Are there any great Randy Orton matches?

[Loss]

I know he's had lots of good ones, but I haven't seen him in a really awesome match. I could have overlooked it. If I'm wrong, please feel free to make recommendations.

[nobofnoobs]

You need to watch the first match, but his match against Christian at Over the Limit 2011 is one of my favourites of his. Lots of neat storytelling and counters.

 

The Foley hardcore match at Backlash 2004 is superb too.

 

Those are the two that I'd consider "great".

[Jingus]

The Foley hardcore match at Backlash 2004 is superb too.

Yeah, that's the first one that came to mind. His matches with Benoit that year were also quite highly acclaimed, though I didn't think they were anything particularly spectacular.

[FLIK]

I really loved the HHH mania match but I think I may literally be the only one that did.

[goodhelmet]

These are the matches that received enough interest at the time to get put on a MOTYC set....

 

Rey Mysterio vs. Randy Orton (SD! 4/4/06)

John Cena vs. HBK vs. Edge vs. Randy Orton (Backlash 4/29/07)

John Cena vs. Randy Orton (Summerslam 8/26/07)

Randy Orton vs. Triple H (Last Man Standing) (No Mercy 10/6/07)

Randy Orton vs. John Cena (No Way Out 2/17/08)

John Cena vs. Randy Orton (I Quit Match) (PPV 9/13/09)

John Cena vs. Randy Orton (Ironman Match) (PPV 10/25/09)

CM Punk vs. Randy Orton (Mania 4/3/11)

CM Punk vs. Randy Orton (Last Man Standing) (Extreme Rules 5/1/11)

Randy Orton vs. Christian (SD 5/6/11)

Randy Orton vs. Christian (Over the Limit 5/22/11)

Mark Henry vs. Randy Orton (NOTC 9/18/11)

 

Out of these matches, I would say the Mark Henry match is a legitimately great match. The Christian series was hurt by having 30 matches on TV and PPV over a 3-4 month span. I enjoyed the Punk matches more than most but it has been awhile since I saw either. All of those John Cena matches are blurring together for me.

[tim]

like all these sorts of questions, theres going to be an adjective problem. but there was a smackdown match vs. benoit in 2005 that i really really liked last time i was it 2 or 3 years ago.

 

edit: also the rey match from 06. i guess i wouldnt categorically say it's "GREAT", where ever my barometer for great is, but it's close at least.

[BBscout]

To me the guy's best stuff to judge from is...

-Foley (Backlash 04)

-Benoit (Summerslam 04)

-Taker (Mania 21)

-HHH (No Mercy 07)

-Cena (Breaking Point 09)

 

The Summerslam 07 with him and Cena delivered in its spot, but to me a high opinion on it would be a little inflated and stem from there being the typical hot NY/NJ crowd that it was worked in front of.

 

But, great or good?

 

I'll call the Foley and Cena great. Not all-time classics but great matches. The HHH match was a ton of fun, and the Taker and Benoit matches surprised me.

[WingedEagle]

The two that stand out for me are 1) vs. Foley at Backlash '04 and 2) the heel vs. heel match with Edge on Raw.. Other than those and his work in the angle setting up the Mania main event vs. HHH, nothing he's done has been that memorable for me. Same thing with Sheamus, just a couple of guys I don't connect with at all and more often than not don't enjoy.

[Bix]

Don't forget the Benoit matches from when he replaced Booker T in the Best of 7 series. Those were awesome.

 

Aside from the stuff last year with Punk, Christian, and Henry, the '05-06 Smackdown run was probably his best work.

[Dylan Waco]

The Foley match is great. I think the Cena match from SS 07 is really great too, though I haven't watched it in a while.

[goc]

I know that I'm very much in the minority with this opinion (maybe the only one) but I absolutely loved the Cena/Orton Iron Man match from Bragging Rights 09. It was my favorite match of the year but it's not a match that most people seem to rate much better than "good."

[sek69]

The match with Christian on SD was one of the best matches I've ever seen live.

[Chess Knight]

Rey Mysterio vs. Randy Orton (SD! 4/4/06)

Depends on definition of 'great', but I'd say this is a really great match, the best Orton match ever, the best or second best of 2006 SmackDown (which was excellent), a top 5 SmackDown match ever in general, the best Mysterio match in a year where Mysterio was probably a top three in the world, and probably the second best match of Mysterio's entire WWE run. I have some reservations about saying that but I have none calling it great.

 

1/13/06 v Benoit is something I reckon I'd call 'great' as well. Orton was really good at making all of Chris' signatures seem really dangerous.

[Johnny Sorrow]

I loved the match against Taker at Mania. When it started I was all, "Yeah, no way are they gonna have Orton win" and by the end I was freaking out cause I was thinking he WAS gonna win, and I lost myself in the match, going nuts, kayfabe.

[TravJ1979]

The Foley match is great. I think the Cena match from SS 07 is really great too, though I haven't watched it in a while.

I happened to watch SummerSlam 2007 last night. I thought enough of the Orton/Cena match (along with the Rey/Chavo match) to put them on my short list to re watch for my Best of the 2000's project. It was one of those that seemed like it would be average in the beginning, but turned out to be a great match.

