“Football, eh? Bloody hell…” – Sir Alex Ferguson, lost for words, after Manchester United snatched the 1999 Champions League final from Bayern Munich in the final seconds of injury time.
“Summerslam, eh? Bloody hell…” – Duckman, lost for words, after watching Summerslam 2014 on the WWE Network for just $9.99.
I’m assuming that by now you’ve all watched Summerslam. I’m also assuming that you’ve read enough opinion pieces on the show, and in particular the main event, to last you a lifetime. Well, you’ve got one more to go. Don’t worry, I’ll try to make it fun.
Every week I sit down and try to think of something interesting to write about. Every week I struggle. I don’t want to be one of those people who write the same stuff as everyone else. Unless, of course, it’s Grant Cook. If it’s Grant, I’ll copy the shit out of whatever he writes.
The main event of Summerslam made me want to write. In fact, it made me feel like I needed to write. That doesn’t happen often these days. For once, I didn’t have to force myself to fire up the laptop and then sit for an hour staring at the wall, trying to find new and entertaining ways to complain about WWE’s commentary team. Brock vs. Cena happened and that gave me plenty of inspiration and excitement about what the future may hold for WWE.
Whatever your opinion of Brock, Cena or indeed Summerslam as a whole, there can be no argument that it was a true once in a lifetime experience. And I’m not talking about those Cena vs. Rock once in a lifetime experiences, which actually happen twice in your lifetime. Of course that’s assuming you didn’t die between Wrestlemania 28 and 29. If you did, it was literally only once in your lifetime. So at least WWE didn’t lie to you, not that you’d know.
Brock Lesnar vs. John Cena was a match, the likes of which no WWE fan has ever seen. That’s not an exaggeration. I have been watching WWE since the late 80s and I’ve never seen a WWE Title match – on any PPV – that compares in any way to Cena vs. Brock.
No matter the era, no matter the star, no matter the politics involved backstage, no matter the setting or the stakes, no true top WWE star has ever been so comprehensively destroyed in a high profile WWE Title match the way John Cena was at Summerslam.
The number one guy in WWE, the top man, the franchise player, the hood ornament, the merch shifting messiah, was effectively squashed and destroyed like a jort wearing jobber and left for dead in front of an audience that witnessed the arrival of the REAL Brock Lesnar. No matter how you cut it, that’s a big fucking deal.
Before I get into why this match and finish was so brilliantly booked and so effective, I want to give kudos to both WWE and John Cena.
WWE get credit because they finally did something unexpected with John Cena – they used his star power to legitimately solidify the superstar push of someone else. Sorry Bray, maybe next time.
John Cena gets extra credit and a lifetime membership to the Chiropractors Association of America (he’s going to need it) because he agreed to do something no other top guy in WWE history has ever done – be exposed as weak, ineffective and ultimately just completely out of his depth with a monster heel in a World Title match. You would never have seen Hogan, Bret, HBK, Austin or Rock do what Cena did at Summerslam. That says a lot about him and his understanding of the business and what his role now is in WWE. He’s not the King anymore, it’s time for him to be the King maker.
Brock vs. Cena was very similar to the debut of Big Van Vader in 1987 against the top guy in NJPW from the mid-1970s to the early 1990s, Antonio Inoki. In fact Inoki is more than that – he’s a cultural icon and one of the most famous sportsmen in the history of Japan.
In that match Vader, making his NJPW debut, utterly destroyed Inoki in violent and brutal fashion, pinned him inside 5 minutes and ended his four year winning streak. The finish lead to a riot from NJPW fans, that resulted in the promotion being banned from Sumo Hall in Tokyo for a year.
In less than five minutes, Inoki made Vader a star in Japan for the next twenty years. The match was one of the most impactful of all time and is celebrated as one of the most historic matches in the storied history of New Japan Pro Wrestling.
The match is also famous for Lou Thesz pulling Inoki aside and telling him he was proud of him. In his eyes Inoki had gone from being a wrestler, to being a businessman. It was the right time and the right opponent and when Inoki did the right thing, he made Vader into an instant, money drawing star.
Inoki putting over Vader in the fashion he did would earn NJPW and the UWFi millions of dollars for years after the match. A famous series between Vader and ‘shoot’ wrestling star Nobuhiko Takada in the UWFi in the early 90s, resulted in crowds of over 50,000 fans selling out baseball stadiums to see them clash.
People came to see the monster Vader, the man who humbled Antonio Inoki and dominated NJPW, wreak more havoc and pain on his next victim (opponent). When Takada did finally beat him, he became one of the biggest draws in the history of Japanese wrestling and eventually ushered in the era of PRIDE FC and the boom in MMA in Japan in the late 90s/early 2000s.
