Results:

  • Jeff Hardy def. Cesrao – Pre-show
  • New Day (c) def. Lucha House Party, Miz & Morrison, and Forgotten Sons to retain the SmackDown Tag Team Championships
  • Bobby Lashley def. R-Truth
  • Bayley (c) def. Tamina to retain the SmackDown Women’s Championship
  • Braun Strowman (c) def. Bray Wyatt to retain the Universal Championship
  • Drew McIntyre (c) def. Seth Rollins to retain the WWE Championship
  • Asuka wins the Women’s Money in the Bank match
  • Otis wins the Men’s Money in the Bank match

Three Thoughts:

Otis & Asuka Survive Mayhem

WWE is knocking it out of the park with their cinematic presentations. The Money in the Bank matches involved wrestlers making their way up Titan Towers to the roof to pick up the briefcase. Before we get to the winners, here are some highlights:

  • Brother Love, John Laurinitis, Paul Heyman, Doink, Stephanie McMahon and Vince McMahon all had cameos. Vince’s was the best, with Styles and Bryan wrestling into his office which has a dinosaur skull on the wall.
  • A food fight broke out.
  • King Corbin may have committed two murders, throwing Aleister Black and Rey Mysterio off of the roof.

The Women’s Match ended first. It was Asuka who managed to outlast Nia Jax & Lacey Evans (the other two women on the roof) to secure the briefcase. Asuka will make a wonderful Ms. Money in the Bank, and I can’t wait to see her antics increase.

The Men’s match had a finish involving Styles, Corbin and Otis. Styles and Corbin both had the briefcase, and Elias appeared and his Corbin with a guitar shot to the back. That put the briefcase in Styles hands for just a second before he dropped it. It landed in the waiting arms of Otis, giving us Otis as Mr. Money in the Bank. WWE has a tall task to make Otis a believable contender to Braun Strowman, but I am ready for the ride.

Braun Out-Brays Bray

We had a feeling that the match between Braun Strowman and Bray Wyatt was going to get weird at some point. It got weird at lots of points. Bray was not in his Fiend gear, instead wrestling as his friendly self. His puppets were at ringside to cheer him on from the stands. Wyatt had lots of control in this match, leading to Strowman putting on the old Wyatt Family black sheep mask. That made Wyatt let his guard down, and it was a Powerslam for the win.

Strowman retaining makes sense, especially with the flickers of the Fiend we saw at the end. It looks like Wyatt will unleash the other side of his persona soon enough, and when he does we could get an even stranger sequel to this quality match.

Messiah Falls Short

In terms of wrestling quality, the match between Seth Rollins and Drew McIntyre was the best on the show. We knew these two could tear the house down, and the did just that. The most interesting things were before and after the match. Rollins debuted more “Messiah-like” entrance music. RIP to Burn It Down, one of the best themes of this generation.

After the hard fought match, McIntyre extended his hand in a show of respect to Rollins. In a surprise move, Rollins accepted the handshake. What this means going forward is anyone’s guess, but it is definitely intriguing.

Grade: A

Overall a fun show. This grade is boosted by the show being over at 9:25 pm. A run time of only 2.5 hours is all they needed to tell some compelling stories. The Money in the Bank match was cinematic fun, Rollins/McIntyre put on a clinic, and the opening 4-way tag was solid as well. Overall a great night of wrestling. Plus we got to see Vince’s office, so that’s a bonus.

One More Thing:

We had another hacker promo! If I’ve learned one thing from WWE, it is that we shouldn’t get our hopes up and it will probably be Hornswoggle.

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