Money In The Bank 2011 review and thoughts!

Excuse the terrible pun but, Money In The Bank surely had to be exactly that for the WWE. The hype surrounding the PPV had reached fever pitch by the time last night rolled around and reports claim that backstage had a ‘Wrestlemania feel’ to it and its no surprise. CM Punk/John Cena and Vince McMahon have put on a masterful display in recent weeks. The raw, unscripted and naturally scathing promos by Punk have been genius, the retorts from Cena brilliant and the way McMahon has played the powerless evil boss has been fantastic. Honestly, the whole thing has made CM Punk the hottest name in wrestling right now, and deservedly so.

Smackdown MITB Ladder Match

Money In The Bank kicked off with the Smackdown MITB match. It was a very solid, very fast-paced, back-and-forth kind of match, with total non-stop action (ahem) from the get go. A few notable spots were spectacular looking including Sheamus powerbombing Sin Cara through a ladder with the masked amigo being stretchered to the back. WWE has announced today that they have suspended Sin Cara for a violation of the wellness policy. Lord knows what kind of drugs he’s taking, maybe HGH to get bigger? Although with his size, they can’t be working very well. Mistico was a star in Mexico and one of the best on the circuit, he just can’t seem to cut it in the WWE. Shame. Heading into the match I was sure that either Sheamus, Wade Barrett or Cody Rhodes were winning it. Sheamus is the safe option of course, whereas Barrett has shown he can hang in the main event with ease, when booked properly. Cody Rhodes has impressed me tremendous amounts since his character change and I thought he was on the way to being built up as a serious main eventer. I was happily mistaken. Daniel Bryan captured the contract for a World Title shot. Daniel Bryan has gone from the indies and working shows in front of a few dozen people, all the way to performing in front of thousands and getting a shot at the premier Wrestling companies world title. What a feeling. On top of that he’s one of the best, if not the best worker in the company right now. I’m looking forward to what WWE has in store for Bryan.

Winner: Daniel Bryan

*** ½

Kelly Kelly vs Brie Bella

……………………………………

¼ star.

Winner and still Divas Champion: Kelly Kelly

Mark Henry vs The Big Show

If it wasn’t clear that the WWE are once again building Mark Henry up for a main event run, this match screamed it in your face and kicked you in your nuts. In what was a glorified squash match, Mark Henry was made to look an absolute monster. Big Show was taken out of his element and had to resort to moves from the ropes to attempt to take out Mizark, all in vain however has Henry dominated most of the action. After he finished him off, Henry wrapped Show's injured knee in a chair and jumped on it. Obviously, this wasn't the greatest match in the world, but Henry left looking like a total badass. WWE couldn't have booked this better.

Winner: Mark Henry

**

Raw MITB Ladder Match

I was a big fan of the Raw match being vastly different from the Smackdown one. Obviously they were both spotfests, however, the Raw match seemed to feature more creativity and urgency whereas the Smackdown one featured more atheleticism. It was a nice story that added to the quality of both matches. As for the eventually winner Alberto Del Rio, I’m not sold on it. For one, Del Rio already won a number one contenders match on Raw… so what the fuck was the point in that? Two, I STILL don’t think he’s ready. If Del Rio really is to face John Cena at Summerslam as reports have been all year, I don’t really see that as an enticing main event at all. Hopefully WWE will take the year they have to build him up and use it wisely.

Winner: Alberto Del Rio

*** 1/2

Christian vs Randy Orton for the World Heavyweight Championship

Another very solid match between the two. Whenever they get in the ring together everything seems to ‘click.’ I’m not convinced on how things played out, however. Orton came out of the match looking like the biggest tool on the planet. In the world of keyfabe Christian is trying to physically injure Randy Orton, yet it was SPIT that crossed the line with him? Sure, it was pretty nasty and went right in the mouth but when you’re defending your prized possession THAT is what’s going to send you over the edge? Really? Just how strong do WWE want to make him look anyway? The post-match beatdown made Christian look like an absolute pussy. I get that Orton has ‘anger management issues’ and is portrayed as a ‘psychopath’ but come on, making your newly crowned World Champion get beatdown to such an extent moments after winning the title? Solid booking there… Anyway, I’m glad Christian has the title again, lets hope he doesn’t drop it on Friday Night Smackdown.

Winner and NEW World Heavyweight Champion: Christian

*** ½

CM Punk vs John Cena for the WWE Championship

Lets face it, this is the match fans watched the PPV for. Forget that, this is the reason people watch wrestling. The crowd were on fire all night, but I wasn’t prepared for the huge face pop that CM Punk received upon entering the arena. What really slapped me in the face though was the reaction for Cena… holy shit. The boo’s drowned out his music at times. I have never heard a louder heel reaction in all my years of being a wrestling fan, for anyone, period. The build up, the hometown hero, the face of the company, the title and jobs at stake, the setting was perfect.