What made Vader vs. Inoki and Lesnar vs. Cena so special was that they both made the heel appear dangerous, unstoppable, violent and most importantly of all – real. We all know it’s not actually real, but if they don’t keep giving us reminders that it’s fake, and actually present something as serious and real, we’ll eat it up with both hands and ask for more.
I watched Summerslam with my brother. We both sat open mouthed – and at times audibly wincing – as Brock spent a little over 15 minutes completely destroying Cena and laughing off his attempts at comebacks. My brother was squirming in his seat as Cena landed time and time again on the back of his head after another scary German suplex from Brock.
When the match was over, we both agreed we’d never seen anything like it in a WWE World Title match. We were actually stunned by what we’d seen. Just like when Brock beat Taker at WM30, it took a few moments to actually process what we’d witnessed. It was a completely unprecedented piece of booking by WWE, complemented by great performances from Cena and Brock.
Some Cena fans complained that the beating Cena took, with such ineffective comebacks, was boring and hurt Cena. These people don’t understand what WWE were doing with this match and how well they executed their plan. For the first time in a decade, John Cena passed the torch. Actually, he didn’t pass the torch, he had it ripped from his grasp and rammed up his ass.
The finish was a thing of beauty:
Brock has killed Cena for the whole match. He’s kicked out of the AA, he’s laughed off Cena’s strikes. He’s hit him with 16 German suplexes, brutal knees, elbows and punches. Somehow Cena gets the STF on and for the first time in FOREVER he has it locked in tight, he’s really got it hooked and he’s cranking the shit out of Brock’s face. It’s the move that HHH tapped out to. It’s the move that has won him countless matches. Brock fights the move for 30 seconds or so, then just gets pissed off, rolls over into the full mount, rains down more brutal punches and elbows, drags Cena up and F-5s him into the mat for the pin.
It was like Brock just went, “ok, I’ve toyed with this mouse for a while and he almost got away, time to kill him.” And then he did.
Perfection.
In the eyes of the smarks and the Cena haters, this moment was long overdue. In fact most hardcore smarks must have felt like it was their Christmas, Birthday and the day they lost their virginity (a date in the future for most, or one that will never actually happen) all rolled into one.
This was a celebratory, public and humiliating beating of the man who many feel has been a blight on WWE for years. Someone who is beyond stale and needed to move aside. It must’ve felt like after all those years of bitching and crying about Cena, someone finally listened. This was the moment they wanted and amazingly WWE and Cena gave it to them. Savour it nerds, you won’t get a moment like that again.
It’s taken WWE nearly two years but it appears they’ve finally worked out how to book Brock Lesnar in 2014. Brock is not a regular WWE superstar. He won’t be on Twitter promoting his feuds. He won’t be at autograph signings or public appearances. He won’t be lined up on the stage, like a school kid at assembly, the next time Hogan has a birthday party. He won’t bow down to HHH or Steph on TV. He won’t plug the fucking network. He’s different. He’s special. He’s an attraction. He’s scary. He’s legitimate. He’s a Champion. He’s everything a true top guy in wrestling used to be.
The WWE Title used to be the most sought after prize in all of wrestling. It used to mean something and it used to draw. Those days felt like they were long past and would never return. The WWE Title has been devalued for years, with wrestlers becoming WWE Champion on a rotation basis. You didn’t win the Title because you were the biggest draw, it just felt like now it’s Orton’s turn again, let’s see if this run works. It was the WWE equivalent of the “medal for participation” at a school sports day. That was until Summerslam.
With Brock as WWE Champion everything about the WWE Title and the way the Champion is presented changes. Now it’s not a case of a heel Champion defending the Title and escaping with it by the skin of his teeth – which has long been WWE’s formula for their heel Champion.
Now it’s a case of a heel Champion, who is utterly dominant and destructive, who holds the World Title and it’s up to the challenger to slay the monster and TAKE the World Title from him. That psychology is completely different for WWE and it has endless potential to make a true star out of the man who beats Brock for the WWE Title.
With Brock’s schedule it’s obvious he’s not going to be defending the WWE Title at every PPV. He certainly won’t appear on RAW every week. This is a good thing. Remember, Brock is an attraction, he’s special, he’s a once in a generation kind of athlete. You think Usain Bolt turns up to every 100m event? You think Ronda Rousey fights on every UFC show? Did Michael Phelps take part in every swim meet on the schedule? Nope.
These people are like Brock. They’re different from all their peers. They’re better. They are elite athletes who perform on the biggest stages, in front of the biggest crowds, at the most important events. There’s a reason for that. It’s because when they compete people pay to watch.
