WWE Elimination Chamber 2023

[El-P]

I commend the effort of trying to convince people that there's such an intricate storytelling going on with deep interpersonal relationships and emotional ties justifying the fact that after losing to Reigns in his hometown, the biggest babyface they had in 10 years's arc is gonna actually peak with some tag match involving Solo Sikoa or something.

Basically, they made it about Roman vs Sami since the Rumble. It was the biggest and most successful angle in eons. It was all about Sami vs Roman. They booked the match in Montreal, Sami's hometown, and made a huge deal about it being there (with references to the Montreal screwjob and all during the promotion, so no, there's no overstating how important Montreal was). They had Sami's family at ringside. And Sami still lost after a shit finish with two ref bumps and two run-ins, sure, he got a "visual fall" (let's talk about "putting over" without putting people over, that's some level of bullshit argument) but really, in the end, it was a downer. Oh, the Montreal crowd got a Kevin Owens run-in. Whoop-dee-fucking-doo.

If I had been involved in this storyline for months and pulling for Sami, you can rest assured this would have turned me off big time. 

As far as Sami remaining over at that level, hey, maybe he will and great for him and good for them. Still, he should have been the one to beat Roman. Instead, he lost in his hometown.

And the Elite guy (yeah, you're in 4 Life, much like the nWo or the Bullet Club) is gonna defeat Roman. The irony.

[Coffey]

If WWE were going to pull an audible, it should have been at the Royal Rumble with Cody winning the Rumble, not at having Sami win the WWE title at a not-Wrestlemania show a month before Wrestlemania. The blow off for the Roman Reigns 900+ day title run has to happen at the biggest show. You don't crown the champion at the AFC Championship, you crown them at the Super Bowl.

Now if that should have been Sami Zayn at Wrestlemania instead of Cody Rhodes, that's a different conversation altogether. 

[El-P]

12 minutes ago, Coffey said:

The blow off for the Roman Reigns 900+ day title run has to happen at the biggest show. You don't crown the champion at the AFC Championship, you crown them at the Super Bowl.

Totally agree. Hence the "They booked themselves into that corner", of delivering a downer in Sami's hometown.

12 minutes ago, Coffey said:

Now if that should have been Sami Zayn at Wrestlemania instead of Cody Rhodes, that's a different conversation altogether. 

It's the same conversation. It should have been Sami at Mania. Since it could not be, then they booked Sami vs Roman in fucking Montreal. And since Reigns can't lose before Mania, Sami got beat in Montreal. Clap clap clap. 

I don't care if they make great ratings still, but to me nothing has changed at all. It will always remain the same old same old. Drew got beat in Whales. Sami got beat in Montreal. Better be fan of whoever they chose, because if not, then it's just not worth your time.

Speaking of which, good luck with the next 20 years of Austin Theory. 

[SirEdger]

And we wouldn't have had the epic rivalry between the Von Erichs & the Freebirds if Terry Gordy didn't slam that cage door on Kerry's head on Christmas Night 1982.

[Timbo Slice]

Matt is half-right: they book venues well in advance, booked this angle well in advance, and had Cody written down to best Roman well in advance. When you plan something out, it’s the job of the company to make a choice to either be steadfast in their decision making or adjust on the fly. That company normally adjusts on the fly on the bottom end of the spectrum. Not the top.

And this is something that a LOT of companies do because they plan things so far in advance. They don’t allow for the delta to take advantage of something hot. Tony K constantly does this with his stop/start, “Let’s put these two together because it’s good in a vacuum” booking. WWE obviously does this. NJPW and Naito not winning the title at WK. I have no idea why these companies can’t be more agile. There’s a difference between being impulsive and being quick on your feet. And wrestling is better when it’s more amorphous lest things either get unfulfilled or overwrung. 

[C.S.]

2 hours ago, DMJ said:

- Where was GUNTHER? Where was Bianca Belair? Where was Charlotte Flair? Becky?

Where was Cody? 

[RingoPlaysDrums]

Keeping Cody off the show was a smart move I'd say. He hasn't been booed yet and I don't expect him to at Mania or on the way there but there's a chance he would have been last night in Montreal.

