After a few weeks of Brock Lesnar and Seth Rollins trying to one-up each other, last night’s Raw turned the focus on another Battleground feud that is quickly becoming personal. Let’s take a look at what went down.
Wyatt and the Authority Destroy Roman Reigns
As per the usual, we kick off the show with the Authority in the ring. Seth Rollins welcomes everyone to Raw and then says Brock Lesnar isn’t in the building tonight, but he wants to make sure everyone remembers what happened to him last week. He praises Jamie Noble for being a warrior (Noble actually broke three ribs thanks to Lesnar), and we can’t disagree with him at all.
Rollins is apparently here to give everyone from the Authority gifts because they re-united and took down the Beast. First gift of the night? APPLE WATCHES FOR EVERYONE!
But you know what, super expensive wrist-wear isn’t enough for these guys. Rollins has a special gift for Kane… HIS OWN HAWAIIAN GETAWAY!
Rollins says before Kane goes on his vacation, they’re going to destroy Roman Reigns and Dean Ambrose in a no-DQ tag match tonight!
BUT WAIT, THERE’S MORE! Rollins says that J&J reek of style so they of course need a BRAND NEW CAR!
That was… fun?
Later, we see Bray Wyatt cut another creepy promo on Roman Reigns. Wyatt says that life isn’t fair and he wasn’t his fathers favorite, but now he has his wings and he’s just starting to have fun with Reigns. Wyatt says that he won’t let Reigns succeed and again tells him ‘Anyone but you’ to close things out.
Backstage we see Reigns and Ambrose getting pumped for their match and it’s all kinds of bro-tastic.
The actual main event match was exactly what you expected between these four, just a ton of craziness and an interesting ending. Reigns starts going insane and Superman Punching everyone.
YOU GET A SUPERMAN PUNCH!
AND YOU GET A SUPERMAN PUNCH!
AND YOU GET A SEIZURE-INDUCING FLYING SUPERMAN PUNCH!
Reigns just starts destroying everyone, but of course out comes Wyatt because he can’t let Reigns succeed. Wyatt takes Reigns out at ringside and Kane and Rollins begin to pick Ambrose apart. The Lunatic Fringe tries to fight back but to no avail, chokeslam, Pedigree, 1-2-3 the bad guys win.
After the match, the Authority and Wyatt begin to destroy Ambrose and Reigns. The Big Dog in particular takes one hell of a beating. First being powerbombed through a table by Rollins.
And then eating a Sister Abigail for good measure after that.
We go off the air with Wyatt posing over a prone Reigns and it’s pretty awesome.
This feud is growing on me more and more. Good job by WWE keeping the Authority the center of the show while also getting the Wyatt/Reigns feud some much-needed interest.
Cena & Cesaro Put on a Classic… But Owens Gets the Last Laugh
It’s time for our official U.S. Open Challenge and out comes John Cena to take on any and all comers. Kevin Owens comes out and teases accepting the challenge before telling Cena that on second thought, he’ll just wait for Battleground. So instead of Owens, out comes Cena’s opponent…
CESARO!
Finally the Swiss Superman is getting some shine after Tyson Kidd’s injury! Cesaro and Cena basically put on a Match of the Year candidate that was full of awesome spots. I mean these guys have had great matches in the past, but this one took things to a whole different level.
Cesaro looked like an absolute champion in this match. He literally hit Cena with everything in his arsenal during this match.
Pop-up Uppercut? Check.
Catching Cena in mid-air and hitting a suplex? Check.
What about a vicious running uppercut to Cena on the outside? Yup, there was one of those too.
Bonus points to Cesaro for the primal roar he let out while running at Cena. But after an uppercut that vicious, you eventually have to get your opponent into the ring right? Don’t worry, Cesaro even made that look incredible.
Can someone tell Vince that this is what fans connect with? Cesaro needs a main event push ASAP.
But to be fair, it wasn’t all Cesaro in this match. Check out this awesome reversal by Cena that got the U.S. Champ a near-fall.
That almost makes up for the worst Springboard Stunner in the history of humanity. Almost.
Yikes.
In the end, Cesaro paid homage to his fallen comrade Kidd by locking Cena into a Sharpshooter and looking like he might steal the U.S. title… before Owens attacked him and caused a DQ. Owens then hits both Cena and Cesaro with Pop-Up Powerbombs before saying he was going to be the one to take the title off of Cena.
Just an awesome, awesome segment from Owens promo to the match. If we’re lucky, this will lead to a Cesaro-Owens feud after Owens is done with Cena.
Other Results:
Someone Save Dolph Ziggler – The Show-Off and Lana make their way out to the ring and the crowd chants for Lana while Ziggler says he’s with thim and then talks about how Lana was just using him to get back at Rusev but now everything’s changed and Lana says that she didn’t know a real man until Ziggler (that’s gotta hurt Rusev) and they’re more than friends and yada yada yada.
Speaking of couples we don’t care about, hey look it’s Summer Rae and Rusev! Rusev starts berating Lana and apparently Summer Rae doesn’t care that he’s abusive because it gets her back on TV. Ziggler then plays the white knight and threatens Rusev before the Bulgarian Brute leaves.
Summer Rae grabs the mic and calls Lana a gold digger and then slaps her which leads to… yep you guessed it, CAT FIGHT!
And yeah, this whole thing is ridiculous. So ridiculous that Dolph can’t even stop himself from laughing at it.
Seriously, this has to stop. The whole Ziggler/Lana/Rusev thing was bad enough, and now WWE has introduced the terrible acting, super annoying Summer Rae to this and I’m just flipping the channel any time I see one of these four from now on. I can’t handle the stupid.
Sheamus Grounds Neville – Strong match between the Celtic Warrior and the high-flying rookie. In the end, Neville tried to hit a move off the top rope but Sheamus reversed and hit a Brogue Kick for the win.
Millions of Luchas – Pretty good tag team match featuring the Prime Time Players and Lucha Dragons against the New Day and Bo Dallas. Titus O’Neil got the hot tag and destroyed everyone before pinning Kofi Kingston. You know what that means!
Never. Gets. Old.
Intercontinental Tr…ZZZZZZZ – Big Show has what amounts to a squash match with Mark Henry, winning after a pair of KO punches with Miz on commentary because reasons. After Show wins, Ryback runs out and attacks him but Miz runs in and hits Ryback with a boot before running away. Ryback tells Miz to get to the ring for their match.. which ends in a count-out because Miz ran away. I had so much hope for Ryback as IC Champ a month ago. Now? Not so much.
Hey Jack Swagger is Still Alive – Jack Swagger showed up on Raw for the first time since… he was feuding with Rusev maybe? Either way, he was just squashed by King Barrett, who apparently is not jobbing anymore. I really don’t care enough to figure out what is going on here which is pretty disappointing.
Paige Gets Some Momentum – Paige continued her crusade against the Bellas, this time beating their newest buddy Alicia Fox. Brie Bella (still weird that Daniel Bryan’s wife is such a heel) tried to distract Paige, but the anti-Diva just reversed Fox’s roll-up into one of her own for the win.