Matt D

You're the future, kid.

It's not the worst thing in the world to have a few major feuds in the battle royal I Guess. Last year they had Sheamus and Christian.

Also my argument isn't that you necessarily need Bryan involved in the Stewart stuff, but that there's nothing good to be done with him at all given how they've booked, so why not give him the celebrity rub and give the celebrity match the Bryan rub and utilize his skill as a great wrestler. Put him in the most visible spot possible, basically. Unless they're going to run Sting/BABYFACE vs Hunter/Heel instead of just Sting vs Hunter (which is a far superior idea btw, but oh well), there's no more visible spot than Bryan than holding together a celebrity match. I think that's better than some meaningless workrate match.

Hart Foundation too, from a kayfabe perspective, certainly. Trust me, I want Demos in as much as anyone, but they have an ax to grind with Eadie.

First, YES. Rusev vs Bryan is the best thing they could do with Bryan at this stage. they won't. This is second best. Let me break it down: I'm on the side that thinks Stewart is Trump-level celebrity. He is HUGE. I know he's hugely popular with almost every single person I know from every aspect of my life. Having Dolph in there to take bumps and Bryan in there to hold the match together with both of them together to make sure the hardcores don't shit on something that could bring the WWE a ton of mainstream publicity in a more positive way than usual is worth something to the company. Show/Kane/Harper are all physically imposing and will work with casuals and Stewart can play off of them. They've also been built up and protected (at least Show and Kane). So best to get some fucking value for that. Other than that, really, what the hell are you going to do with Bryan? There's nothing you can do with him that has any meaning. Yeah, vs Dolph or Harper or Sheamus or someone would be a workrate match to get the crowd going at the start, maybe, but it wouldn't mean anything. You can't even do a #1 Contender's match because they just had Bryan lose one. So put one of your best workers and most popular guys in the match with a shit ton of publicity. Actually, you're right. I did mess up one thing: Bryan/Dolph/Orton/Stewart vs Rollins/Kane/Show/Harper makes more sense. That way you get rid of one more singles match anyway and loop Rollins back in because he's the one the feud is over. Everyone can hit their spots. It can be a big feel good celebrity match, the kind of thing WWE wants on a Mania card. More people will know who Daniel Bryan is the day after it than they did the day before and that's worth something. I think DDP was a bigger deal on a national level after the Malone and Leno matches. WCW didn't do anything meaningful with that because they're WCW and because Goldberg was ascendant at the same time, but it's not innately a flawed idea. I think the only problem is that the match is a little crowded. Dolph and Harper could probably get shifted to the Battle Royal in that case.

The best use of Bryan now is Bryan/Dolph/Stewart vs Kane/Show/Harper or something.

Bushwhackers are a fine choice. They're so representative of the Federation era, being all over TV for years and years. They lasted all the way into 96. I think they were all over the place on a promotional level too and were closer to being household names and recognized than lots of guys further up the roster. That goes without their pre-wwe career, which doesn't matter at all for the HOF.

A new Brainbuster game should be "Create a scenario utilizing wrestlers x, y, and z that even Johnny Logic can't defend." x: Great Kabuki y: Joey Abs z: Kelly Kelly

It's easier to justify being blindly positive about things and invoking "wrestling logic" when said logic was actually used more successfully? That'd be my guess. You can't invoke wrestling logic for the sake of it when it's being wielded poorly by a bunch of writers who don't understand why and how it works.

Not once in the last thirteen years has it been about that. It's been about making one person happy, period. He won the war. Two wars. Until he dies that'll be his spoils. On the other hand, it's hard to fault a big corporation to want to present a product that it's most comfortable with. That's sort of the nature of the beast, so I can have it both ways.

Switching gears would have been a mistake because then they would have lost control of ever Royal Rumble from now on. They need to have that thing in Iowa every year.

But at least we're lucky enough that we live in a world where we can all hear someone defend every finish sometime in the next twenty four hours, right?

I think the Mania fans are going to resent them killing the knee here. Past that, it wasn't too far off from what they should have done if they were set on this.

Ok I kind of missed smirking dick Daniel Bryan

We've gone over this before but a lot of the problem with Wyatt was a lack of purpose to his actions.

Rusev's facial expressions are amazing and his body language is just as good.

Fuerza Guerrera: Soviet Spy?

Rusev and Ryback had a match on SD where Ryback won by countout to get into the Rumble Maybe they've done so many shitty finishes because Rusev is winning clean when no one expects it? Also, Cena's REALLY anticipating bumps tonight for some reason.

At least Ken Shamrock would have had the decency to take out the ref too.

Honestly, since the Network is free this month, this is sort of like a Saturday Night's Main Event.

Maybe they should have just skipped the Feb PPV this year. Everything is in placeholder mode for Mania.

Fairly nasty Ala-Bella Slam.

What? It was totally disjointed. I didn't know if they wanted to do a straight wrestling match, a character piece or a fight. Dustin says he is going to beat the Stardust out of him. Then he just sort of wrestles him, but with a ton of awkward pauses and no heat. Cody acted weird then cheated and then went for pinning combinations. Did these two want to win or hurt each other? Then Dustin gets a fluke roll up and we are supposed to believe we get Cody. One of the worst matches I have seen in a while. I'll watch it again tomorrow and if it's worth writing up I will.

We kind of wish you were watching an episode of Smackdown instead.