mediocre performers.
Nakamura isn’t a bad wrestler. It’s just clear he’s not a great one. Not in 2017 or 2018.
I have no reason to get any more excited about a Nakamura match in 2018 than a Randy Ortan match.
Backlash sucked, but should we have set our expectations that high? This show felt like an afterthought up until last week due to the Greatest Royal Rumble hype. May is kind of one of WWE’s “offseason” months where creative seems to be at its worst and storylines/feuds tend to coast. I can’t think of too many great or memorable PPV cards that occurred in May in the last 15 years in WWE. It’s just a dull, uneventful month where the post-Wrestlemania lull really kicks in.
I think Nakamura has trouble adjusting himself to the pace of WWE matches. He has to sell a lot, slow down in certain parts to show “struggling” and that’s the opposite of japanese wrestling.
I enjoyed the podcast much more than Backlash. Its nice to able to laugh off the misery of watching that show knowing everyone else was suffering with me.
Other than Rollins, I though Roode was the MVP of the night. He was hilarious and had the people loving him. People keep saying he looked like a geek but so what, it was probably the most over he has been since his debut.
I’m thinking that these ball shots we’re getting from Aj and Nakamura is just a joke Vince McMahon finds hilarious so That’s why they keep doing it
“HA HA! Look at him hit Aj in the nuts! That’s hilarious! I want to see that in every match they have from now On! In fact, 2 or 3 times a match is even better! Make it happen Bruce!”
And I really feel for Samoa Joe. You can be a great promo and a badass wrestler but it doesn’t matter how over you are. Being in the ring with Roman Reigns automatically turns the fans against your matcv
Bryan’s only been back a little while, so expecting him to be as sharp as he was before (let alone better) is a little hopeful. Plus that match was booked and laid out like trash, so it’s hard to impress when you’re trying to polish a turd.
Nia is a horrible talker, but the person that wrote this whole angle and her ‘happy to be a landwhale’ promo in particular needs firing.
And the Elias segment was the second best part of the show. Which says more about the rest of it than Elias’s performance…
I actually think this is exactly what Vince things but in a much more sinister way. The internet wants their dream match - well we all got our dream match! Vince has to be trolling the internet with this as his booking calls on this feud contain all his childish trademarks.
This isn’t X Pac heat, but it’s a new kind of Roman heat in which the crowd is turning on any match he is in. This is fascinating and the only other guy I can think of that gets this reaction is Orton but even that isn’t a rejection of the guy - Orton is just placed in very boring matches
Touching in the Bailey and Sasha situation I think their trying to figure out who should turn heel. Sasha would be the obvious choice but I think their reconsidering thinking Bailey needs the fresh coat of paint more. As far as Daniel Bryan goes he is and always has been average. He’s boring. The Yes chant is all he has and It’s so stupid. It happened by accident as well. If people stop going along with chant you’ll see how much talent he really has because he don’t be able to come up with anything new which explains why he hasn’t evolved. He lives off the Yes chant. He looks like a little boy in a diaper but a bum at the same time with his messy long hair and scraggly beard. He’s descent wrestler but nothing special. You’ll see though soon they’ll be putting the belt on him and I’ll have to put up with his dull interviews and personality and boring ring attire and theme song. The only feud that is exciting is him vs the Mis because Mis will be carrying the feud. I remember before Wrestlemania 30 they had him look like he was this dangerous man beating up Batista and Randy Orton both at the same time. Please don’t insult my intelligence. What a joke. Then at Wrestlemania 30 he faces Triple H and takes the pedigree and doesn’t even sell it. I remember he just kicks out of it at a 2 count like it was nothing. Anyways regarding Kevin Owens when he first came to the main roster after destroying Sami Zayne at the NXT event and he had the confrontation with John Cena that was the best version of Kevin because he was a serious character that meant business. Cena putting him over really got people taking him serious because you he meant business but then of course Cena had to get a rematch and it kind killed Owens because Cena beats him by taoout and it made Owens look weak. That was the downhill spiral. Now he was becoming this joke character that was complaining and making excuses and also being comedy character so it was hard to take him serious anymore. Also when he first came in he a creative offense and really good matches but for a long time now he doesn’t use a lot of moves in his arsenal. He’s just become basic and his in ring work is sloppy and average. So I don’t think He’s as good as he thinks he is. Sami actually is a good wrestler but the WWE just don’t throw him a bone kind of like Owen Hart. AJ and Nakumura just don’t have chemistry It’s time to move on. Nakamura is hard to take serious especially after he lost to Jinder Mahall 2 times clean on ppv.
