Kevin’s WWE Elimination Chamber 2020 Review

WWE Elimination Chamber

March 8th, 2020 | Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania | Attendance: 14,853

Curt Hawkins and Zack Ryder vs. The Viking Raiders

Who put this on my television? This was completely pointless. Hawkins and Ryder only gained a small upper hand thanks to a distraction but nobody ever believed that had a chance. As soon as they finished a short break to advertise the women’s chamber, the Raiders won handily in 4:48. [*½]

Daniel Bryan vs. Drew Gulak

I’m all for this match. I wish it had more build. Fantastic technical wrestling as soon as this started. Bryan seemed to go out of his way to make sure that Gulak looked like more than a threat. Gulak had an answer for everything Bryan did. The story of him having pointers for Bryan’s opponents made sense because he did have a game plan. Tons of smooth counters and quality grappling from both men. Bryan took a sick bump on his neck on a German suplex. It was hard to watch. Gulak added a super reverse suplex and rolled it into a Dragon Sleeper. He added elbows and rolled again, only for Bryan to slip out and counter into the Yes Lock. It was smooth as hell. Gulak passed out to lose in a fantastic 14:19. They had a stellar match that played off of the existing angle coming in, Gulak looked like a beast, and Bryan picks up the win. Phenomenal. [****¼]

WWE United States Championship: Andrade [c] vs. Humberto Carrillo

Andrade opened this with an insane elbow. That elbow is why I can’t take the Judas Effect seriously. That’s the kind of intense start I wanted for a feud that involved guys injuring each other. Speaking of the feud, I love that it has been built around spots on exposed concrete. That’s such an old school thing. That played into the match as well, which was appreciated. The super rana spot from Carrillo was insanely good. He got going down the stretch after avoiding the Hammerlock DDT on the concrete. A series of near falls on flash pin attempts gave us the finish as Andrade used a handful of tights to retain after 12:31. Very good stuff. A simple case of two damn good wrestlers doing their thing. The finish is kind of tired but it keeps Carrillo strong and in the title picture going into Mania. [***½]

WWE Smackdown Tag Team Championship Elimination Chamber: John Morrison & The Miz [c] vs. Dolph Ziggler & Robert Roode vs. Heavy Machinery vs. The Lucha House Party vs. The New Day vs. The Usos

Otis dancing to New Day’s theme was fantastic. The New Day and the Usos kicked this off, reigniting their classic rivalry. They went back and forth until the Lucha House Party came in. I questioned their inclusion but it’s clear why they were in there. They got to hit the high octane flippy stuff. It worked. Miz and Morrison were in next, slowing the pace and beating up all of the already battered guys. The champions still found themselves in peril more than a few times. Heavy Machinery did their thing. Otis is way over. Lince got the big spot from the top of the cell, doing a Shooting Star Press while hanging from the ceiling. It took him forever to set that up, leading to some awkward moments of standing around. Then Metalik was eliminated via Compactor. Dolph and Bobby entered last, getting help from the champs to go after Heavy Machinery. Otis finally got his hands on Dolph and it was a letdown but Tucker made up for it with a wild somersault off one of the pods. Otis did the spot where he ran through the pod, except he went so hard that he went through the whole thing and straight to the outside. Left alone, Tucker was eliminated by Roode and Ziggler. New Day and Usos combined to rid us of the blandest team in the world, leaving it down to them and the champs. New Day went home after Kofi missed a dive. This segment was solid. I’d like Usos/Miz and Morrison to be a future title match. The Figure Four/Starship Pain spot was cool, as were the near falls after it. A pretty cool combination pin using the ropes allowed the champions to retain after 32:53. A good Chamber match but one that never quite hit the level of being great. There were some quality spots and the Otis storyline played out well. A few spots just didn’t quite work for me and it dragged at points. [***¼]

