Forget everything you think you know about the effort level on WWE house shows, as these two tore the house down in Tokyo.

July 3, 2015
World Wrestling Entertainment
Tokyo, Japan

8.3

As much as we hear from wrestlers about how fun it is to work house shows, this seems to be pretty much what you would expect from a television or pay-per-view match around this time. In fact, it greatly mirrors the two matches they had on pay-per-view, with John Cena busting out the Code Red and lots of finisher kickouts. They also protected Kevin Owens, who Cena still hadn't beaten with the cameras on where it "counts", by doing a low blow DQ finish.

I have no qualms with any of this, and my thoughts pretty much fall with where they would for the more high-profile matches from this feud. If you like those, you'll like this, even if it doesn't really bring much of anything new to the table. The more interesting part is that a kid on smartphone captured the match and might have in the process exposed that everything we're told about how WWE thinks about house shows is wrong.

"WWE likes to send fans home happy on house shows with a babyface win."

"What happens when the cameras aren't on doesn't really 'count'."

"Wrestlers do more schtick instead of taking big bumps or working too hard because they need to prolong their careers."

We've heard it all a million times. Have we been living in a vast web of deceit? In wrestling? I do think this was a great match, but it's the kind of great match that only works once because of all the kickouts. This feud gave it to us twice, and I suppose we got it three times if this match truly does "count". (It apparently does or Cena would have won, right?) 

Now, to go ponder everything I've been told about everything since childhood, being that I'm suddenly skeptical of everything we're told about what WWE does and why they do it.