Money In The Bank 2016 Thoughts

There’s nothing quite like being surprised by professional wrestling. After months of tediousness, the future can sometimes seem to be crystal clear, and very few deviations are imaginable. But it’s those huge moments where the writing is on the wall… only for the much-maligned WWE Creative Team to come along and bulldoze the wall down in front of us… those are the moments that so many of us live for.

I had anticipated Money In The Bank 2016 to be a good show. I was able to successfully predict all but two matches on the night (one of them being the negligible Apollo Crews/Sheamus affair). And while I was enjoying the show a great deal (it was an uneven, up-and-down live special to be sure, but the ups were so high that they cast a large shadow on the downs, leaving them but distant remnants by the end of the night), the main event of the evening seemed to be too etched-in-stone for my taste. The Roman Empire would continue its expansion, Dean Ambrose would tease–but not follow through with–a cash-in on his buddy to build drama, fade to black for the typical Raw opening where Rollins bemoans coming up short and finds enough rationale to merit a do-over at Battleground.

And then, WWE blew that whole scenario up.

But before we get to that, let’s take a quick look at Money In The Bank 2016 from top-to-bottom.

THE PRE-SHOW

The night started off so damn auspiciously, with the typically overly drawn-out Pre-Show featuring matches that are hardly anything to write home about and a panel telling us what we already know and will be told again during the actual show anyway. The most noteworthy occurrence here was the Golden Truth vs Fandango & Tyler Breeze encounter that saw the heels emerge with ludicrous burns covering their bodies. The match was several minutes of R-Truth and Goldust executing Flair-like chops on their foes so the latter could recoil in immense and stinging pain. It was absurd. And I get that it was comedy–not all wrestling needs to be serious and straight-faced–but this was just contrived lunacy. And bad makeup.

Also on the pre-show, Lita barely caught herself from calling Anderson and Gallows “Bullet Club”. So there’s that, I guess.

NEW DAY VS THE VAUDEVILLAINS VS THE CLUB VS ENZO AMORE AND BIG CASS

On a personal note for this match, I had the rare fortune of being able to talk the wife into watching Money In The Bank with me for a while before she went to bed, and she was downright bewildered at this match. I believe it was something along the lines of “Where has wrestling gone since the last time you made me watch it that there are now leopard print men, Vaudevillains, and gay unicorns?”. It was hard for me to convince her that these are some of the most entertaining acts in the company right now.

This match did not really meet the expectations I had set for it, but that’s not to say it was “bad” by any stretch. It just seemed sloppy, I guess. There were too many moments that just did not come across as fluid, or it seemed like someone was in the wrong place at the wrong time. It was fun enough, though; it was that chaotic kind of fun where it’s hard to keep track of what is going on, but you find yourself not caring because it’s all a joy to watch anyway. It’s hard for a match with these teams to not be at least a little enjoyable.

DOLPH ZIGGLER VS BARON CORBIN

This affair could be summed up in two words: TOO LONG. And I mean that on multiple fronts. This feud has been going on too long, and this match itself went on too long. I really couldn’t believe this battle was booked for the duration that it was. The fans turned on Ziggler and Corbin with a “Boring” chant, and while I always think that is abhorrently rude, they weren’t wrong. I spent most of this match wanting it to end.

Did anyone else notice the “Let’s Go Ziggler”/”Ziggler sucks” chants? Man, how the once proud Ziggler has fallen.

CHARLOTTE & DANA BROOKE VS BECKY LYNCH & NATALYA

Another sloppy affair, where too much of the action felt herky-jerky to me. And more “bitches be crazy” storytelling from Creative with a heel attack from Natalya after the loss. I get that the ending prominently featured Becky being thrown into Natalya, but it all came across as a bit out-of-nowhere. So this was a surprise that didn’t really work for me. Long-term, I do tend to agree with it–the women’s division could use more storylines other than Charlotte Vs Whoever-Charlotte-Is-Feuding-With-This-Month, AND I’m down with giving Becky Lynch more to do–but in the moment it was just a deflating “What? Why?” kind of turn.

SHEAMUS VS APOLLO CREWS

Of all the matches in the valley of the card between the fourway tag bout and before the show picked up again, I thought this was the best. These two just seemed to have more chemistry and energy than the women or Corbin and Ziggler. Crews’ moonsault off the apron was the highlight of the match, and his win was well done, as well. Hopefully they don’t Ziggler/Corbin this feud into the earth’s mantle, but for now I’m interested in these two keeping this angle going.

AJ STYLES VS JOHN CENA

This match was swell.