[Coffey]

23 minutes ago, SirEdger said:

And we wouldn't have had the epic rivalry between the Von Erichs & the Freebirds if Terry Gordy didn't slam that cage door on Kerry's head on Christmas Night 1982.

We also don't get any of this Sami storyline if Drew McIntyre beats Roman Reigns at Clash at the Castle.

[Embrodak]

20 minutes ago, Cien Caras said:

In todays shitty wrestling environment where the metric of quality is deemed to be the utterly dull style of “great matches”, it’s refreshing to see actual heat and emotional investment. Absolutely the right decision not to have Sami win which would be some gratitude era bullshit where everyone gets to have their divas title crying moment, instead you put the heat on the champ rather than throw that away for one feel good moment and no follow up (see the wet fart that was Adam Page as champion).

it’s ok, in this fake sport it’s a better story when the baddies win and you pay to see them defeated. Kerry getting his head smashed in by the cage door by the Freebirds was a lot better than Kerry getting his sympathy title win. 

Yeah the IWC’s bete noire mentioned recently how one of the arts of booking is striking the balance between giving the audience what they want and making the audience want what you want them to want. I’d say that WWE has done that pretty much perfectly with this storyline thus far. I guess if you just really dislike or are indifferent to Cody, it doesn’t work - that’s true of my dad, for example - but I think Sami losing in Montreal was fine. He got to bask in two nights of adulation and wrestle his highest profile match in front of them. He doesn’t need the title or the win over Roman, and that’s frankly a distraction from the story they’ve been telling, which was about Sami USO, about Reigns trying to use him to keep his belligerent cousin in check but ultimately undermining the stability of the faction that is keeping him on top. Whoever is the creative behind this story, they’re doing a good job for once, and it’s a shame to see the persistence of this antagonism toward the usually overbearing and inorganic WWE creative process the one fucking time in ten years that it actually delivers.

[Ricky Jackson]

Also, even if there was a plan to crown Sami, it would mean a lot more in the end if it came after he tried and failed to beat the champ a few times before finally getting over the hump

[KawadaSmile]

Also, I think treating this as Sami's only chance at a title is... weird. If anything, he has shown he can hang with the top dogs without feeling out of place, something that KO managed to do years prior. 

This is a man who has managed to get a main event from being the funny, quirky and sympathetic lowest ranked member of an all-time great stable. He elevated his stock so much, even in defeat - his presser was incredible! 

Him finally making amends with KO (who was always a fucking awful friend) and beating the LONGEST REIGNING TAG TEAM CHAMPS IN WWE HISTORY AT WRESTLEMANIA is, yes, coherent with the story they have presented so far, and no, not the peak he can reach within the company. 

 

 

Edit: Sami losing his first (I think) main roster title match against ROMAN REIGNS is honestly an upgrade compared to the TWO YEARS he'd spent chasing fucking Bo Dallas and Neville for the NXT Belt. Couldn't even defend that once. 

[Jmare007]

That's why I'm interested in how he's booked after Roman loses the belts. Does he back to plucky/funny guy on the midcard like Kofi or does HHH makes an actual effort to make him a legit top babyface you can make some money off.

Regarding last night, I guess the question ends up being if it's more important to "make" Sami Zayn on the February PLE in front of his home crowd or "make" Cody Rhodes at Wrestlemania. The argument of making either one of the lose so they can get over the hump later works both of them in this case, imo.

[Jmare007]

Also, Draw winning never made any sense to me because he already had gotten a lengthy title reign and has been their top babyface before. Even though the atmosphere was crazy for Clash at the Castle, Drew didn't have a third of the momentum both Sami and Cody have right now.

[KawadaSmile]

34 minutes ago, Timbo Slice said:

NJPW and Naito not winning the title at WK. 

That decision still infuriates me. 

