Watry (And Non-Fan) Reviews WWE MITB 2018

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WWE MITB Money In The Bank 2018 Review

Kickoff – I actually watched NXT Takeover Chicago II Sunday afternoon after moving furniture in 90 degree weather after returning from the Dells for my birthday. Yeah, tiring weekend to say the least. I did tune into the Kickoff Show just in time to hear Booker T rip on CM Punk and watch the Smackdown LIVE Tag Team Title match. Nothing to write about there. Still no Sanity was my main takeaway. Oh well…

Daniel Bryan/Big Cass – I like the choice. Gets the pay-per-view portion off to a strong start with Daniel Bryan’s music playing. Easy to get the Chicago amped up. Nothing to write about with the bout. Daniel Bryan won as expected, and we can all peacefully move on.

Girlfriend comes over to my place at this point. This is where the column will get fun. I asked her to watch with me. She is NOT a fan at all, so let’s see how this turns out! Early indicators were not good, as she immediately went to her phone. Uh oh! Apparently to call her dad for Fathers Day…fine.

Bobby Lashley/Sami Zayn – I know myself and others have been down on this story line and rightfully so. At Money in the Bank though, WWE handled it completely right. Lashley destroyed Zayn and won clean. Over and out. Perfectly. The payoff in the end maybe, kinda, sorta made it all worth while?

Girlfriend is talking to her father. She jokingly mentions she is watching ‘wrestling.’ To her shock, he is too! All the way in Missouri. I immediately smile and talk about how great her dad is – somebody I had never met before. Funny moment. She was wowed a bit for Lashley’s power moves.

Seth Rollins/Elias – The match I was looking forward to the most. Good stuff. Not quite the epic level I had envisioned. That is okay. I went with Rollins retaining and was right. Elias as a champion may happen down the road but him as the heel without gold fits like a glove. I enjoy Seth as the resilient fighting champion who never gives up. Fans are digging it, so why end it? Best part of the match is the roll up finish does allow for a rematch. Sign me up! Extreme Rules perhaps…

Girlfriend is now officially watching. She asked if they were brothers or related. Nope, not that I know of. I asked her who would win. She said since one guy was limping, it would probably be the guy in green. That is what her name was for Elias. Guy in green.

Womens MITB Ladder Match – All kinds of fun. I want to get more in depth with this entire picture, but truthfully, everything pretty much played out Sunday night. There is no speculation or rumors to be had. We already saw what happened with the briefcase. I guess WWE didn’t want Raw to have two, so they just got one cash in out of the way. Of course, it also didn’t help that WWE had themselves backed into a corner with RAW Womens Championship bout. Regardless, I enjoyed the heck out of this. I was rooting on Ember Moon, even if it seemed like a long shot. No issues with Alexa Bliss being the wormy weasel doing very little work but winning. That is her entire character and had been played up in prior weeks. Very entertaining pre-match video and then a payoff.

Girlfriend picked Bliss to win. She did, no joke. I think her name for her was Alicia Bliss. The logical was ‘us short girls gotta stick together.’ Um, alright. Makes sense to me. As I predicted during the entrances, my girlfriend was ALL IN on watching this. She got into the spots, the climbing, the pain, the agony, and the eventual conclusion. Made for a fun atmosphere considering after the Bobby Lashley vs. Sami Zayn match she wrote her thoughts on a notebook with just one word: boring.

Column teaser… #WWE #MoneyInTheBank pic.twitter.com/gBMg62BYhH

— Justin Watry (@JustinWatry) June 18, 2018

Roman Reigns/Jinder Mahal – You know what? These guys delivered. I liked what was done here, especially with Mr. Wheelchair Phony at ringside. I have been to Chicago before. Good city, good food, etc. All that wonderful stuff. Sadly, for all the praise they get as a wrestling town, this is where their ugliness and SMARKY attitude interferes. Yes, I am using the word SMARKY. Too bad. That is all this is. The live crowd never gave these two a chance. It was off to the races immediately with chants and pointless hijacking. I hate to be the bad guy here, but this speaks more negatively of THEM than it does WWE. Sorry, it’s true. Reigns win after a good match.

Girlfriend was still buzzing after her pick, Ms. Bliss, won MITB. I remarked that it explained why the bigger ladder was needed. Didn’t care for Reigns or Mahal. Wasn’t ‘her type’ apparently. Good news for me, I guess.

