Well I suppose not all of 2020 could be peaches and cream.
Believe it or not, this has been a tough year for an industry that is built entirely around performance for a live crowd.
WWE has, to its credit, managed some absolutely wonderful pay-per-view matches this year, but it truly is hell trying to get into heaven, and before we can bask in the glory of 2020’s best wrestling, first we must do the main roster version of basking in glory, which is changing the glory’s theme music and asking it to wear a dorky shirt for no good reason. IT’S A KEITH LEE REFERENCE.
10. Women’s Elimination Chamber (Elimination Chamber)
Right. Okay. Right. Let’s start with the really divisive one.
Just to say upfront, as an angle to get over the blood-curdling terror of Shayna Baszler, this worked really well. However, angles don’t normally last 21 minutes.
If this was the first step on the journey to probably still today Raw Women’s Champion Shayna Baszler, it’s more palatable. But seeing as Becky Lynch retained at Mania in a decent but underwhelming match, this Elimination Chamber match has aged like a fine murderer.
It’s just awkward. Baszler enters as the fourth combatant and wipes everyone out. Then we wait. Then Liv Morgan arrives and is killed also. Then we wait. The crowd lose their patience, Baszler can’t save it with posturing, Asuka can’t save it with dancing and making weird noises, it’s just, as a viewing experience terrible.
Kayfabe the time WWE, just rig it, who cares? Or have Baszler come in 5, kill everyone just in time for Asuka, although that would mean extending the pre-Baszler section of the chamber which was heatless Natalya vs the heatless former Riott Squad, which was also mega boring.
Damned if you do, damned if you don’t.
9. Bobby Lashley vs SLAPJACK (Clash of Champions)
I mean, shrug. What do you say about this? It’s a thrown together on the day, meaningless extended squash, featuring a wrestler called, and it still hasn’t become so bad it’s good, we’re all waiting for it, f**king Slapjack.
Literally the only thing of note about this match is that, for a terrifying force hellbent on destroying Raw via stealing a bunch of bane costumes from the dollar store and [checks notes] lobbying for and receiving employment by WWE, this is at time of writing, the ONLY pay-per-view to have featured RETRIBUTION in ANY in-ring capacity.
Seriously, the faction’s been around for four months and the only impact they’ve made for anyone not watching the TV shows which is a lot of people turns up, is this weird Jason-looking motherf**ker who gets munched by Bobbles Lashford, and then RETRIBUTION turn up and bobbles beats them up too. Next?
8. The Women’s Survivor Series Match
Okay, there are definitely worse matches out there, and compared to some of the women’s Survivor Series matches we had in the 2000s, this is a Rembrandt, but god damn did NO-ONE come out of this match looking good.
When you have 10 people in a match and not one person comes out of it with improved stock, that’s a bad match.
The whole match is a joke, and I don’t mean that in a snide way, literally the match is structured like a joke, setup, development of the setup and the punchline, which is Lana won the match, lol but she’s terrible.
Hey, if WWE wants to use most of their woman’s division to tell literally this one joke, fine it’s up to them, but WWE why did you tell it so weird?!
Why did you have Lana tag in and do well. Literally Lana tags in and that would fit the story if she immediately f**ks up, but she wrestles competently before her groups screams at her to tag out.
So Bayley looks like a chump for being eliminated first, Shayna Baszler looks like a chump for getting herself disqualified for literally no reason, Jax and Belair look like chumps for not understanding how countouts work, especially Jax who is next to the ring, unencumbered at 9 and still runs AWAY from the ring, the only person who emerges with anything is Lana, but she won as a gag, what’s she gonna do, challenge Asuka again?
I dunno, maybe I’m just grumpy, it’s just, Bianca Belair is right there, why won’t you… Why didn’t she. Oh forget it.