I know I was joking around about it being a DREAM MATCH for the Roundtable Predictions this weekend, but it absolutely delivered on that promise. If not for the very next match being one of my top five favorite Money In The Bank Ladder Matches of all-time, this would be the match of the night for me. I thought the story of the match was impeccable, with Styles having so much of Cena’s repertoire scouted out and consistently being a step or two ahead of him. I don’t have the problem with the ending that so many others do. Seeing Styles go clean over the leader of the Cenation would hardly be a bad thing, but the shenanigans-enhanced ending allows the feud to get more heated for Battleground. If there’s a downside–and there is–it’s that WWE JUST TOLD THIS SAME STORY in the Styles/Reigns feud. Come on! Is every story Styles gets involved in going to be “The Club helps AJ even though he didn’t want them to… or did he?!”? It’s time to move on to a new idea. But if it ratchets up the intensity here even further, I’m all for it.

MONEY IN THE BANK LADDER MATCH

And let’s not forget the backstage promo with Owens, Del Rio, and Jericho earlier in the night… that was quite amusing. Seeing Owens interact with people is its own reward.

As I noted, I think this was one of the elite contract matches of all time, and the highlight of in-ring action for the evening. WWE took a lot of the excitement of last month’s Intercontinental Title fourway match and just added some ladders to it. There were just some stellar visual moments in this one, whether it was Del Rio using a bridged ladder to make his double stomp look less contrived, everyone fighting at one point on the two bridged ladders or the one under the briefcase, or Sami’s Michinoku Driver to Owens. That’s TWICE this year I thought Sami murdered Owens with a move onto a ladder (his exploder suplex at WrestleMania being the other). Dean’s win was predictable, but not undeserved or disappointing.

RUSEV VS TITUS O’NEIL

As far as cool-down matches go, this was one of them. It killed some time, but mostly it succeeded in making me think that the main event was going to have some flukey opening because I was not hip to the knowledge that this show was going to run over 11pm EST. Rusev, trash-talking Titus’ kids at ringside post-match remains a lot more fun speaking than he is wrestling.

SETH ROLLINS VS ROMAN REIGNS; DEAN AMBROSE VS SETH ROLLINS

A good match that wasn’t quite as good as Cena/Styles, Rollins vs Reigns was still pretty high caliber. WWE did manage to fool me with the barricade spot, because I fell into the “Oh, he missed the part he was supposed to crash through and now the doctors are here! Did he hurt himself?” trap that they sprung (unless it wasn’t a trap and Reigns did wreck himself but was okay to finish the contest, but that seems unlikely). And that Spear-into-a-Pedigree? Glorious idea, that. But it was all gift-wrapped with a shockingly clean win for Rollins and the follow-up of Ambrose outsmarting the conniving Seth. Wow. What a great end to a show.

AS A WHOLE

So, yeah, wow. Out of all the possible endings to Seth Rollins/Roman Reigns at Money In The Bank 2016, did ANYONE predict Seth would win in clean and legitimate fashion? That’s rhetorical, because if you say you did, you’re either a liar or one of those people who picks intentionally absurd endings just so you can brag if they actually happen. I couldn’t believe it when it happened, to the point of saying aloud to an empty living room (unless my cats particularly cared), “He can’t kick out of two Pedigrees can he? WHAT, HE CAN’T!”

And even after that, even after the least likely of all endings to the WWE World Heavyweight Title match, when Ambrose’s music hit, I was certain what was to follow was just the usual moment where the holder of the briefcase comes out to remind the champ that he is looming. But nope, Dean came through with the promise of a cash-in and took the belt from Seth. Two shocking endings in the span of three minutes. And to that end, I feel kudos belong to WWE. We give them enough of a hard time when they shovel mountains of crap down our throats; they deserve to be commended when they offer us some creme brulee instead.

While Money In The Bank was by no means a flawless live special–and the rut that it fell into between the tag team title bout and the DREAM MATCH was substantial–it stands as my favorite WWE Brand special of the year so far. Possibly the only letdown of the night (given that the bad matches were expected to be as much) was the tag title fourway, and it was still enjoyable. I just had imagined it being a 4-star affair, and falling short of that is no great crime. It’s even more forgivable when you factor in that three of the last four matches on the card (discounting Seth/Dean since I tend towards not quantifying those kinds of cash-ins as “matches”) all met or surpassed that same 4-star threshold for me.

But those are just the thoughts of one man. I’m going to drop back and hand-off to the comments section now. Do you agree with me that WWE got the ending perfectly right? Were there any disappointments for you? What was your match of the night? Maybe I’m just one crazy person giving too much credence to this show, but I was a big fan.