What followed was 35 minutes of pure, straight-up wrestling, and it was booked perfectly. The match of the year by far. I was honestly thrown by how back and forth it was. We’ve become used to the stale formula that Cena is booked by, tonight he really got to show what he’s made of for the first time since his feud with Shawn Michaels a few years ago. Cena hit two AA's on Punk towards the end, and Punk kicked out. Cena's facial reaction was gold as he told the referee, "I don't know what to do." Vince McMahon coming out to attempt a ‘Chicago Screwjob’ was excellent booking as well as the tease of Del Rio cashing in his MITB after Punk had won the title.  Honestly, it was a perfect ending. Everyone was expecting a clean Cena win, a Chicago Screwjob or Punk winning and then Del Rio cashing in. All of those endings were teased, and it got the crowd in attendance, and everyone watching at home, compelled and excited for the finish. Serious props go to the WWE for giving this match a chance as well as Cena and Punk putting on a five star classic that is sure to be remembered for years. 

Winner and NEW WWE Champion: CM Punk

*****

I’ve been very critical of the WWE this year, but ever since CM Punk’s promo on Raw we’ve had gold at least every episode of Raw and the payoff at Money In The Bank was executed superbly. My anticipation for tonight’s Raw is incredibly high. This is exactly what WWE needed, a sense of unknown that’s been missing for so long. Enjoy it while you can wrestling fans, because pessimistic me says it won’t last for too long.

Thanks for reading!

Leave me some feedback on Facebook or Twitter @crapminitweets or of course, in the comments below.

Lets. Talk. Wrestling.

Richard McMaster

Monday Night Raw Thoughts - Cena/McMahon/Punk

My anticipation for this week’s Raw was higher than it has been in sometime. Coming off the back of that fantastic unscripted WORKED shoot promo from CM Punk, I was intrigued as to how the WWE would move the storyline forward. On the topic of the promo (since I didn’t write last week) I thought it was a bold move by WWE as it went against their usual policy of never over-exposing the business but, boy did it pay off. The Internet was a-buzz and no one really knew what to think of it, some people STILL think it was a shoot. Lets not get it twisted, if the WWE is airing video packages of the promo as well as mentioning CM Punk over the week’s programming, then you’re kidding yourself if you think it was a shoot. WWE executives most likely told CM Punk to go out there, stir up some controversy and didn’t give him a script to follow. Therefore, Punk’s promo was a worked – shoot and it was probably the best promo to come out of the company for a few years.

 One of the things that made it great was the fact that it was soaked in a realism that you rarely get in this PG era. The results meant that adults can appreciate the storyline as well as younger fans and even Internet fans like myself found it compelling due to the usually ‘taboo’ subjects of creative team members, other wrestling promotions and the insulting of legends that were mentioned during Punk’s tirade. The WWE are on to absolute money with CM Punk IF they can convince him to stick around. Many people were calling it Punk’s ‘Austin 3:16’ moment, and I don’t think they’re far wrong. Punk showed an aggression and temperament that was reminiscent of the Attitude Era. I’m not saying that Punk’s promo brought about a new era in the WWE, I think they’re too caught up with pleasing sponsors and other organisations and too worried about shrinking stock to abandon PG just yet, however I think it was very significant in shifting the landscape at least for a couple of weeks.

This was evidenced by the opening to this week’s Monday Night Raw. The WWE Champion John Cena came out to start the show, however, he didn’t look very happy. His reason? He feels it was the wrong decision to ‘suspend’ CM Punk for speaking his mind. That direction came as quite a shock to me, but it was a fantastic decision I feel. John Cena has become the stale ‘company man’ in that he never really questions authority like he used to in his early days. Its tried and tested throughout the Attitude Era that wrestlers who challenged authority became the biggest draws I.E. Stone Cold Steve Austin and The Rock. People can easily relate to wrestlers that are aggravated by their boss (as they are themselves) and is part of the reason Austin became the biggest drawing superstar of all time. Cena delivers a solid promo and asks the chairman himself Vince McMahon to join him in the ring later for a face off… more on that later.

Raw was actually in-ring heavy this episode (aside from the start and finish), which was a nice change. However, none of the matches were really anything to write home about. First up was Kelly Kelly & Eve vs The Bella Twins. I didn’t really glean that much from the match apart from the fact they’re all hot and Eve continues to be a waste of space by not being able to execute a standing moonsault properly. I’ve never really understood what happened to ‘twin magic’ as it seemed to disappear after the Bella’s began to be pushed. WWE exploiting the fact that they’re twins in a tag match is a great way to attempt to garner some heel heat for the pair. They should be cheating their way to victory through dirty tactics and entering the ring without tagging… but I suppose psychology is a little too much for them to handle.

