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Random Network Reviews: Elimination Chamber 2010

December 31, 2016 | Posted by Kevin Pantoja
Image Credit: WWE
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Random Network Reviews: Elimination Chamber 2010  

Elimination Chamber 2010
February 21st, 2010 | Scottrade Center in St. Louis, Missouri

Hot off the heels of one of the best Royal Rumbles ever, the road to WrestleMania XXVI stopped in St. Louis. Edge was the top contender for whichever title he wanted at WrestleMania, Shawn Michaels was desperate for a match with the Undertaker and newly heel Batista was pretty much the best thing going. For the first time in about ten years, the February PPV would not be No Way Out. Since the show used to host the Elimination Chamber match anyway, the WWE just changed the name of the show to reflect the match in an odd time where they did that to multiple PPVs.

The twelve men competing in the two Elimination Chamber matches tonight are highlighted in the opening video package. Michael Cole, Matt Striker and Jerry Lawler handle commentary.

WWE Championship Elimination Chamber
Sheamus (c) vs. John Cena vs. Kofi Kingston vs. Randy Orton vs. Ted Dibiase vs. Triple H

Remember when Ted Dibiase Jr. was going to be a big star? Kofi Kingston and Sheamus start the match. Kofi glances over his shoulder on his way into the chamber since he was ambushed a year ago before he could get in the chamber. He’s sure to start quick against Sheamus but the power of the champion takes over. Kofi shows off his athleticism by landing on his feet when Sheamus tries hip tossing him onto the steel. They go back and forth until Triple H joins the fray and laughs because he’s about to get his shovel on Sheamus. Silly new champion. HHH pretty much kicks Sheamus’ white ass for a while until Kofi shows up to mix it up. Kofi hits one of the better Boom Drops ever, over the top and onto HHH outside. Next in is the “Viper” who goes right after Sheamus. That poor guy is not well liked. Orton takes out everyone but again, Kofi screws things up for someone as he dives onto everyone. Multiple finishers get countered by almost everyone involved. Dibiase joins in next, dropping some of his dad’s trademark fist drops on HHH. He works together with Orton, because of their Legacy partnership. They basically commit a hate crime on Kofi and put his head through the chain links, apply a Boston crab and stomp on him all at once. Legacy dominates to the point where they can wait right outside of Cena’s pod for him to enter. When he does, he inexplicably fights through them and proceeds to get his shit in on both. Orton turns the tide and looks for the RKO as Cody Rhodes runs out. He slides a pipe into the Chamber. Dibiase uses it and accidentally hits Orton before hitting Cena. He chooses to cover Orton and eliminate him at 23:56. Dibiase doesn’t last much longer, losing to Trouble in Paradise at 25:54. Sheamus instantly hits Kingston with a Brogue Kick and High Cross to send him packing at 26:02. Rapid fire eliminations now. Sheamus looks to get rid of Cena now, but HHH grabs that proverbial shovel and stops him. One Pedigree later and the champions is out at the 28:38 mark. Oh great, it’s down to Cena and HHH. That’s original. I expected a battle between them, but Cena puts on that STF and HHH fights but gives in with a soft tap out.

Winner and New WWE Champion: John Cena in 30:22
A good match but nowhere near one of the best Chamber matches. It would actually be on the lower half of the totem pole for sure. I liked the Legacy angle and Kofi provided some good spots for sure. Nothing about this was that memorable though. ***¼

John Cena’s celebration is cut short by the arrival of Mr. McMahon. He says that Cena will make it to WrestleMania as champion as long as he can defend the title right now against Batista.

WWE Championship
John Cena (c) vs. Batista

I can’t put my love for Heeltista into words. A valiant Cena throws a right hand but Batista shrug it off. He spears Cena and wins via Batista Bomb.

Winner and New WWE Champion: Batista in 0:31
Too short to give a rating to. I really liked it as an angle, though it might have had more impact if the concept hadn’t been done a ton by Money in the Bank winners.

