One night removed from an excitement-filled NXT TakeOver (which will be a tough act to follow), we have the 30th edition of Survivor Series. We have a couple titles on the line, interspersed with a few traditional Survivor Series bouts. And, oh yea-Brock Lesnar against the returning Bill Goldberg. Should be another fun night from Toronto, so let’s dive right in, shall we?
Best Match of the night:
The inner geek in me geeked out for Goldberg over Lesnar. But no.
No, this one belongs to the SmackDown versus RAW, five on five elimination match, won by Team SmackDown. This match was pretty strong. Long match, lots of crazy spots and plenty of action. Very easy choice for me on this one.
Worst match of the night:
In terms of expected duration? That would be the main event.
In terms of expected quality? I wanted more out of the Cruiserweight match. I was annoyed Corbin interfered, and while I guess perhaps it’s a way to get him more heat, it was a baffling choice. I get it, he and Kalisto have had issues, but if Corbin “wasn’t well enough to be on Team SmackDown”, then he shouldn’t have been on the show. But, since he was on the show, people can already begin to say “wait, what the heck, why ever bother putting Corbin on if you never actually wanted him on the team”.
Crowd Chants of the Night:
New Day rocks
He’s got kids
Cesaro
Holy sh!@
Ellsworth! Ellsworth!
Y2J
Stupid idiot
Shane O Mac.
Roman sucks
Wake up Roman
This is awesome
Let’s go SmackDown
Goldberg
Star of the Night
I have to give consideration to two guys I never expected to be mentioned here.
1-Ellsworth, because the mascot played a huge part in eliminating Braun Strowman.
2-Shane McMahon, for taking more punishment than anyone should, and dishing out a great amount, too.
I’d say, in total, the stars of the night would be the victorious men’s SmackDown Live team.
Spot of the Night:
Slater with a stage dive type leap from the top rope onto scores of bodies on the outside.
Jordan, performing an overhead suplex on his own mate, Gable, launching him to the outside onto a similar score of bodies.
Sheamus cutting off an Uso going for the superkick with a Brogue kick, allowing Team RAW to win the tag team Survivor Series match.
Strowman caught AJ while attempting a Phenomenal Forearm, and then easily heaved the World Champion over the top rope. Yikes.
McMahon. Top rope. Through Strowman AND the announce table.
Shane, sort of going for his coast to coast leap on Reigns, gets Roman’s spear instead. Now, watching instant replay? It looked a lot more obvious Shane wasn’t landing that move in a positive fashion, but it was still an awesome spot.
Orton with a wicked RKO on Rollins, as Seth was attempting a frog splash on Bray.
Jobber of the Night:
Generally speaking, there wasn’t one. However, since he did get to play the role of human lawn dart, I figure it’s fine to put Ellsworth in here. I mean, that spot was done with him in mind, right? That’s why it happened. No one else was taking that bump tonight. He had a job to do, and the mascot did it.
I give a nod too, to Brock Lesnar. Yes, Lesnar. Why? Because someone in the back told him: Brock, you are going out there. We are paying you a boatload of cash. You are going to be destroyed by Goldberg. Not just lose to him, but literally get in all of one move. Go do your job.
And, that’s exactly what happened.
Upset of the Night:
Not so much that Goldberg won. But that Goldberg beat Lesnar handily and with all of what, four moves? Not four moves in repitition. Four moves total. A shove, two spears and a Jackhammer.
Bill Goldberg, gone for 12 years, made Lesnar look like a jobber.
Now, we can (and will) debate the logic of this, in terms of whether it impacts how Lesnar gets booked. Or if this was WWE’s way of reigning in The Beast.
Either way? Wow. Never expected that at all.
Holy Sh** Moment of the Night:
Charlotte attacks Bayley, just moments after the pair were victorious as the remaining members of Team RAW.
Kalisto, from the ring apron to the floor, nailing a Spanish Fly on Brian Kendrick. It’s here, not under spot of the night, because even the crowd chanted for it.
Ambrose, after being eliminated early on, comes back to get revenge on AJ Styles. Security pulls him away, and his former Shield mates free him from their clutches and we have a Shield reunion, putting Styles through a ringside table. Go figure.
Lesnar got no offense in. Match over in less than five minutes. This was, quite possibly, WWE’s version of Tyson-Spinks.
