WWE Fast Lane 2016 (2/21/2016)- Cleveland, OH

PRE-SHOW:
Awwww…. Renee got all dressed up for prom. Now Dean, you’d better have her back home by midnight!

Lawler actually had a decent line when he said that “Kalisto is so short his mask smells like feet.” Much less clever was the guy who had a sign declaring that “Mike Miller is a Roody Poo.”

RENEEE YOUNG INTERVIEWS PAUL HEYMAN- good.
Hey, maybe one of you other so-called experts on the panel would like to do your jobs and asks Mr. Heyman a question? Ah. Thank you, Booker.

DOLPH ZIGGLER PROMO- not so good.
Ah. JBL just made his entrance, and apparently got a monstrous pop.

2 OUT OF 3 FALLS MATCH FOR THE WWE UNITED STATES TITLE: Kalisto(c) vs. Alberto Del Rio- 7.75/10
Mauro is calling the match!
Stupid commercial. This is all time in which I could be watching this big match they’ve been hyping up.
If this is going to be the end of this feud I would have preferred a more decisive win for Kalisto, but between the roll-up and the DQ in the first fall, they definitely left Del Rio an out to set up for one more match at WrestleMania. Other than that, a great match, playing to both men’s strengths.

AJ STYLES IN THE SOCIAL MEDIA LOUNGE- he was very good, although “let me put it to you like this” is clearly his “I’m stalling for time so I can think of an answer” phrase.

MAIN SHOW:
How much money each year do you think that WWE spends on the random, pointless pyro that goes off at the beginning of the show?

NAOMI & TAMINA vs. SASHA BANKS & BECKY LYNCH- 6.25/10
They told their story well, with the fact that they weren’t on the same page burning our babyfaces early and never letting Becky and Sasha be completely on the same page throughout the match, which made you wonder if someone would turn on the other after the match.

WWE INTERCONTINENTAL TITLE MATCH: Kevin Owens(c) vs. Dolph Ziggler- 8/10
Dolph can be a great babyface, and Owens is the best heel in the business right now.

KANE, BIG SHOW, & RYBACK PROMO- really unnatural, but kind of fun. Especially Kane’s bit. Also, did anyone else notice that Kane has mood lighting that follows him wherever he goes?

RYBACK, KANE, & BIG SHOW vs. THE WYATT FAMILY (w/Bray Wyatt)- 5.5/10
Okay… I didn’t see that result coming. Big Show even got to beat the crap out of Strowman.

JOJO INTERVIEWS ROMAN & DEAN- bad.
I love it how they pretend that Roman and Dean haven’t fought each other for some sort of big prize before with no damage whatsoever to their friendship.

WWE DIVAS TITLE MATCH: Charlotte(c) (w/Ric Flair) vs. Brie Bella- 7/10
They had a quite a few great spots in here (that big forearm and the entirety of the finishing sequence in particular stand out) and Brie did a great job of getting the crowd behind her. Charlotte should have sold better after the match was over.

CHRIS JERICHO PROMO- good.

AJ STYLES vs. CHRIS JERICHO- 8.25/10
Within about ten seconds, JBL said “All Japan,” “Baba,” “Inoki,” “Kobashi,” “Kawada,” and “Stan” (Hansen).
The match was as awesome as you would expect, but I must profess my extreme disappointment that the Styles Clash was kicked out of.

NEW DAY, EDGE, & CHRISTIAN WASTE EVERYONE’S TIME- bad.
Not that E&C weren’t entertaining, but this was a complete and total Raw segment that was only on this PPV to plug their stupid E&C comedy show on the WWE Network. Is there really someone who didn’t buy the Network to see this PPV, but would buy it to watch the E&C comedy show?
The end result of this appears to be a feud between the New Day and the League of Nations. That is so completely random it’s not even funny.

OH COME ON! First they give me that sh*t, and now they are putting the f*cking Ministry of Dorkness on PPV?! They argued about which type of car they all were.

