WWE Money In The Bank Reax

Read on for my thoughts on last night's Money In The Bank show.

Kickoff:
Very good opening tag match. The Usos really brought it here. I think they might be worthy of the Tag Titles down the line. They've still got room to grow (like a lot of performers), but this is the most motivated I think they've ever looked. The Shield was as awesome as they generally are.

The stuff with Kofi, Show, and Vickie feels a little silly. I get the point of it, and think in some ways it's good for getting over the things on the show, but it feels weird for active (though currently hurt) members of the roster to be putting over stories without talking about what THEY'RE going to do when they get back. Why not talk to, say, Regal or Booker since we're not expecting them back in the ring soon?

MITB:
I loved both promos setting up MITB. I care more about Sandow than I've cared about some performers their whole careers because he's such a good talker. He's not just all "golly gee willickers I can't wait to win a championship because I've wanted to be a wrestler my whole life and this is my dream". That gets old REALLY fast.

That was a pretty awesome MITB match. I didn't see that performance coming from Fandango. Is it time to turn  him face? Yes, the match was basically a crazy hardcore brawl, and I do miss the days when ladder matches weren't just "throw a bunch of people in a match and let them beat the hell out of each other", but this was better than a certain other ladder match put on lately. For instance, they actually wanted to win the match! Anyway, I liked the ending. Rhodes vs. Sandow should be good.

Not really crazy about the Maddox/Vickie segment, since (for now) it feels like it didn't really accomplish anything (at least enough for it to take up PPV time). BUT, it did bring the crowd back down after a chaotic ladder match. That's important. Roller coasters have downs in between the ups for a reason.

Miz vs. Axel was better than it had any right to be. Obviously it wasn't HARDCORE SPOTFEST #728228, but it told a good story with the moves and holds that they did use. It's still weird to me every time Miz puts on such good performances, since for better or worse he's stuck in that "goofy reality show star" box, and the IWC treats him like he's the spawn of Satan "RUININ' MUH WRESSLIN".

I have a sad. I wanted a longer match from AJ and Kaitlyn. What they did was really good, but I wanted something a little more epic from the build-up. At any rate, both deserve props for what has been a very entertaining feud.

I don't really like the panel idea for some reason. Too "sports" like I guess. I'd rather them use that time to interview the wrestlers before or after their matches.

Ryback vs. Jericho, while a fine match from a technical standpoint, left a little something to be desired for me. It was as if Ryback "got lucky" and barely beat Jericho. I guess they're definitely depushing Ryback for whatever reason. To me, it makes sense to have the full-time guy annihilate the guy who's not going to be wrestling for a while (like when he took out Kofi), but I guess they want to keep Jericho strong for when he comes back. It's not like Jericho couldn't have attacked Ryback when he returned and be right back on the road to being serious business.

Ziggler vs. Del Rio was really good. Ziggler's "workrate" (as popularly used) is amazing. Insanely hard worker. Del Rio is also a top-notch competitor. I hope both men have great futures in the company. The ending was clever to continue the split between Ziggler and his entourage while keeping the Title on Del Rio (which should have been the goal).

I liked everything about that match but the ending. Cena for once looked vulnerable and like he could have lost. Honestly, if Cena didn't seem to win so many major matches (and there wasn't so much complaining about it), I would probably be behind it. I can probably live with it at any rate. Very curious to see where Henry goes after tapping clean.

That was all really good. RVD's definitely still got "it". I'm a little perplexed by having Orton win over Bryan, but we'll see where they go from here. They can easily have Bryan beat Orton for the briefcase.

More wrestling coming up.