Carmella/Asuka – To continue my theme of correct predictions, I figured Carmella would find a way to retain. You have no idea how much I was rooting for Asuka though. It is the ultimate battle between sports entertainment and wrestling. I would like at least one of the women divisions to be about the in-ring action and not characters. It was not meant to be. After a surprisingly solid back and forth clash, it was James FREAKIN’ Ellsworth who returned to the company to help Carmella retain. Good grief. You think Smackdown LIVE viewership numbers are bad now? This is just disappointing on so many levels. If the boys love him and he is chummy with everything, keep the clown in back then. Let him get invited backstage to every show and act like a jester in the locker room for all I care. To put this stuff back on TV AGAIN is just baffling. I could say a lot more but won’t even bother. The 15 minutes for Ellsworthless ended a long time ago…

Girlfriend seemed to like Carmella and her act. Kept calling the two ‘blonde girl’ and ‘colored hair girl.’ Seemed confused by the second Asuka appearing and made for a fun ending to the match.

AJ Styles/Shinsuke Nakamura – Yep, AJ kept the WWE Championship just as I suspected. If Nakamura was going to get his moment, it would have happened already at WrestleMania 34. It didn’t go down there, so that was it for him. To be fair, this was the best AJ/Shinsuke match I have ever seen. What they did outside of WWE is not my business, so I loved their Last Man Standing effort Sunday night. Only nitpick is AJ was still not wearing a cup. That is just ridiculous at this point. Fitting Nakamura got a taste of his own medicine with the low blow. Really did like this one. No doubt Styles is the man right now.

Girlfriend is not a fan of gore stuff or UFC. Once she learned the rules were somebody had to be knockout for ten seconds, she checked out. Not her thing, too violent and all that junk. For what its worth, she thought Nakamura was going to win.

Ronda Rousey/Nia Jax – I picked Ronda Rousey to win by DQ, and that is what happened. Really, WWE was screwed here. Nia Jax is not quite as popular as many hoped for, and there was no way Rousey could leave the with gold. This reminded me of WrestleMania 31 with Brock Lesnar and Roman Reigns where there had to be SOME kind of curveball coming. Alexa Bliss running in to steal the title via MITB cash in was awesome and quite the moment. I am all for it, even if I did not see that exact scenario coming. For the actual Rouse/Jax match, it exceeded all expectations and once again shut up all the critics of The Rowdy One. How many will Ronda have to prove her critics wrong in WWE? The girl is legitimate and doing an amazing job. Seriously, I wish all the detractors would sit down now for awhile. You had your ‘hot take’ when she debuted earlier in 2018 and were wrong about her. Admit it and move on to your next bold (wrong) prediction.

Needless to say, my girlfriend loved the cash in and cheered when Alexa popped up. For her, I was happy. Considering where she was two hours ago, the fact that she was so into Rousey/Jax was gratifying. That is how quickly the tide can turn folks. Give viewers something to invest in and then hook them with an exciting moment.

Mens MITB Ladder Match – I didn’t even look at the clock all night, until the main event got started. Wow. The PPV was going to go four plus hours. It flew by for me. Impressive. Lots of highlights here and a worthy main event. Hindsight would have put the Alexa Bliss cash in at the end of the evening, but that is up for debate. Braun Strowman ultimately won. I was wrong about him and Bliss. As I said beforehand, I am TERRIBLE at picking Money in the Bank ladder match winners and was again this year. Went 0-2 and am okay with that. The rest of the pay-per-view, I nailed. Shout out to Kevin Owens and The Miz for playing such great characters here. Oh, and nice reports these past few weeks about Big E. Gotta love those. Repeated again folks – GUESSING A FUTURE STORY LINE IS NOT NEWS! The guy wasn’t even in the dang match. Good grief. Accountability? Anyone? Bueller? Strowman is sure to challenge fair and square and hype up his exact cash in date. You have to assume it will be versus Brock Lesnar but maybe not? Time will tell. I may have preferred the women’s MITB ladder match to this one. A second viewing could change that opinion. Both were super strong. Highly entertaining PPV with good buzz coming out of it and lots of possibilities before August’s Summerslam. Two thumbs up show.

Girlfriend was into the ladder matches more than anything. Must be the car crash effect and drama of going after the briefcase. Got a kick out of everything Braun. His size, his destruction, his entire act of everyone being scared of him – especially The Miz. She was rooting for Finn Balor and Kofi Kingston because the commentators mentioned all of his past MITB performances without a win. Nice way to end the night.

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