Eight hours of Wrestlemania this weekend, and I could only bring myself to watch one match – CM Punk defending whichever of the WWE world titles was his against Roman Reigns, the former Georgia Tech nose tackle Joe Anoa’i.
That one match, it was good*.
The asterisk there: the finish was flatter than store-brand diet cola.
Nobody, not even Punk and Reigns, know how to end a match on a high note anymore.
But until that awkward closing sequence, Punk-Reigns was what pro wrestling can be at its best – two top guys trading actual wrestling holds and counters, sequences with attempted submissions and near-tapouts, a flurry of finishers and kick-outs.
There was one noticeable mistake in the leadup to the pinfall – Reigns used the ring steps on Punk right in front of the referee, which should have resulted in a DQ.
Another sequence, in which Punk distracted the ref by throwing a piece of tape at Reigns, leading the ref to pick up the tape, turn his back on the action for a brief moment, allowing Punk to nut-shot Reigns ahead of hitting him with his finisher, the GTS, was done the way it was supposed to be done.
Cheating is encouraged in pro wrestling; just don’t do it right there in front of the ref.
We want to suspend our disbelief; not make it hard on us.
My issue with the finish: Reigns hit Punk with a spear, one of his finishers, and got the three-count, after Punk had kicked out of several other more convincing-looking impact moves.
The crowd didn’t seem to catch on right away that the match was over, judging by the shockingly quiet response to a world title changing hands in the main event of a Wrestlemania.
Cagematch readers gave the match – which ran 33:56, bell to bell – an 8.94 rating, the highest of the two nights of WM42.
The strong finish led to a Cagematch rating for Night 2 at 6.66, up from the 2.79 that was given to Night 1, which was headlined by the Cody Rhodes-Randy Orton match for the other WWE world title that was tainted by the move by TKO to insert ESPN squawker Pat McAfee and MAGA country-music star Jelly Roll into the proceedings.
That match, which saw Rhodes retain in 22:44, got a 3.97 rating.
For me, I can now return to the world of lapsed WWE fan until Wrestlemania 43, assuming they can do something in the walkup to the Saudi Arabia show to get me to watch my one match a year.
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Chris Graham