It seems as if Santino & Kozlov have faced various members of the Nexus/ Corre for about 5 years at this point. Honestly, WWE should form some serious and legitimate tag teams or just can the titles completely because they have been worthless for too long now. Word is that they’re possibly signing The Kings of Wrestling and maybe the Briscoe Brothers… for the love of god I hope they don’t… because they’ll be separated within a month of debuting.

Zack Ryder came out… said ‘WOO WOO WOO, You Know It’ and… erm… that was it. What the fuck?

4^th of July, what does that mean? Well… not a lot to us English folk but I hope American readers had a great day. I can never see England having something like the 4^th of July, celebrating the country and ourselves… why the fuck not? We should have something similar for sure. Anyway, 4^th of July means that Sgt. Slaughter is at Raw apparently. We get an awful match between Slaughter and Swagger that Swagger wins… thank god. Slaughter wrestling added absolutely nothing and he could have just said the Pledge of Allegiance in a backstage segment.

The audience… oh god the audience. They had to sit through a dark match, a Superstars taping, a live Raw and then a taping of Raw… they must have been half dead and the terrible editing and piped sound in post-production did absolutely nothing. You hear a decent-sized crowd pop, while the crowd is shown on the screen just sitting there and not reacting to anything. This was evident during The Miz FINALLY getting his chance to beat down on Alex Riley, the crowd was absolutely silent and none of them seemed to give a flying fuck.

I’ve mentioned it before in these blogs but how the fuck can WWE support various anti-bullying schemes when the superstars are bullying people on screen? Jerry Lawler continuously reels off joke after joke about Vickie Guerrero’s weight, looks and age. Of course after this we’ll see a video package telling us that WWE doesn’t condone any sort of bullying. It’s just fucking amazing.

Quite a decent match was had between R-Truth, Rey Mysterio and Alberto Del Rio to determine the new number one contender for the WWE title. There was some nice back and forth action but eventually Mysterio hits Truth with the 619, and when he goes for the pin, Del Rio sneaks in and locks his armbar on Rey. Rey taps, and Del Rio is the new #1 Contender for the WWE Title. I think Del Rio has lost a ton of heat since his arrival on Raw and his feud with the Big Show, I fear WWE are going to fast track him to the WWE title just to make him look legitimate again. This can be a terrible mistake as we have seen with Sheamus and recently The Miz… don’t make it again WWE!

I was definitely intrigued by the addition of Mr. McMahon to close the show and that intrigue was rewarded. I thought it was a very nice exchange between McMahon and Cena and again goes back to my point of people loving the challenge of authority. Cena broke out of the cookie cutter mould he has once again become to accuse McMahon of going ‘soft’ and to hang it up if he doesn’t feel like fighting anymore. Cena once again became the ‘company man’ however, it was for a different reason. The champ claims to have signed up to WWE to defend the brand, to represent it and its fan’s freedom of expression… this only exasperated McMahon. There were plenty of ‘ooo’s’ to be heard when Vinnie Mac stated ‘don’t piss me off!’ but the audience was near dead for this segment as well. Its shame because had it been live, I’m sure there would have been some big reactions. As I mentioned before, what makes this storyline so appealing to me is the element of realism. When McMahon stated ‘don’t be Hogan’ and basically told Cena he is replaceable, the sentiments rang true… this is McMahon’s company and he can do exactly as he wants. That’s some great heel work right there. Eventually Cena said Vince has rendered the WWE Title useless, and handed the belt to him. This is not what people would expect the face John Cena to say and do and it gives a nice little twist to his character… maybe that heel turn is coming!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!…. probably not. We can hope though. Vince then goes onto re-instate CM Punk and claims that if Cena loses the match, he’s fired. The end.

WWE have raised the interest levels for Money In The Bank incredibly high. People are still reeling from Punk’s promo, the stakes have been raised for Cena and the storyline has been enhanced with the inclusion of Mr. McMahon. Could we be heading for a McMahon vs Cena feud similar to the Austin one? Perhaps, I’m not sure it would work as well in a PG environment but it could be fun… I guess we’ll wait and see.

Thanks for reading

I’ll be on holiday next week so no blog until after Money In The Bank, which is free in the UK on Sky Sports 1. Nice.

Let me know your thoughts.

Lets Talk Wrestling.

Twitter - @crapminitweets