[Matt D]

Honestly, I think the Christian series was helped, not hurt by all the matches, because Christian is so good at building off of what's come before and switching up his moveset, counters and placement, organically to craft evolving narratives.

[NintendoLogic]

So Orton's best matches are against Foley in Foley's signature gimmick match and against Cena during a period when Cena was a borderline superworker. Sounds about right.

[BBscout]

I think a lot of the guy's work.

 

They put him with all the guys they wanted to elevate over the last year and a half and he gave a ton in the process. You'd think he was ready to retire the way he's been booked, yet he still maintains the same heat and he did a bunch of fresh stuff over the course of that time.

 

Before that, I felt he did great villain work in a Mania main event program.

 

I think he would deliver that all-time classic match if the program presented itself moreso now than ever.

[Jingus]

So Orton's best matches are against Foley in Foley's signature gimmick match and against Cena during a period when Cena was a borderline superworker. Sounds about right.

Is "his best matches were all against his very most talented opponents" really a criticism? You'd expect that would be the case with most guys. You'll do better work with better dancing partners, more often than not.

[cm funk]

The match with Taker at WM21 was my favorite on the show. HBK/Angle, Rey/Eddie and MITB all got more praise, but watching it live that match was my favorite.

 

The hardcore match with Foley at Backlash 04 was great

 

I really liked the I Quit match with Cena, though I remember it being very polarizing, with people criticizing the pacing and Cena's overacting. I thought it worked.

 

The two PPV matches with Christian were awesome

 

I have no problem calling any of those matches great

 

Also, I really liked his matches with Edge and RVD when he was IC champ in 04. Not a single one that stands out above the rest, but they were good series' of matches, the one's with Edge in particular

 

Personally, I think Orton is a really good worker when he wants to be. Not a great worker, but certainly in the tier just below that for my tastes

[Jingus]

Anyone else fond the Orton/Angle minifeud from 2006? It's not really "great", but those were some neat little bouts and I rarely see those matches pimped anywhere. Although those were more interesting for how Angle was trying to change his style a bit, being less spotty and more focused on holds and matwork than usual, than for anything else.

 

EDIT: for that matter, we've listed plenty of matches already, let's talk some aesthetics. How do you guys rate Orton overall? His offense, selling, bumping, general psychology, charisma (which should probably be narrowly defined as "how much did the crowd instinctively care about this guy?"), adaptability, his face work versus his heel work, all that kind of stuff.

[Loss]

He's in his early 30s and is on the downswing of his career, unfortunately. Two wellness violations and less of a push than in the past. He got too much too soon, but at the same time, WWE has trouble slowly pushing guys to the top since they get typecast on their way up the ladder as midcarders, so a slow push may have resulted in less stardom. But it doesn't seem like there was any thought into making sure Orton was a long-term star. He won the title in 2004 for the first time, which was far too soon. He should just now be entering his peak years, but I guess that's not how wrestling works anymore.

[Alchemy]

I know that I'm very much in the minority with this opinion (maybe the only one) but I absolutely loved the Cena/Orton Iron Man match from Bragging Rights 09. It was my favorite match of the year but it's not a match that most people seem to rate much better than "good."

I despise the finish to that, where Orton taps while the crowd counts down. He tapped with 2 seconds to go, IIRC -- at that point, you're insulting the audience. Why hold on through the countdown and stuff only to tap 2 seconds before? It's not like he couldn't hear the chanting counting down.

[anarchistxx]

There is a match against RVD on Raw in 2003 or something which is surprisingly fantastic. Orton gets legitimately concussed IIRC and bleeds a ton hardway, or maybe it is the other way round. I certainly remember rating it a top five TV match of that year.

 

Aside from that, the Foley match is obviously great. At the time it definitely seemed 'great', maybe due to the surprise of Orton taking these crazy tack bumps and Foley looking incredible for someone who had not worked properly in four years. Not seen it in years, though. The Summerslam title win is superb too, bit of a carry job by Benoit who takes some heavy bumps but it got Orton over as a title threat and it seemed like a big moment.

 

The one thing that sticks out to me with Orton and others is how they messed up the 'dream' matches of that period. Cena/Orton, Cena/Batista and to a lesser extent Orton/Batista should have been huge Wrestlemania showcases, instead of being wasted at Summerslam. With patience and a long build those matches could really have meant something, which seems pretty unthinkable now since they all seem to have wrestled each other a million times.

 

Orton himself has never recovered from HHH beating him in that terrible Wrestlemania main event, of course, just as he'd got really hot. The Shane 'O' Mac stuff didn't exactly help either. That was the last chance they had to make him a star - the internet went crazy over that Raw when he kicked Vince McMahon, even cynical bastards like me were tuning in the next week.

 

He is still over but he is never going to have a massive run again you wouldn't think. I won't be surprised if he drops out in the next year or two - I'm sure he's financially set and he doesn't give the impression of getting much joy out of wrestling these days. Only a matter of time before he gets fed up of it all or WWE gives him the push for wellness.

[NintendoLogic]

I think Orton is good in that you can plug him in with anybody and he'll hold up his end. But he's not going to carry a lesser worker to greatness. Dave recently said that he thought the three best workers in WWE were Orton, Rey, and Bryan because they have good matches and aren't generic WWE style workers. I found this mind-boggling since to me, Orton is practically the poster child for the cookie-cutter WWE style.