It's kinda strange to see the order of
how things took place at Sacramento, California, during the staging
of the WWE's second Smackdown Live-exclusive pay-per-view event
called WWE No Mercy. They kicked off with a main event and end the
night with a supposedly-main event show but seemingly not enough to
be tagged as one.
Yes, it all started with the WWE World Championship triple threat match between AJ Styles, Dean Ambrose and John Cena. And while everyone has paid their dues well in the match, it either sent a message to RAW to set the pace higher or just degraded the quality of this championship.
Perhaps, it's more of the competition
angle; to think that SD Live has been running wild since
Battleground.
And funny how Styles retorted to a
chair to finish the event; says a lot storytelling-wise. Plus the
segment where both Cena and Ambrose made Styles tapped but wasn't
declared a finish might say there is more to this feud after the
evening.
Nikki Bella defeated Carmella in what
has been a sweet revenge for the former since returning to the WWE
after SummerSlam. I think this us what a fitting comeback should've
ever been. The problem is that she was also one of the hopefuls for
the women's championship so that return-with-a-bang story was pushed
a bit off-and-later.
But at least she stayed fearless and
with a better finisher – the rack attack 2.0! (Earlier before the screenshot above, though.)
Heath Slater and Rhyno still being the
tag team champions means they might build The Usos as the show's
perennial heels in the tag team division. At least, they are taking
the beauty and the man-beast very seriously. But you have to wonder:
what's next for them – especially for Heath?
Not a bad match at all.
Once again, Baron Corbin was on top of
the game in this duel with Jack Swagger. And it's no surprise at all,
with the former's submission loss to the latter during that Smackdown
Live episode. He is poised to be the bigger threat in this show soon,
though Swag still has it.
Dolph Ziggler is an obvious handpicked
winner in this career versus title match against
then-Intercontinental Champion The Miz. No way he's gonna retire soon
no matter how many social media “farewell” posts to hype
everything up.
Still, these two has made everything in
the script as believable as it gets. They should've been put in the
main event spot. With the back-and-forth action,
counter-after-counter, outside-the-squared circle shenanigans that
eventually led to ejections, man, is there anything that displayed
beautiful storytelling than Dolph Ziggler and The Miz?
No question: Match of the evening; and
more importantly – at the honor roll for 2016!
And perhaps, more of the Daniel
Bryan-Miz feud coming. This is just the first wave no matter how many
you have seen them argue in months. Heck, it may be a new star or
just Zig as champ as the second unit.
While Becky Lynch was declared
out-of-action for the evening, I had a strange feeling that Alexa
Bliss has been taken a step back (if not buried) by Naomi in their
impromptu match. Hey, I thought she was supposed to be the top
contender for the woman's division? And are we seeing Naomi doing the
foil just weeks after her formal face turn?
That seems confusing to me. And the
ample time given them to wrestle made them literally a bathroom break
match by length. You're lucky if you hadn't go to the loo that time
to see how Alexa Bliss could be a foil to Lynch once their title
match takes place. But again, while she exhibits her strength, the
loss was a shocker yet bummer.
Bray Wyatt defeated Rany Orton is a
somewhat short-but-supposedly-swift storytelling match in the main
event. Their mind games speaks for the the PPV name itself. The
problem is it felt lacking at some point no matter how many counter
they try to take.
And I think the RKO attempt-into-a-Luke
Harper appearance just salvaged the match at its entirety.
No Mercy was a solid good show. But I
guess experimentation on booking hasn't really done totally good on
this. They pre-hyped everything with a world title match, injected
the much main event deserving contest midway, and a main event that
made me felt off for a while – mostly.
May be unconventional conpated to the
typical McMahonish (as Romeo Moran of Smark Henry describes it) but
has taken another inch (just a thin one) higher than Clash of
Champions.
The Verdict: 7.1
Author: slickmaster | © 2016 september twenty-eight productions
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