They use this time to recap the Bret Hart angle where his limo got hit by a car and he injured his leg. It was all leading up to the terrible Bret/Vince match at WrestleMania.

WWE Intercontinental Championship
Drew McIntyre (c) vs. Kane

My goodness, I loved Drew McIntyre’s entrance. Kane is the one who starts hot, overwhelming the champion with his power. McIntyre turns it around by going after Kane’s knee, only to change his mind and go after the arm. I don’t think he has a real strategy. Drew takes an ugly spill outside. I’m surprised he didn’t get hurt. Back inside, he’s working the arm again, which I guess takes away the Chokeslam possibility. Kane says fuck this, and goes to a big boot. See Drew, you should have worked the leg. McIntyre tries to walk out and surprisingly, when Kane goes after him, he gets in a right hand. They make it back in the ring where Drew uses a dirty thumb to the eye to set up the Future Shock and retain.

Winner and Still WWE Intercontinental Champion: Drew McIntyre in 10:16
The crowd didn’t care about this at all despite Drew being in the midst of a decent push and Kane being a guy who usually got a reaction. That hurt a match that already seemed to have no real direction.

Gail Kim is walking backstage when Maryse comes up to her and speaks in French. She translates to English and disses the Smackdown Divas. Kim responds in French, revealing that she knows that Maryse has been talking smack in French to her. MAJOR STORYLINE REVEAL! I’m sure every fan was excited to hear that Gail Kim knew all along.

Originally, we’re supposed to get Maryse vs. Gail Kim in the finals of a tournament to determine a new WWE Divas Champion. Melina got injured and had to forfeit the strap. Of course, instead of giving us the finals, Vickie Guerrero shows up to massive heat. She was looking rough in this era. Since the Raw girls said bad things about Smackdown girls, she makes a tag team match pitting the brands against each other. Oh, cool. So no title match and instead we get a random tag.

Gail Kim and Maryse vs. LayCool
Okay, I mean I didn’t like the random tag idea, but I really love me some LayCool. Gail and Layla have a little back and forth. Gail gets the upper hand but some good heel tandem work from LayCool sends Gail off the apron and outside. Gail takes the heat for a bit and goes to tag Maryse. Maryse piefaces her, leading to McCool planting her with the Faith Breaker to win. Shouldn’t Maryse touching Gail be considered a tag?

Winners: LayCool in 3:36
As much as I enjoy all four girls involved, this really didn’t do anything except give LayCool a spot and build the Divas Title Finals, which could have been accomplished on Smackdown or something. ¾*

The Miz is interviewed about the upcoming debut of NXT and his rookie being Daniel Bryan. He basically calls Bryan a nerd that he will turn into a Superstar. Miz was absolutely nailing everything at this time. MVP interrupts to say that he will get a US Title shot (Miz is US Champion) tonight because he pinned Miz or some shit recently.

William Regal makes his way to the ring. He is new to Raw after ECW closed. He’s also out to plug NXT since he’s a pro on the show. Regal starts talking smack about being the longest tenured NXT Pro and stuff before he’s interrupted by the 2010 Royal Rumble winner, Edge. He just rambles a bit before spearing Regal. I guess they needed to fill time or something.

WWE United States Championship
The Miz (c) w/ Big Show vs. MVP w/ Mark Henry

This was when Miz had three titles (US and the two tag belts as a member of Show-Miz). I recall someone calling the MVP/Henry team “Ball Sweat”. Anyway, this is pretty standard throughout. Their match at the Royal Rumble a month earlier wasn’t very good. Things move along slowly until Miz pulls out a modified lungblower that he almost never uses. As expected, MVP starts in with the babyface comeback while the crowd sits on their hands for the third straight match. I can’t blame them for only being excited for the two Chamber matches, since the middle of the show has screamed filler. Big Show gets involved a few times so Henry battles him and they do the tired spot of the guardrail breaking. MVP misses the Player’s Boot and Big Show knocks him out. Miz just pins him like nothing as the dumbass referee doesn’t question why MVP was out cold.