No Disqualifications Match: AJ Styles vs. Aleister Black

Can Aleister Black help get AJ Styles to a rare great match? AJ hasn’t had one in like, a year. The rules to this were kind of dumb. If it’s No DQ, why wouldn’t the OC just jump Aleister? They were at ringside. I did like some of this. For example, AJ wrenching back on the Calf Crusher looked way better than it usually does. Black using the kendo stick to escape came off well too. The same goes for AJ attempting a Tombstone. That honestly should’ve been the finish. It’s just that none of this felt like it was all that interesting and kind of just dragged. Black’s highlight was the Meteora through the table. When Aleister started getting jumped by the OC, Undertaker made a surprise appearance. He took out the two scrubs outside and hit AJ with a Chokeslam. Black Mass connected and Aleister won in 23:11. Big win for Aleister, though the match wasn’t as good as it could have been. Pretty lackluster and hopefully Aleister moves on to something more interesting. [**¾]

WWE Raw Tag Team Championship: The Street Profits [c] vs. Murphy and Seth Rollins

I enjoyed their matches at Super Showdown and on Raw. This seemed mostly similar. I will admit that I missed a bit of this as I was doing stuff around my house. I came back around the time that Montez Ford was getting going and hitting a dive with Angelo Dawkins’ headband on. The Viking Raiders evened the score by showing up and taking out AOP. Following that, we got a straight tag and it was once again good stuff. I liked Seth getting the knees up on the frog splash that beat him on Raw. It showed that he learned and is a smart wrestler. As this match neared 20 minutes, Kevin Owens walked down the aisle eating popcorn. The distraction was enough to leave Seth open to get destroyed by a Dawkins Pounce. Murphy then took a double powerbomb into the guardrail. Inside, he was finished off with a frog splash in 18:21. Another quality match on this show. Nothing groundbreaking but some good tag team wrestling. [***¼]

Post-match, Owens dropped Rollins with a Stunner. That’s not the most interesting WrestleMania match but it could be worse.

WWE Intercontinental Championship: Braun Strowman [c] vs. Cesaro, Sami Zayn and Shinsuke Nakamura

3-on-1 matches like this never appealed to me. However, it is nice to see Sami Zayn compete again. The idea here was that Sami Zayn has annoyed Braun to the point where he has gotten into the big man’s head. Quick tags were used to keep Braun down. Nakamura and Cesaro handled the heavy lifting, with Sami getting in for cheap shots and to brag. Braun got going and ran over Cesaro and Nakamura as he attempted to get Zayn. Braun was always in control in singles action but the numbers game proved to be too much. Braun ran into the ring post, took a Kinshasa to the post, ate a double suplex, and a Helluva Kick. Sami got the three count to win his first title since his NXT days. The match went 8:24. It was more entertaining than I expected and kind of fun. [**½]

Elimination Chamber: Asuka vs. Liv Morgan vs. Natalya vs. Ruby Riott vs. Sarah Logan vs. Shayna Baszler

Shayna feels like the obvious winner but I’m still down for a fun match. The women have put on two stellar chamber matches in history. I wanted Liv and Ruby to start but we got Ruby and Natalya instead. Nattie is really bad at trash talk. Her Sharpshooter was lame but I loved that it allowed Liv to laugh at Ruby’s pain. Their segment was okay. Sarah Logan burst out of her pod with a vicious double knee strike on Nattie. I like her being the overly aggressive one. There were some big spots during this segment. Shayna was surprisingly next in and she dominated. She choked out Logan with relative ease before we even got a Riott Squad interaction. She dominated Ruby and eliminated her as well. Shayna destroyed Natalya by slamming the pod door on her and then choked her out to eliminate her. Shayna was all alone with the next pod set to open. Shayna and Asuka talking trash to each other was great. Shayna met Liv at the pod and was greeted with a boot but quickly got in control. The swing powerbomb into the pod glass was sick. Shayna choked her out too. That left us with Shayna/Asuka. WWE should’ve just opened the pod instead of waiting for the allotted time. It made for some awkwardness. Asuka gave Shayna her best fight, including putting her in the Asuka Lock. However, it was a foregone conclusion, as Shayna choked her out as well at the 21:00 mark. I’ve seen that some people are upset with this. I liked it. It was easily the worst of the three women’s chambers so far but was still good. It was different. You need this to happen once in a while so people know it’s possible. Everyone knew Shayna was winning and sweeping the field added to her dominance. [***¼]

7.0

The final score: review Good

The 411

I felt like this was a good show. It was certainly longer than it needed to be but I never felt like I was watching something bad. Only AJ/Aleister seemed to drag. Everything else was pretty good with Bryan/Gulak being my favorite thing on the show. I enjoyed myself.