[2012-04-29-WWE-Extreme Rules] CM Punk vs Chris Jericho

[Superstar Sleeze]

WWE Champion CM Punk vs Chris Jericho - Extreme Rules 2012 Street Fight

Overshadowed because it is on the same card as instant classics John Cena vs Brock Lesnar & Daniel Bryan vs Sheamus. In fact, Extreme Rules 2012 is in the running for the greatest card WWE has ever put out. This is a great street fight. It is not as great as other two are, but few matches are. This match is still a killer match. Another thing that hurts this match is the build is kinda lame. Jericho is going after Punk's family for their substance abuse issue and that eventually Punk will succumb to his genetics. My issue with these angles is not that they are tasteless but rather I just dont buy them. It feels forced and artificial. Also, I dont think they are that interesting for a grand arc. I know the WWE well enough to know these angles dont lead anywhere. They are just a 3-4 week program to fill time before the street fight. In a good Soap Opera, this would have a consequence on Punk's next storyline and Jericho's next angle, but they wont and they didnt. Very rarely do I find things like this tasteless it is more that they bore me because the writing is so bad in the long-run. 

I really liked the first 2/3rds of the match. It felt like a throwback street fight where both men were out to hurt and maim each other. Especially Punk who is the pissed off, wrong babyface out for revenge. He should be the one bringing the fight to Jericho and that's exactly how it is. It is nothing but strikes and thats how it should be. Then he moves onto weapons perfect. He really kicks Jericho's ass. Jericho uses the ref as a human shield to poke Punk's eyes. GREAT HEEL MOVE! I dig it! Lots of Jericho's dropkicks and weapons shots. Again that makes sense given the personal nature of the feud. Punk's family is ringside in Chicago (crowd was wicked hot as expected). Jericho does the great heel move was exposing the metal barricade dropping Punk on it. Jaw-jacking with the sister, she does a great job hauling off and smacking him. He becomes incensed and lunges for her and Punk plays the protective brother perfectly and jumps him. He goes bezerk and in the moment of the match bodyslams him on the announce table board. Just a great visual. 

Jericho back drops out and then uses the Kendo stick to take back over. I thought around here they lost some of the energy they had built up. Jericho hit a chinlock. Even more egregiously Punk went for an inside cradle. No, no, no. Avenging babyface in a street fight should not be eeking out a victory or winning by technique. I thought they went for too many nearfalls. Punk stumbling into a Codebreaker or Jericho taking the Macho Man elbow only for them to a Codebreaker on a chair and the Macho Man Elbow to the table just undercut things. They could have missed the first iteration to make the second iterations mean more. The nearfalls felt forced too. Like they knew it was too early to go home but they were throwing out counters into nearfalls to fill time. There were moments where the fire was there. Like the fire extinguisher to Jericho, Macho Ebow through the table and Anaconda Vice. I liked how Jericho got out of the Vice with the Kendo Stick, but again the the follow up was not that great. It was Jericho incredulous that he couldnt win and just looking like a dude left holding his dick. Punk reversing the G2S into a catapult into the exposed turnbuckle into a G2S was a strong finish. There bit too much selling from Punk to really believe in  such a rapid comeback, but the comeback was hot. 

The beginning of the match was really strong and wrestled how a street fight should be. The finish stretch was hit and miss, but more hit than miss. Overlooked because how stacked the card is and the poor build, but dont sleep on this match. ****  

 

 

[ShittyLittleBoots]

This starts off hot, but much like at Mania, once Jericho properly takes over, things go dry. He was good at receiving the ass-kicking from Punk early on, but once he was working the heat, it just wasn't interesting at all. They really lost me at about the bit where Jericho starts pouring beer on Punk, and everything after that just drags badly. 25-minutes for a match like this was just completely unnecessary, and it truly felt like they didn't have enough material for that duration. They get me back for a second w/ that awesome Elbow Drop through the table, but everything after that is once again pretty damn uninteresting. I was ready to call this better than their disappointing Mania meeting during the first 10 minutes or so, but like I mentioned, things quickly got very dull & remained dull for a very long time. **

[cactus]

This started strong but ended up it actively boring me to the point that I would just wish it would end. The brawling is decent and Jericho is great at being a smarmy prick. On top of the usual kendo stick and chair shots that you can expect to find in any WWE street fight during the past decade or so, they also got creative by using the cover of the announce table as a weapon. Jericho getting smacked in the face by Punk's sister was a nice little pay-off to all the trash talk that Jericho had been speaking about Punk's family in the lead-up to this match. After Jericho drenches Punk with the beer, the match starts to lose me. The match slows to a snail's crawl and not even a surprise Codebreaker is enough to wake the crowd up. I was beyond bored by the time that Punk hits his big dive through the announce table. There's a reason all the best brawls throughout wrestling history rarely ever go past the twenty-minute mark. You just can't keep the heat building for that long and this match is a shining example of that. ★★½