Winner and Still WWE United States Champion: The Miz in 13:01
This was largely uninspired. It wasn’t bad, but they mostly worked it like a house show match. The biggest thing about the match was the guardrail spot, which didn’t even involve the two participants in the match. **

World Heavyweight Championship Elimination Chamber
The Undertaker (c) vs. Chris Jericho vs. CM Punk w/ the Straight Edge Society vs. John Morrison vs. R-Truth vs. Rey Mysterio

In the most shocking thing of the night, Undertaker actually aggressively and quickly walks to the ring and into his pod. CM Punk gets promo time before entering, which is great. His SES run is incredibly overlooked. It gets interrupted by Truth, who starts with Punk. Punk is the first to eat steel, on a Truth slingshot. It doesn’t mean much though as Punk puts him away with a GTS at 3:34. Alone for about 90 seconds, Punk is handed a microphone for another promo. Punk is sure to call out the babyfaces, even saying he’ll make the Undertaker tap out like he did at Breaking Point. Mysterio is in next and flies all over the place. Matt Strike says a weird comment about this being the seeds for the tree of life that is WrestleMania. Punk swings Rey into the steel like a bat. Their encounter is pretty great, working as a solid prequel to their feud over the next few months. Rey uses a rana from the top onto the steel and a splash to eliminate Punk at 9:44. Yes, another guy alone. Jericho enters next and he’s vicious. He pulls a Spider-Man like Rey off the cage and face first onto the steel. As the next clock counts down, Jericho has Rey in the Walls of Jericho until John Morrison joins the fray. He comes in hot as expected, which picks up the pace. More fun from Morrison which leads to him elimination Mysterio at 19:41. Again, Jericho applies the Walls as the buzzer sounds but Undertaker comes in and kicks his ass, getting in all of his shit. It’s really cool seeing Jericho and Undertaker interact. It’s unbelievable how rare that was considering their careers. Morrison takes a sick back drop onto the steel. Jericho angers Undertaker with slaps and tries to run into a pod and close himself it. Undertaker holds the door, gets in and beats the shit out of Jericho. Morrison catches Undertaker with a big kick but has a bad ankle and it acts up here. He tries for Starship Pain but Undertaker gets his knees up. With both men down, Jericho exits the pod. Undertaker sits up, so Jericho runs back into the pod and closes the door. Jericho does come back into the field of play before Undertaker Chokeslams Morrison onto the steel, sending him packing at 28:24. THE STRAPS ARE DOWN! This leads to the rare back and forth between these two legends. Jericho counters the Chokeslam into the Walls, which Undertaker nearly turns into Hell’s Gates, but Jericho gets the submission on anyway. Under manages to counter into Hell’s Gates anyway but Jericho reaches the ropes for leverage to get free. Undertaker survives a Codebreaker and nails the Last Ride. Undertaker slowly gets up, but behind him, we see the floor grating open up and out comes Shawn Michaels. Michaels nails Sweet Chin Music on Undertaker, desperate for a WrestleMania rematch with Undertaker that Undertaker refused to give him before this. He stands over Undertaker while Jericho covers and wins his 6th World Title.

Winner and New World Heavyweight Champion: Chris Jericho in 35:36
Better than the opening Chamber match for sure. I liked that this was different from the typical layout we get in these matches, with guys getting eliminated early. It allowed for a welcome change of pace. Punk’s promos, Mysterio and Morrison’s aerial stuff, the battle between Jericho and Undertaker and the twist ending were all great. ****

4.0
The final score: review Poor
The 411
Honestly, this is really a one match show. The main event is the only thing truly worth going out of your way to watch. The opener is pretty good but certainly on the lower end among Chamber matches. The middle of the show is pretty dire, capping out with just a two star match, while also having a rather pointless Regal/Edge segment.
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