By Thomas Brunt Going into both WWE Payback and WWE Extreme Rules, most fans with common sense knew Champion Roman Reigns was going to emerge victorious over rival AJ Styles in their program. How it was going to happen was another matter, a matter that many feared for the former IWGP Heavyweight champion. Make no mistake about it, Styles once again proved why he is indeed "The Phenomenal One" in his latest series of matches with Roman Reigns, but this was never the concern. Roman Reigns winning wasn't even the issue. The issue was a concern of whether or not the former TNA star would be buried, or at least how he would look in defeat to the hated champion. The concern, unfortunately became more a reality as week after week until the go home Raw for Extreme Rules, both AJ Styles and his (now) former stable, the Bullet Club continued to look weak and painfully so to both the leader of the Roman Empire, and his cousins, The Usos
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By Graham "GSM" Matthews Natalya def. Summer Rae It's a shame Natalya wasn't contending for the WWE Women's Championship at an earlier time because I really would have liked to see her with a title again. It would have been logical to have her win Sunday's Submission match at Extreme Rules had Charlotte not been in the midst of a long reign as champ heading into SummerSlam. At any rate, she and Summer contested a solid match here and it was nice to see Summer showcase her skills a bit while on offense. Natalya emerged victorious as she should have, but Summer at least looked good in defeat. Zack Ryder def. Viktor As I've expressed before, Ryder is perfect in the ultimate underdog role. Sami Zayn plays a similar character, of course, but Ryder is a bit different because he has had to fight his way up the card over the years. That said, I wish he was more prominently featured on programming because he definitely has the fan following. Viktor bores me to tears whenever he's in the ring, more so on his own than when he was with Konnor, but Ryder increased my interest in this match and made it bearable. By Graham "GSM" Matthews Dean Ambrose, Kevin Owens, Sami Zayn and Alberto Del Rio Staked Their Claim at Winning Money in the Bank We'll be seeing segments like this one in the weeks leading up to Money in the Bank with the Ladder match participants talking about why they're going to win, so I'm surprised they gave one away so early. I suppose it was WWE's way of getting these guys on the show, but on the bright side, everyone played their role well and I'll never complain about hearing from Owens on the mic. I specifically enjoyed his verbal exchange with Zayn and I'm glad their feud is still at full force heading into the event. Del Rio's involvement at the end basically gave away the outcome of the next match, but at least Zayn talked up Zack Ryder as a potential threat by bringing up his WrestleMania upset victory. Alberto Del Rio def. Zack Ryder in a Money in the Bank Qualifying Match Del Rio and Ryder worked well together and I was happy Ryder scored as much offense as he did (going so far as to hit his finisher on Del Rio before he rolled out of the ring), but again, the ending outcome was never in doubt after what we saw in the opening segment. I know Del Rio is a former Mr. Money in the Bank and world champion, but honestly, I would have rather seen Ryder appear in the Ladder match over Del Rio. At least he has attempted to rejuvenate his character recently, which is more than what can be said for Del Rio at the moment. By Graham "GSM" Matthews and RJ Marceau With all the excitement surrounding the impending return of the WWE Draft, RJ Marceau and I thought it was only appropriate to hold a draft of our own using the current WWE roster and wasted no time in doing so. The rules were as follows: each of us could select up to 20 Superstars with a minimum of two tag teams and two women. Each tandem, although they could consist of two to three people, counted as one pick. Every active/signed NXT talent wa eligible as well. Afterward, we created our own pay-per-view card using the talent we selected. The only rules were that every individual must be used in some form or fashion and multi-person matches were fine but only one special stipulation match (i.e. Last Man Standing) was allowed. Voice your feedback on which was better in the comments down below, or by tweeting us on Twitter at the links provided in the byline. With RJ taking SmackDown and myself taking Raw, here were the results. |
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