WWE Battleground 2014

WWE  Battleground 2014WWE  Battleground 2014

By Big Red Machine
From July 20, 2014
Discussion

WWE Battleground 2014 (7/20/2014)- Tampa, FL


PRE-SHOW:
FANDANGO vs. ADAM ROSE (w/Layla, Summer Rae, & the Exotic Express)- DUD!
The camera spent most of the match focusing on the Exotic Express. Fandango yelled at them… so they both slapped him in the face, which really just seemed like a completely unreasonable response. This was done right in front of the referee, and there was no DQ. This led to Rose taking over the match and winning. Why are we supposed to like Adam Rose? He is annoying and he couldn’t even win on his own.

NAOMI vs. CAMERON- 1/10
So we have two pre-show matches… and neither of them got any time. Hmm… I wonder what the solution could be? Maybe only do one match in order to MAKE SURE THAT THE MATCH YOU HAVE SPENT WEEKS BUILDING UP ON TV GETS THE TIME IT NEEDS TO DELIVER?!
Anyway, Naomi was really over. She even got “NAOMI!” chants. That’s the first time I can remember that happening. You al really couldn’t help but cheer every time she punched Cameron in the face (and that happened A LOT. Cameron got the win by pulling the tights, which made me sad.

MAIN SHOW:
2 OUT OF 3 FALLS MATCH FOR THE WWE TAG TEAM TITLES: The Usos(c) vs. The Wyatt Family- 7.5/10
During this match, Jerry Lawler uttered the following sentence: “He might have made a big mistake by angering the sheep.”
The heels dominated for a while, getting a pinfall. Usos actually got a pinfall in a hope-spot which let them make a tag as well. This fall really is something you should go out of your way to see because everything executed so well… aside from the pinfall itself, which was very poor.
Jey was eventually able to make a tag and Jimmy ran wild with a bunch of flying moves, including stealing Jeff Hardy’s clothesline off of the barricade. He then got cut off by LUKE HARPER DOING A DIVE! After that they started trading GREAT nearfalls until we came to a great finish. What an opener!

SETH ROLLINS PROMO- great
Then Ambrose jumped him! Agents tried to stop him, and Hunter showed up and ordered for him to be thrown out of the building, saying “you’re not going to screw this up.” Hmmm… interesting implications there, but apparently we won’t have a match tonight.

WWE DIVAS TITLE MATCH: AJ Lee(c) vs. Paige- 4/10
The match had some good spots, but some of their stuff just didn’t look quite right.
There were multiple “Marry me, AJ” signs, so some people apparently haven’t heard the news. There was also a kid with a sign that said “Marry me, AJ? I’m already 13!” This kid is apparently ignorant of both the news and the law.

KANE & ORTON BACKSTAGE- okay

JACK SWAGGER (w/Zeb Coulter) vs. Rusev (w/Lana)- 5/10
Rusev wins by count-out, despite being in the Patriot Act a lot. After the match he put Swagger in the Accolade which I thought was a mistake because having Swagger get destroyed doesn’t help set up for a rematch the way it would if they just had Rusev narrowly escape and win by count-out. I was also left wondering why the referee didn’t reverse his decision and DQ Rusev.

DUST-DUST PROMO- they only way this works is if the result is Cody turning on Goldust and saying “I was weird just for you and it didn’t help us win” or something like that. Either way, for the intervening period, it is intolerable.

SETH ROLLINS DEMANDS TO BE DECLARED THE WINNER BY FORFEIT- Then he gets jumped by Ambrose on his way to the back. Security tried to pull him off, but when they eventually succeeded, Rollins attacked Ambrose.
This really didn’t feel like it belonged on a PPV.

CHRIS JERICHO vs. BRAY WYATT (w/the Wyatt Family)- 6.75/10
Jericho wins clean in the first match of the feud. Not a good sign for Bray.

ROLLINS LEAVES THE ARENA- he tells security he doesn’t need their help. Okay… but why is the guy with the MITB briefcase leaving this early? And especially now that Ambrose is finally out of his way!
Rollins did a good job of playing up the paranoia, and he should have been paranoid because Dean was apparently somehow hiding in the trunk of Rollins’ car. They brawled. If I ordered this show on PPV and not the WWE Network, I'd be pretty annoyed right now.

20 MAN BATTLE ROYALE FOR THE VACANT WWE INTERCONTINENTAL TITLE- 6.5/10
A lot of good stuff here. I really loved the little story they told with Kofi and Cesaro. That was some CRAZY stuff. Speaking of Cesaro, if I gave you 18 guesses, you would never guess who eliminated him from this battle royale.
Sheamus and Ziggler had a great little mini-match at the end. Miz won in great heel fashion, though I don’t understand why. If you want to unify the titles at Summer Slam, Miz vs. Sheamus is a program that doesn’t need the titles, as it already has a built-in payoff of Sheamus kicking Miz’s face off with the Brogue kick. It would have made a lot more sense to put the IC Title on someone else and have Miz screw Sheamus out of the US Title in the build-up to Summer Slam so that you get two big matches for Summer Slam instead of one.

FATAL FOUR WAY MATCH FOR THE WWE WORLD HEAVYWEIGHT TITLE: John Cena(c) vs. Roman Reigns vs. Randy Orton vs. Kane- 7.25/10
Loud "DANIEL BRYAN!" chants. The crowd seemed to be a lot more pro-Cena than usual (although the Cena dislike has spread to Asia now as well, because that sign in Hebrew said the equivalent of “how much more John Cena do we have to take?”). The match was very good (especially Kane-Orton stuff), but it hit the point where it felt like overkill.

On the post-show, the Usos made Renee Young shout “Ohhhh!” I’m just reporting the facts.

This certainly wasn’t a bad show from WWE, as one you made it to the main show, almost everything was very good… but there very little that was more than just “very good” either. There was nothing that made you feel like it was worth going out of your way to see this show for those who didn’t order it. In the grand scheme of things, it will probably be remembered the way most people looked at it going in: a filler PPV.

Join this review's conversation in the discussion board