Brock’s track record as a money draw is there for all to see. He’s the only man in history, other than Mike Tyson, to headline two events in one year that drew more than 1 million PPV buys apiece. When he went to UFC he increased their PPV audience by over 25%. When he came back to WWE at Extreme Rules in 2012, he increased the buy rate from the previous year by 23%. Brock Lesnar, when booked and utilised correctly, is a mainstream star who can draw big money.
And what about the man who took 16 of the most painful looking German suplexes ever executed in a WWE ring? What about the man who for a decade has dominated WWE in a way that few others ever have? For John Cena, the future isn’t quite so clear right now, but the possibilities are endless. In the short term Cena’s taken a big hit, but in the long term it could be the shot in the arm that his character has needed for at least five years.
John Cena was Superman. At Summerslam Superman died. The Hulk smashed him to pieces. Like all good heroes, he’ll be back. The question is whether he’ll be the same man when he returns. Could Cena come back as a different man? A former top star who now realises that he isn’t the top dog anymore and someone has taken his place. Does he try to fight his way back to the top? Does he maintain his never give up attitude and try to slay the monster? He could, but I hope he doesn’t.
There has never been a better time to turn John Cena heel than right now. The loss to Brock could be the catalyst for the most overdue heel turn in recent WWE history. I mean, if that kind of beating doesn’t change John Cena’s character, nothing will and we should all just give up on the notion of him ever turning heel.
Imagine how much more interesting Cena would be if the loss to Brock broke him. Imagine how great it would be if Cena turned on the fans for cheering Brock killing him. Imagine how much mileage they could get out of Cena finally snapping and dropping the goody two shoes act that sells t-shirts but pisses off large sections of the fan base. Think of the fresh matches a heel Cena would give WWE.
That’s what was so great about Summerslam and the main event in particular – the possibilities for the future are open ended. In one night WWE took the stale and boring Cena and either turned him into a martyr for Brock, or they planted the first seed for the John Cena heel run that we’ve all been crying out for. Maybe it’s just me, but it feels like there’s some long term and big picture thinking going on in WWE for the first time in a long time. It’s amazing how easy and great wrestling booking can be when you don’t change your mind every 30 seconds.
In a perfect world, Daniel Bryan would return from injury at the Royal Rumble, win it and then be defeated by Brock at WM31. The following year at Summerslam (which is rumoured to be at Met Life Stadium) could be the coronation of Roman Reigns as THE MAN in WWE. He beats Brock and is then set for feuds with Bryan, maybe a heel Cena? A big return match with Brock at WM32? Again, there’s so many possible directions this could go in during the next couple of years.
As for the rest of Summerslam? I thought it was a great show. A strong 9/10. We had great matches, mostly with clean finishes, surprising Title changes, only one stupid skit, the crowd were red hot, the right people won, there’s new feuds coming out of the show and some of the newer talent really got a chance to shine with Paige, Wyatt, Rusev, Reigns, Rollins and Ambrose all having good to great matches. There’s not much else you can ask for from a WWE PPV in 2014.
Summerslam, eh? Bloody hell.
Time to wrap this up with some plugs. Remember, you can follow me on Twitter @MFXDuckman. You can also listen to me each week on the MFX Podcast, where each week I and my partner-in-crime Sir Ian Trumps take an alternative and highly amusing look at the week in WWE and TNA.
We’ve just recently celebrated 100 episodes and MFX101 will be up this week with our review of Summerslam and so much more. Check the show out on the MFX page here or over at www.mfxpodcast.com.
Well, that’ll do for this week and this is probably the last article you’ll see from me for a few weeks. Next week my younger brother Martin (who I watched Summerslam with) is going into hospital to have a brain tumour removed. It’s been a really scary, emotional and downright shitty time for him and my whole family in recent months.
It’s basically the worst news you could hear about a family member, especially someone who you are incredibly close to. My brother is my best mate and I love him with all my heart, so to see him going through this has been like waking up and realising your new prison cell mate is Brock Lesnar and he’s hungry for love. Scary and painful.
All joking aside, we’ve had to pull together as a family and support my brother in any way we can. If that means no articles or podcasts for a while, then that’s what will happen. Thankfully his surgeon is very confident of removing the tumour and with it Mart’s sight (which he’s lost most of) should come back.
He has a long recovery and possibly a life time of treatment ahead of him, but he’s remaining strong, positive and facing this shitty hand that life has dealt him head on. I’ve never been prouder of him. So if you’re reading this, please send some positive vibes to Mart and hopefully I’ll be back soon with good news.
As always, thanks for reading and be sure to keep supporting all the great people that make SLTD the top site it is.
Until next time…
Peace
Duckman
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