[NintendoLogic]

I had to work early Sunday morning, so I ended up calling a night before the main event. I was genuinely excited to see how things would play out, though, so I made a point of staying away from all wrestling-related websites and message boards to avoid having things spoiled before I had a chance to watch the match. I was thinking we might get some blood when I got on Peacock and saw the show was rated TV-14, but I guess that was because of the "fuck you Roman" chants. As far as the match goes, Sami's selling was brilliant, but that's about the only kind thing I have to say about it from an in-ring perspective. Tribal Chief Roman might be my least favorite offensive wrestler of all time. Everything he did looked good, but the endless staring contests and Bond villain monologues were just unbearable. Throw in the extended power naps after every near fall and I don't even know if the match contained five minutes of actual wrestling. From a booking standpoint, however, I don't know how you could ask for anything more unless you're absolutely convinced that Sami beating Roman for the belts was the only acceptable outcome. We even got some added intrigue about which side Jey will end up on. I could see them doing something like Demolition/Colossal Connection where the Usos lose the tag belts and Jey turns face after the match.

[Matt D]

Booking a territory in 1983 is different than booking a national promotion in 2023. You can send a crowd home upset if you're going to make them happy a month or two down the line.

Heat's on the promotion, not the heel. There were ways to give the crowd something more even if Sami was losing. But again, I think a lot of it is that they even booked themselves into the corner in the first place.

[El-P]

27 minutes ago, NintendoLogic said:

As far as the match goes, Sami's selling was brilliant, but that's about the only kind thing I have to say about it from an in-ring perspective. Tribal Chief Roman might be my least favorite offensive wrestler of all time. Everything he did looked good, but the endless staring contests and Bond villain monologues were just unbearable. Throw in the extended power naps after every near fall and I don't even know if the match contained five minutes of actual wrestling. 

That's WWE epic main event style. Straight from the Taker vs Micheals and Taker vs HHH series at Mania, which are only gonna be more influential than ever. It fits the promotion and its global blockbuster scale, but it's the least interesting style ever to me.

[DMJ]

16 minutes ago, El-P said:

That's WWE epic main event style. Straight from the Taker vs Micheals and Taker vs HHH series at Mania, which are only gonna be more influential than ever. It fits the promotion and its global blockbuster scale, but it's the least interesting style ever to me.

I'd disagree here a little, though it may be seen as splitting hairs.

I'm not a "movez" guy, but I did find last night's main event to be lacking a little bit. I mean, it felt like every single Roman cut-off was an uppercut and the rest of the offense was spears. Sami spent most of the match selling, but his offense also seemed to comprise of mostly Exploders and Helluva Kicks. We did see a Blue Thunder Bomb and a sunset flip powerbomb at one point, but I dunno, I think that's where the CM Punk/Cena match at Money in the Bank 2011 or the Cena/Bryan match at SummerSlam 2013 (?) had this one beat in terms of actual in-ring action. I'd add the Kofi/Bryan match from WrestleMania a few years back to that list too. Fuck, I haven't seen it in ages, but Rob Van Dam/Cena at ONS II hit the mark in ways this didn't.

I know that, character-wise and storyline-wise, this match was worked correctly and I was definitely engaged in it from beginning to end (as were the live audience), but I don't think this was a Match of the Year Candidate match as much as this was a "must see" match because of the storyline and the crowd.

Playing armchair producer/agent, I might've asked "What is Sami's strategy? What is Sami going to do that Roman doesn't expect?" I go back to that Finn Balor/Brock Lesnar match from a few years ago. There was a great moment there where Lesnar nearly seppeku'd himself on the corner of a table (IIRC) and Balor instantly knew his killshot Coup De Gras could actually slay the Beast. It didn't end up working out that way, but I would've loved to see something similar here where Roman, despite dominating the match and having the power advantage, now finds himself extra vulnerable to a Helluva Kick or unable to hit the Spear because Sami figured out a way to bust his ankle or something. 

It was a very good match because of the intangibles that are rare in WWE, but it wasn't a match that I think will be talked about 5-10 years from now. That may be the biggest knock against what has undoubtedly been a stupendous run for Roman. He's had some great matches over the past 3 years, but true masterpieces? I dunno if he has more than 2 or 3 as the company ace, while Cena has anywhere from 8 to 12.*

 

* And, yeah, I know we're comparing apples to oranges a bit here, but if comparing WWE aces over the past 20 years isn't a valid PWO discussion, nothing is.