Botch of the night:
Was a botched spot or two in the women’s Survivor Series match
Kalisto had a bad landing on a move, but being as agile as he is, he actually masked it rather well and made a quick recovery.
Cole yelled out RAW wins, after Wyatt pinned Reigns. Oops.
Commentary of the night:
There’s a fine line between madness and genius and Brian Kendrick dances on it.
He’s a good mascot.
No he’s not, but he’s ours, so we defend him.
Never thought I’d see the night, John, where you were rooting for Dean Ambrose.
Neither did I.
Our mascot just beat your monster.
Braun Strowman, throwing human beings for distance.
Rollins and Reigns doing a little redecorating at ringside, and it’s not going to look good for Orton.
LOL Moment of the night:
It’s like the Battle of the Bulge, but I’m not talking about Kevin Owens’ stomach. I did LOL at that, but I am also in shock that someone in the back allowed that line to be uttered. Or, it wasn’t cleared, and Otunga won’t have a job for long.
Ellsworth prevented Strowman from climbing back into the ring. That was funny. Everything that happened after? Was not funny for Ellsworth.
Noteworthy Moment:
The Cruiserweight division remains on RAW, thanks to Baron Corbin (from SmackDown) costing his brand a shot at the division.
What on Earth did we just see from Lesnar and Goldberg. Wow. Unexpected match, to say the least. Either we will see a rematch at ‘Mania, or this will just baffle me. Wow.
Overall lowlights:
I don’t know why, but the pacing bugged me tonight. On one hand, I have gotten annoyed when there’s a long over-run, mostly because I have to get up for work in the morning and I had been used to PPV fading to black before 11pm. Tonight? Tonight the show ended at 10:30PM, after a very brief main event. Felt like WWE should have had one more match squeezed in, if they couldn’t or wouldn’t book Brock and Bill to run longer than 5 minutes.
I do remember, way back when, when these shows had more of the 4v4 or 5v5 matches, and less of the video packages. I miss those. As good as the matches were, if you trim down the hype reels a bit (because, you know, if we are seeing them, we’ve already paid for the subscription), you could have more matches. Also, if you didn’t have to delay things to set up for, and then tear down from, the “special” Cruiserweight Division ring setup, you’d save time too.
Overall highlights:
Crazy spots out of most of the Survivor Series matches especially. The men’s one was insane, and it chewed up most of the 9pm hour. Spots were nuts, action was intense, and we know The Undertaker will be happy knowing that his beloved SmackDown Live won the match.As stunned as I am with the main event, the inner mark in me was thrilled because it was just cool seeing Goldberg back and dominant.
After the final bell:
Wow. This show did not go at all as I expected. We had no issues between Shane and Brock, thus no setup for what I was sure was coming at WrestleMania. Now, of course, we can still see those two clash in several month’s time…but I, as well as others, had expected tonight to be the night when the fuse got re-lit.
Shane McMahon continues to look better than he has any right to look. James Ellsworth with a colossal helper.
I get it, in two weeks we have the SmackDown exclusive TLC, but did we really need the infighting? I suppose that’s one thing I can say I miss from the old school Survivor Series matches. Outside of the occasional spat (Owen/Hart Family…), for the most part the four or five man teams all got along. Tonight, it was all about strange bedfellows. It worked for the most part, but was sort of odd seeing Team SmackDown boil over and be directly responsible for not one, but two eliminations of it’s own men.
When it was 8:30 and we only had three matches left, I knew one was going to run long (the main Survivor Series match). But I expected the other two to run longer too. I was wrong.
I think people are going to dissect the Goldberg/Lesnar booking for a while. On the one hand, Lesnar is Lesnar, so somehow this won’t damage him as a monster heel. But, at the same time, it has to present like a chink in the armor. There’s a man out there, Bill Goldberg, whom Brock Lesnar has never beaten in a professional wrestling match. And, as much as the first one was an utter trainwreck, this one was notable for a different reason. Four moves and done. Five, if you count Brock’s sole offensive burst. Is Goldberg really done? Was someone within WWE sending a message for the rumored frustration with Lesnar at times, like from the Orton bloodbath at SummerSlam? Or was this just someone in Creative saying, ya know what, let’s have one guy who’s been retired 12 years, totally dominate our part-time Beast? We don’t know yet, and perhaps we won’t know ever. I believe something will come out soon enough, but there’s more to this one, one way or another.
