6. Intercontinental Champion The Miz Vs. Apollo Crews: The Intercontinental Championship hasn’t felt relevant in years due to the lack of care on the part of WWE Creative in making it feel like the important secondary title it once was. This match did nothing to fix that problem. It wasn’t the fault of Miz or Crews, as both are solid workers and capable of having good matches. The problem fell entirely on Creative, who couldn’t be bothered to build this match up properly on the TV leading up to the PPV. Then there was the crummy finish. Both men were having a really good match, albeit one on the short side at 6 minutes. However, the finish was beyond crap, as Miz retained the title after his wife Maryse distracted the ref, allowing Hubby Dearest to ram Crews’ head into the giant ringpost, following it up with a Skull Crushing Finale for the pin. The IC title, its’ current champion and the up-and-coming Crews all continue to look weak. Way to go, Vince. ***1/2
7. John Cena Vs. AJ Styles: Far and away the best match of the show and the only one that was anything close to extraordinary. After disappointing at Money in the Bank with a sluggish match, both men make up for that lackluster bout with one of the year’s best matches. Cena has finally shaken off the ring rust that he accumulated over an eight-month shelving due to injury. Styles was finally allowed a showcase for his considerable in-ring talent. The match was refreshingly devoid of the constant outside interference and clusterf*** booking that has plagued all of Styles’ post-Mania 32 matches. After being lulled into a coma by the last few matches, the live crowd in Brooklyn finally came to life again. The crowd was largely anti-Cena. God these “John Cena Sucks” chants are getting old. Not to mention that such chants just expose how stupid the IWC clods actually are by insisting that Cena can’t wrestle when he’s proven for over 11 years that he is a superb all-around wrestler. Cena and Styles put on a real nailbiter, taking each other to the absolute limit. At 30 minutes, it was a long match but it was so brilliantly executed that it felt far shorter. The ending was a worry, especially since WWE has repeatedly done the wrong thing and book Cena to win yet feuds that he could easily afford to lose. Given that he’s taking three months off to film another season of a TV show that people clearly preferred watching paint dry instead of tuning in, it made sense for Styles to win. Thank the heavens that common sense prevailed. Styles finally pinned Cena with the springboard flying forearm after several attempts by each to put their quarry away for good. Cena sold the loss like it was a heartbreaking one, pulling off his “Never Give Up” armband and holding back tears. It felt as if the guy telling us never to give up just did. While shocking to some degree, it gives Cena’s character some much needed context for his inevitable return. This match blew away everything else on the show. ******+++ 8. WWE Tag Team Champions The New Day (Xavier Woods & Kofi Kingston) Vs. Karl Anderson & Luke Gallows: I knew we were in for trouble once Anderson and Gallows were turned into jokester heels instead of the vicious monsters they were in Japan. I knew we were in for even more trouble once Jon Stewart showed up in the New Day’s corner. Yet I was unprepared for just how bad this match turned out to be. Without Big E, the New Day’s live reaction was noticeably muted. The Kofi-Woods tandem didn’t work and gel together as smoothly or sharply as the usual Kofi/Big E tandem, leaving me to wonder if Big E truly is the heart and soul of this group. Anderson and Gallows were so below par and clearly not allowed to work at their usual high level that it was just sad to watch. It was a depressing match fitting for an increasingly depressing night. The match plodded along with no excitement or good wrestling for what seemed like an eternity. Anderson and Gallows were just about to cover Woods’ corpse for the win after finishing him off with the Magic Killer when Stewart interfered. He started begging for mercy and straining for laughs that weren’t there, so Anderson and Gallows decided to give him the Big E treatment of ramming his balls straight into the ringpost. Before they could make Stewart a permanent castrato, Big E made his return and cleaned house. The ref just threw his hands up and gave up on this match, with no winner declared live. Lord knows I wanted to join him. The following day, WWE.com would clarify that Anderson and Gallows won via DQ. This wound up being the worst match of the entire weekend. What a depressing fact that it was this one. ½* 9. WWE World Heavyweight Champion Dean Ambrose Vs. Dolph Ziggler: At a time when a great match was desperately needed, two stellar in-ring performers gave us only an average one instead. This was yet another crushing disappointment in a show loaded with them: a great match on paper that turned out to be astonishingly mediocre in execution. It soon became clear that not one person watching the match live inside Barclays believed that Ziggler could plausibly pull off the win. He has been jobbed out to the point that no one believes he’s a plausible contender and serious threat to any World champion. Aside from the lack of plausibility and crowd heat, another problem was that Ambrose and Ziggler just didn’t gel as opponents, lacking that creative spark the best feuds often have. It wasn’t a bad match so much as a lazy one. When it was all over my immediate impression was that both men went through the motions and were more concerned with getting it over with as quickly as possible. There was no palpable suspense; Ziggler’s repeated act of constantly covering Ambrose to get near falls fell flat without the nail-biting moments or big moves to justify such a concept. Ambrose scored the pin with Dirty Deeds, but at the end, he didn’t come off looking like a dominant champion. **1/2
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