Hello everyone, and welcome to another edition of Reading Between The Ropes. As always following a PPV, I like to run down the good, the bad, and the Jared Balstrup of the evening. Last night’s offering was Backlash, and there were some positive and negative aspects about the show. So, without any further ado, let’s run through what we saw.
IC Title: Shelton Benjamin vs. Chris Jericho
An excellent, excellent start to the show. Definitely my pick for match of the night. It didn’t start off like a house-on-fire, which was good. Don’t let the crowd dictate the pace, as they say. It warmed up slowly, and you can see the crowd inching further and further towards the edge of their seats.
Jericho played the more aggressive role which, as I said in my preview column, was the smarter move, even if he did have (predictably) the lion’s share of the crowd support. We saw some decent mat wrestling in the early exchanges. However, the first note-worthy incident was the hurricarana by Jericho, which looked rough as Chris landed heavily on his head.
I marked out when Jericho did his one-footed pin attempt, something that became synonymous with his heel antics in WCW in the 90s. We also saw Chris test the referee counts on a few occasions. Benjamin’s athletic leap to the top rope was excellent to see, and the match kept going up a notch as each second passed in the second half of the contest.
The crowd loved it, and rightly so. The T-Bone and Walls of Jericho weren’t enough. The excellent counter from Jericho to the knees up from Benjamin actually led to Chris’s downfall as Benjamin countered in to a pin. A great match, and a frustrated Jericho. Benjamin gets the rub over Jericho again! This reign is impressive. Will Chris’s character take a more aggressive turn in the aftermath? I’m intrigued to find out.
My Pick: Jericho
Winner: Benjamin
Score: 0-1
Tag Team Turmoil
I liked the idea of the Heart Throbs beginning against the reigning champs. I thought I was in for the prospect of the champs fighting through from start to finish. The Heart Throbs looked diabolical on Raw on their debut, but here they seemed a little more stomachable, to invent a word.
Their exit was very weak, however, and it smacked of a match that contains multiple pins. People always go out with moves that would never beat them in other circumstances in those sorts of matches. Maven and Simon Dean being the next team surprised me. I thought that it was between either of these guys to come out with the win, meaning I suspected these two to be the final two teams remaining. Dean and Maven lasted shorter than anyone else, and went out with even less of a whimper than the Heart Throbs.
La Resistance were the next team, and I really didn’t predict them to be the ones to end Regal and Tajiri’s credible and somewhat over title reign. I thought it was a bad move myself, and I was disappointed to see guaranteed new champs in the final leg of the match. Regal and Tajiri were doing a great job as champs, and I think this change of champion hurts the belts as the new reigns become even more meaningless.
Anyway, enough of the rant. Hurricane and Rosey were the last team, and it was they who dominated the final leg of the match. It never looked like being a La Resistance victory, and the fans were fairly excitable to see the superheroes gain their first tag title reign. Surprising new champs in this one, for my money.
My Pick: Regal and Tajiri
Winners: Hurricane and Rosey
Score: 0-2
Last Man Standing: Edge vs. Chris Benoit
The chants for Matt continue, and I’m glad. The WWE has created a monster here, and I hope they are beginning to realise what a reckless and unfair decision they have made. However, this is a review of the PPV and I’ll try and focus on the match. It does need to be said, though, that these chants have become apart of the matches with Edge now. Atmosphere is a key thing at PPVs, and crowd reaction needs to be taken account of. So, you cannot dismiss these chants as not affecting your outlook on the contest.
It was a fairly slow beginning to this one, but the trash can lid shot from Edge to Chris as he dived to the outside certainly got people’s attention. It definitely aroused the man who kept yelling “You cheated on your wife, Edge,” countless times. I laughed. Benoit’s countless German supelxes were great, particularly his one from the top of the ladder, which was a treat to see.
I thought we might see a spear in to the ladder, or perhaps Benoit dodging a spear in to the ladder. I felt there were some untapped areas in this match that could have been utilised, especially considering this match was the only one with a non-DQ style stipulation to it.
Edge seemed to get too much of the latter stages of the match for me. Having Benoit come across as a guy who kept getting up and up was a smart move, but I felt he could have had a lot more of the latter part of this contest in his favour. It reminded me somewhat of Rock-Austin at Wrestlemania XIX, where Austin didn’t hit a move for the final 3 or 4 minutes of the match. Benoit didn’t seem to hit any in the final 5 or 6 in this one. The brick shot did in for Chris in the end, and Benoit continues to be the best seller in the game today. His far away look was scary as he exited the ring.
My Pick: Edge
Winner: Edge
Score: 1-2
A bit of a mid-way intermission here. The diva stuff was PATHETIC. Master’s did the EXACT same thing he does on Raw and unless they were going to debut a man like Burchill or someone else in this segment, it was useless. Turns out they didn’t debut Burchill, and so it was useless. Why pay for stuff like this when it’s the exact same thing we see on Raw for free each week?