R-TRUTH vs. CURTIS AXEL (w/the Social Outcasts)- 0.5/10
Right. Because this match and that last segment needed to be on PPV, but the US Title match had to be on the pre-show with a commercial in the middle of it. The finish saw Goldust inadvertently cost Truth the match because he thought it would somehow help Truth if he threw Heath Slater INTO the ring. This was a crappy Raw match in a crappy Raw storyline that for some reason they decided to put on PPV. There is no reason this time couldn’t have gone to either title match or to AJ vs. Jericho.

#1 CONTENDERSHIP MATCH: Dean Ambrose vs. Roman Reigns vs. Brock Lesnar (w/Paul Heyman)- 8.25/10
The story of the match was Dean and Roman realizing that the only way they could win was if they worked together to take Brock out first. I thought the match could have used a bit more time, as the finish felt very abrupt. After the match, Hunter came out to have a stare-down with the winner.

An awesome show from WWE aside from the gaping hole between AJ vs. Jericho and the main event. What the hell were they thinking?

1. Not only does Kane have mood lighting, I swear I heard it click on when Kane was about to walk into frame.
2. Was that supposed to be a tweener turn for The New Day? Because that's what it felt like
3. From what I've been reading from you, compared to what I saw last night, it seems like that was the least offensive Ministry of Dorkness outing in quite a long time, mostly because the amount of mic time given between the four of them actually went in descending order of how good they all are on the mic.
4. Also you're selling the Edge and Christian show short. It's actually really fun!

NWK2000 wrote:1. Not only does Kane have mood lighting, I swear I heard it click on when Kane was about to walk into frame.
2. Was that supposed to be a tweener turn for The New Day? Because that's what it felt like
3. From what I've been reading from you, compared to what I saw last night, it seems like that was the least offensive Ministry of Dorkness outing in quite a long time, mostly because the amount of mic time given between the four of them actually went in descending order of how good they all are on the mic.
4. Also you're selling the Edge and Christian show short. It's actually really fun!

1. That was just Kane snapping his fingers to summon the mood lighting.
2. If not a full-on babyface turn. I guess this was their way of getting the League of Nations onto WrestleMania?
3. The promos weren't as bad as usual, but this is still a f*cking PPV. Their very presence offends me.
4. Maybe, but I didn't like the idea of the segment as a whole. I totally popped for the Lance Storm reference, though, because I prefer my PPV segments to be serious.

Big Red Machine wrote: AJ STYLES vs. CHRIS JERICHO- 8.25/10
Within about ten seconds, JBL said “All Japan,” “Baba,” “Inoki,” “Kobashi,” “Kawada,” and “Stan” (Hansen).
The match was as awesome as you would expect, but I must profess my extreme disappointment that the Styles Clash was kicked out of.

and just like that Jericho is better than the NJPW roster and the ROH roster

I thought the sudden ending of the main event fit perfectly esp now that we see what Wrestlemania is shaping up to be.

badnewzxl wrote:I thought the sudden ending of the main event fit perfectly esp now that we see what Wrestlemania is shaping up to be.

Yes, but it wouldn't have affected things much if Dean and Roman went for a minute or two trading finishers after Brock got taken out and it would have made this match better.

Big Red Machine wrote:

badnewzxl wrote:I thought the sudden ending of the main event fit perfectly esp now that we see what Wrestlemania is shaping up to be.

Yes, but it wouldn't have affected things much if Dean and Roman went for a minute or two trading finishers after Brock got taken out and it would have made this match better.

The match was plenty long. Plus, this way Ambrose got to save some face by getting hit with the spear after having his focus on Lesnar. That's better for the build to their Mania match. I'm glad they didn't do what I expected and just job Dean out without giving him something.

badnewzxl wrote:

Big Red Machine wrote:

badnewzxl wrote:I thought the sudden ending of the main event fit perfectly esp now that we see what Wrestlemania is shaping up to be.

Yes, but it wouldn't have affected things much if Dean and Roman went for a minute or two trading finishers after Brock got taken out and it would have made this match better.

The match was plenty long. Plus, this way Ambrose got to save some face by getting hit with the spear after having his focus on Lesnar. That's better for the build to their Mania match. I'm glad they didn't do what I expected and just job Dean out without giving him something.