[NintendoLogic]

As far as strategy goes, I kind of had the sense that Sami had the Superman punch scouted and came up with the exploder into the turnbuckle as a counter. That could just be headcanon on my part, though.

[El-P]

29 minutes ago, DMJ said:

I mean, it felt like every single Roman cut-off was an uppercut and the rest of the offense was spears. Sami spent most of the match selling, but his offense also seemed to comprise of mostly Exploders and Helluva Kicks.

Well, I forgot to add the Heyman factor into the WWE Epic tm formula. That's where the repetitions comes from. The Kevin Owens match at the Rumble was the same (expect it was completely "there"to me for the most part, whereas I thought this one was a great WWE style match, even though I don't care for the style at all).

People will talk about how minimalistic and efficient it is, when in fact it's simplistic and efficient, which is not the same thing. And it also can only be done when you have a certain scale and level of overness aka status. This is why Taker vs Micheals (and even the "first" HHH vs Taker, not talking about Mania 2001) were awesome epic matches whether you care for the style or not (I don't, but I can't object their greatness either), but also worked because of whom worked those match and in a specific context that also allowed them to do so in that specific way. Two elements (status/context) which are usually more or less completely forgotten about when matches and workers are talked about.

[DMJ]

^ Absolutely.

It helps when you've got a catalog of 9-10 signature moves compared to 3-4.

Even Taker, by that point in his career, had an arsenal of stuff that included "high flying" (The Old School and the dive), submissions (the Triangle Choke), two signature strikes (the Big Boot, the legrop on the apron, and the uppercuts), and then, like, 3 power move finishers (Tombstone, Last Ride, Chokeslam). Meanwhile, Michaels had a couple of "classic" bumps, the Superkick, the elbow from the top, the flying forearm, and also was doing the Sharpshooter/Figure Four at times IIRC. Basically, they had a bunch of things they could do inside and outside of the ring to stretch 20+ minutes.

Again, I'm not saying Roman needs more moves just for the sake of having moves, but, y'know, whatever happened to the Drive-By? Didn't he used to do a flying clothesline from the top rope? Didn't he used to do a powerbomb or was that just a Shield thing? It would've been a great visual to see him apply a nasty abdominal stretch once Sami had that huge cut down his chest. It wouldn't hurt for Roman to add a few more signature moves to his arsenal.
 

[sek69]

Funny to see WCCW held up as an example of wrestling being better before it was all about childhood dreams, when the main focus was the Von Erich boys chasing the title their dad never was able to win. 

[KawadaSmile]

18 minutes ago, DMJ said:

Again, I'm not saying Roman needs more moves just for the sake of having moves, but, y'know, whatever happened to the Drive-By? Didn't he used to do a flying clothesline from the top rope? Didn't he used to do a powerbomb or was that just a Shield thing? It would've been a great visual to see him apply a nasty abdominal stretch once Sami had that huge cut down his chest. It wouldn't hurt for Roman to add a few more signature moves to his arsenal.
 

He used the Drive-By last night. It might have been the first big move of the match. He used it against KO too, pretty sure. He still occasionally uses that one arm powerbomb, depending on the opponent's offense.

However, I do agree to an extent. I remember that around 2016 he used to do a sweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeet Black Tiger Bomb which he dropped after some time. That man was also on random RAW episodes doing La Magistrals, Single Leg Crabs and what not, and all that shit looked cool. 

At this point, it's not even if he *can* do more moves, is if it's needed. Roman never was a guy whose matches relied on a huge amount of moves - see his first match against Lesnar or against Bryan - and sadly, when he is on a run that people are reacting to basically NOTHING for 5 minutes straight, I dunno if he feels the need to mix things up.

[sek69]

It's not an exact parallel because nobody died, but Dave mentioned last night was like if Kerry lost the big match at Texas Stadium after all the hype. It was going to fizzle out either way since Kerry wasn't going to be a viable long term champion for numerous reasons, but he absolutely had to win that night, just like it felt Sami had to win last night.

[Badlittlekitten]

Meltzer is being weird about this, claiming Sami is a bigger draw than Roman because the Smackdown rating held up without Reigns on the show. 

No doubt Zayn is massively over but the overall Bloodline saga (of which Roman is the core) is obviously the draw.