Viscera vs. Kane
Lita’s acting like more of a heel than Trish in this feud nowadays, and I guess she is in the fans’ eyes. Viscera showed a lot more than Kane in this match, which was surprising. Kane seemed to go through the motions, but I don’t blame him. The prospect of trying to put on a spectacle on PPV with Big Vis wouldn’t exactly inspire the best of us.
Still, Vis seemed like the greater trier out there. His spinning heel kick was cool, and to hear the chants for him was great. What makes it great is the fans have been chanting “Mabel”, not Viscera. As a nostalgic son of a gun, I always smile at such nods to the past.
Trish is admirable as she takes some shots at times. I liked the spot with Lita using the crutch to smack the chair in to her face. That wasn’t the ‘shots’ I refer to. One might think I mean the big splash, however, the tougher ‘bump’ seemed the shake from Vis. That looked quite scary, actually.
The fans loved it, though. Trish being carried out was boring and an obvious work, but I’m interested to see if they use this to further the Lita-Trish situation. Lita seems the more obvious heel based on her reactions and the real-life situation causing the fans to give her heat, so maybe the WWE will use this and change the positions in this feud. Oh, yer, Kane won, by the way.
My Pick: Viscera
Winner: Kane
Score 1-3
Hulk Hogan and Shawn Michaels vs. Muhammad Hassan and Daivari
The pop for Hogan was immense, and the crowd was a sea of red and yellow. The fan in the front row got a nice nod of recognition from Hogan as he walked past the ropes. I think the fans tired themselves out come the end of this match as the celebration pose pops at the end didn’t get anywhere near as much of a reaction as the first few moments of the contest did.
Michaels and Hogan had the bulk of the match, with a lengthy domination of their opponents in the early moments. The lead pipe was a nice introduction of the match, and I think Michaels being the face in peril was the correct choice. That way we could build up to Hogan’s re-entering in to the match more and more.
Hogan’s performance surprised me. I was surprised he started the match, and I was surprised how many times he came in and out. I thought he’d be more protected than that. I was also surprised to see his flurry of elbows at one point. I thought he would be very laboured in this match. He was, but nowhere near as much as I thought he would be, so that was good to see.
The closing moments were over pretty quickly and, again, we weren’t graced with the big leg. Obviously Hogan really does need to protect his hips and legs. As I said, I didn’t think he’d hit the big leg, especially since he didn’t pull it out for Wrestlemania. If he was going to hit it, it would have been last month. The way they compensated for it’s absence was nicely done, with the superkick winning the match and Hogan gaining the decisive pin. Queue pose celebrations and weird tattooed fan and a fun time was had by all.
My Pick: Hogan and Michaels
Winners: Hogan and Michaels
Score:2-3
Christian’s appearance was warranted and he got a fairly decent pop as he came out. Hearing Jim Ross acknowledge these pops was significant, I felt. Perhaps he could become a face in the not so distant future. His pops lessened following his comment about leaving Raw, and I was surprised he didn’t get bigger cheers for his rap. However, the way it built up to dissing Cena further enhances my opinion he will be on his way to Smackdown! to challenge in the main event for Cena’s belt very soon. I hope so.
World Title: Batista vs. Triple H
When Ross kept commenting about Flair’s worried expression as he made his way out to the ring, I felt we may see some significant angle played out. However, it was rendered a pretty useless remark when all he did was announce HHH. I don’t know why Ross mentioned that, then.
The match began slowly for me, and it didn’t have too much of a pattern to it. However, it did pick up as it went on, and I felt it was actually a better contest than their outing at Wrestlemania. The pedigree being hit was no surprise to anyone. However, I claim the better prediction as in my review column I mentioned how the ref will take a bump, he would come to following a pedigree and slowly count, only for Batista to kickout of a long two count. That’s EXACTLY what went down.
Hunter can now claim his pedigree actually had Batista beat, but the ref wasn’t in position. It saves face for all, so to speak. We almost saw the pedigree hit again, but it wasn’t, and I didn’t think it would be. Hitting it again wouldn’t allow for the prospect of the aforementioned face-saving on all parts.
Batista picks up the win, but it was nice to see the loser up and ready to cause hell following the match, something I don’t recall seeing for a while as a PPV has closed. The last five minutes of the match were good stuff and it kept me entertained, but it was only because of ref bumps and interference, really. The jury’s still out on Batista for me.
My Pick: Batista
Winner: Batistia
Score: 3-3
So, my predictions were average in the end, but it wasn’t an easy PPV to predict by any stretch of the imagination. The show started excellently with the best match of the night, and it was weighted a lot better than Wrestlemania in terms of what matches occurred when. The paper thin card, however, left room for useless fill, and this card was crying out for a Matt Hardy vs. Christian match, or some Randy Orton match in-between that could have given it a bit more bulk if injuries and stupid decisions didn’t intervene. Not a bad PPV, though.
Until next time,
Mitchell L. Gadd
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