Ambrose doesn't need to save face, and, if anything, that sort of "semi-distracted Ambrose gets speared" finish is counter-productive to what they want to do with Roman. For Ambrose vs. Lesnar, the important idea is that Ambrose used a chair to break up Brock's winning submission and take Brock out. It doesn't matter how quickly Dean is pinned after that happened.
As for the length of the match, A) I don't think 16 minutes was long enough for a match this big, and B) this isn't an issue of match length so much as one of match timing. If they had done the chair spot at 13 minutes instead of 15 you could still go the same sixteen minutes without the finish feeling so abrupt.

This is the same argument we had about the Rumble. You go a few extra minutes so Reigns can win 100% clean and you just had the overwhelming fan favorite get beat straight up by a guy half the crowd boos. It's better that Ambrose lost BC his focus was on Lesnar. If they went longer, the ending would not have involved Lesnar almost getting the win, unless you have him reenter the ring but that's just extending the match for no reason. The match was great and there wasn't really anything missing from it. Why did it need to be longer?

badnewzxl wrote:This is the same argument we had about the Rumble. You go a few extra minutes so Reigns can win 100% clean and you just had the overwhelming fan favorite get beat straight up by a guy half the crowd boos. It's better that Ambrose lost BC his focus was on Lesnar. If they went longer, the ending would not have involved Lesnar almost getting the win, unless you have him reenter the ring but that's just extending the match for no reason. The match was great and there wasn't really anything missing from it. Why did it need to be longer?

We're coming at this from two different angles. To me, it's better to have Reigns win 100% clean so that you don't lose anyone who is on the fence about him. Having him get the win the way they did made it feel a bit like he was capitalizing on Dean's hard work.

Also, it just felt to me like the ending was abrupt.

Big Red Machine wrote:

badnewzxl wrote:This is the same argument we had about the Rumble. You go a few extra minutes so Reigns can win 100% clean and you just had the overwhelming fan favorite get beat straight up by a guy half the crowd boos. It's better that Ambrose lost BC his focus was on Lesnar. If they went longer, the ending would not have involved Lesnar almost getting the win, unless you have him reenter the ring but that's just extending the match for no reason. The match was great and there wasn't really anything missing from it. Why did it need to be longer?

We're coming at this from two different angles. To me, it's better to have Reigns win 100% clean so that you don't lose anyone who is on the fence about him. Having him get the win the way they did made it feel a bit like he was capitalizing on Dean's hard work.

Also, it just felt to me like the ending was abrupt.

True. I don't see how you could even think that way. Reigns beat Daniel Bryan stra8ght up last year and people were still on the fence about him. What makes you think this will work this time?

The way they did it works for the fans more by somewhat protecting their overall favorite. No one is more popular than Ambrose right now.

badnewzxl wrote:

Big Red Machine wrote:

badnewzxl wrote:This is the same argument we had about the Rumble. You go a few extra minutes so Reigns can win 100% clean and you just had the overwhelming fan favorite get beat straight up by a guy half the crowd boos. It's better that Ambrose lost BC his focus was on Lesnar. If they went longer, the ending would not have involved Lesnar almost getting the win, unless you have him reenter the ring but that's just extending the match for no reason. The match was great and there wasn't really anything missing from it. Why did it need to be longer?

We're coming at this from two different angles. To me, it's better to have Reigns win 100% clean so that you don't lose anyone who is on the fence about him. Having him get the win the way they did made it feel a bit like he was capitalizing on Dean's hard work.

Also, it just felt to me like the ending was abrupt.

True. I don't see how you could even think that way. Reigns beat Daniel Bryan stra8ght up last year and people were still on the fence about him. What makes you think this will work this time?

Because people don't love Ambrose anywhere near as much as they love Bryan.

badnewzxl wrote: The way they did it works for the fans more by somewhat protecting their overall favorite. No one is more popular than Ambrose right now.

You don't need to protect Ambrose, though. He is going into a loss at Mania against Lesnar and you already made him look strong (for the purposes of that feud) by having him take Brock out with the chair.

I give up.