Seriously, 18 seconds? Did management not see how over Daniel Bryan was with the crowd? I lost my shit when I saw the entire front row of people with the YES! signs, and I had high hopes for an entertaining opening match. But for the second year in a row, apparently Sheamus vs. Daniel Bryan just isn’t meant to be a Wrestlemania match. It was completely removed from the card last year, and this year it’s made the opening match, and ended in 18 seconds. Kind of absurd, and it makes me wonder what Daniel Bryan did to get such an unceremonious job.
But whatever. In spite of the Daniel Bryan jobbing, Wrestlemania was still an okay show. Granted, it’s never been about the show as much as it’s always been about the gathering of friends, but when I think back to the show as a whole, it wasn’t the best, but it wasn’t terrible either. As always, it’s more fun to analyze the crowd, pick out entertaining signs, and criticize the people in the front row than it is to watch the wrestling sometimes.
My predictions though, man, did I whiff on most of the night.
- WRONG – Daniel Bryan jobs to Sheamus in 18 seconds. Still baffled to why this was, I guess we’ll find out in coming weeks.
- WRONG – Kane beats Randy Orton. I seriously did not see this coming, since Kane is the consummate company guy that always does the job. But I was pleasantly surprised, because Randy Orton, well sucks.
- RIGHT – Big Show beats Cody Rhodes for the Intercontinental Title. One, there was no way Big Show was losing this, after the months of torment over his years of jobbing. Two, Cody’s ready to step into the main event picture, likely to be amongst the first of Sheamus’ challengers.
- RIGHT – Maria Menounous and Kelly Kelly beat Beth Phoenix and Eve. The best part of this match was demanding everyone present with a Twitter account to suddenly make #skidmarks #wrestlemania trend world wide
- RIGHT – Undertaker defeats Triple H, goes 20-0 at Wrestlemania. Despite my beliefs that The Kliq would be the rightful ones to screw Undertaker out of the STEAK, it’s really surprise that the Undertaker won either. If there has been anyone over the span of the last 20 years that could possibly command and have more respect of the entire pro wrestling industry, it’s the Undertaker, and the elder statesman who long preceded both Triple H and Shawn Michaels (his singles emergence), deservingly comes out on top.
- RIGHT – Team Johnny beats Team Teddy’s troup of jobbers plus Booker T. Disappointing, was not enough Otunga. Gratifying, was correctly predicting the involvement of Eve in the outcome of the match, and seeing the overrated Zack Ryder doing the job, to the Miz.
- WRONG – CM Punk beats Chris Jericho, retains WWE Title. I’m glad I was wrong. I’m kind of over Chris Jericho, and he would have been a boring champion. Now the door is wide open for him to get burnt out again by SummerSlam, although I’m betting he gets another run as Intercontinental Champion, and/or feuds with Sheamus or Randy Orton on his way out.
- WRONG – The Rock beats John Cena. Now this was the biggest whiff of them all, considering I would have legitimately bet money that it would have gone the other way around. I guess either the WWE felt way too many people though like I did, and really wanted to turn the screws, or they legitimately have a grandiose idea that is bigger than Wrestlemania in the works, that really needs both The Rock and John Cena. Sadly, I’m led to believe that it’s the former, and that within the next two months, John Cena will get some credibility-killing measure of redemption against The Rock, and The Rock will vanish after SummerSlam, likely along with Chris Jericho’s next burnout.
Overall, I was a cool .500, going 4-4 in my predictions. But the magnitude of getting the Rock/Cena one wrong probably tips it to an overall loss, at least how I see it. I’m still baffled by it, considering The Rock winning serves no purpose to the company unless he is legitimately going to stick around for a significant amount of time, which I don’t believe he will since he’s a movie star. And I’m also still baffled at the super-job that Daniel Bryan had to do, and it makes me sad – the more Daniel Bryan’s gimmick fades, the sooner there will be less and eventually no more AJ Lee on television.
