WWE Extreme Rules

>

Still having Wrestlemania hangover? Well we get WWE's next pay-per-view installment Extreme Rules.

This show originated in 2005 as the rebirth of ECW in a magical show in New York that saw the Dudley Boyz beat Tommy Dreamer & Sandman. In the 2006 show RVD finally won the WWE title, this was the last show that trully had a ECW feel to it. The 07 show was a forgettable one, but 2008 was a solid one that gave us a great ladder match between Edge & Undertaker that I had the chance to see live at the San Diego Sports Arena.

I have always been impressed and interested what WWE offers us in relation to the production and setup for the show. Stages used to be unique for every show and not the same one every month with different logos. This is a picture of the stage from my seat

The ladder match had some awesome spots that ended with Edge throwing Undertaker off the ladder to the outside of the ring through 4 tables. This is one of the final extreme matches Edge had, he unfortunately had to retire this month because of his recurring neck injuries (for a Edge tribute blog go here)

The stipulation was that if Taker lost he would be banished, so we didn't get to see him for a few months until SummerSlam

So lets get into the matches announced for this Sundays show

Jerry Lawler & Jim Ross vs Michael Cole & Jack Swagger
I'll start off by saying that I'm sick of this feud, I have no interest whatsoever in Cole and usually end up changing the channel; the only good thing to come put of this is to have Jim Ross back on commentary, even if it is for a couple of months. Also finally Swagger is getting some TV time which hopefully gets him a further push after this ends.
I have no idea how this will end as I expected this to be blown off at Mania but noooooooooo, we get another month of it. I don't care who wins as long as it end; I expect King and JR to pick up the W with help from Swagger who in the process will turn face.
Lawler and JR pick up the win.

Cody Rhodes vs Rey Mysterio (Falls Count Anywhere Match)
I've been a fan of this feud from the get-go and was expecting someone to help get over Rhodes and Rey has been instrumental to get this done. Their Mania Match was a solid one that told a good story with the Dashing One picking up the win, therefore I expect Mr. 619 to get the W in this one to keep this feud going.
I hope they get 15-18 minutes to tell a good story, with Rey getting the win.

---SPOILER ALERT--- This match will be announced on SmackDown!
Michelle McCool vs Layla (Loser leaves Smackdown match)
I'll start off by saying I love LayCool and think they have been great in their role, whether McCool was given a head start because of her backstage relationship or not is irrelevant as she was given the ball and ran with it. Michelle has an injured foot so I guess this is a match that will be used to explain her absence, thus Layla will pick up the win (for the record, I find Layla to be the hottest diva today, her face, her body, her accent, THE WHOLE DAMN PACKAGE)
Layla wins this one in a 7-8 minute match.

Randy Orton vs CM Punk (Last Man Standing Match)
This feud has grown a bit stale even with 2 of the greatest SuperStars around. Orton will be moving to Smackdown and Punk is THE greatest heel in WWE today, bar none. With rumors going around that Punk won't resign with WWE this match may go his way to make him feel good, also a loss wouldn't hurt Orton as the people are really behind him.
I'm interested in seeing how violent the WWE allows this guys to be, no need for huge spots but some use of weapons could help the match and accentuate how sadistic both guys are -in their own way-.
Punk wins in a 23 minute (sounds like a good wish) show-stealing match

Alberto del Rio vs Christian in a Ladder Match for the WHC
This is quite a mystery and hard to call as we have ADR going to RAW because of the Draft and if he wins he would take the title and have both titles on Monday Nights, yet he is so overdue to win this match and the crowd may lose faith in him if he doesn't pick up the W. On the other hand Christian is a solid performer but has never been see as Championship material by the office so -I'd love to see him finally get the title- it's hard to believe they will put the strap on him.
Regardless of the outcome I expect these 2 to put on a clinic -along with the Orton-Punk match- I expect this one to steal the show. I'll go out on a limb and pick a winner
Alberto Del Rio gets the W, not sure how they will manage the title after that but that's for creative to figure out.

John Cena vs John Morrison vs The Miz in a Triple Threat WWE title Match
For some reason I'm not real interested in this match although I like all 3 guys. Cena takes a bunch of crap from most fans but you have to respect his commitment and hard work, I mean the guy is on the road close to 300 days a year, does media appearances left and right, is a great performer and always gets a reaction. Morrison is one of the best wrestlers around, his parkour is amazing, he gets a great reaction from the crowd but for some reason (maybe it's Melina and the stuff backstage with Trish Stratus) WWE decides not to let him be a real top guy. And finally, The Miz; this guys is a perfect example of what hard work and fighting for what you believe in is all about, that package before his Wrestlemania still gives me chills and I think he is a role model for anyone to follow.
With that being said, I don't care for this match. I expect R-Truth (a guy I could care less about) to somehow mess with JoMo, that leaves us with Cena-Miz  which I'd love to end with Miz picking up the clean win but I find it hard to believe they will go with that.
A good thing about this is that the winner is hard to predict, which is a testament to the Miz growing as a believable character. No one believed he'd go past a couple of week as champ, but here he is after beating Orton a couple of times, Cena at Mania (all have been with help, but it means WWE believes in him and makes fans think he can win any match which adds to the product).
Winner: I want Miz, I expect Cena.

The storylines are not that interesting but we have some matches that have huge potential and could be some of the best this year.
Hope we get an entertaining 3 hours and our moneys worth; I'll be back on Sunday night for a review, for now...

Mr Khakbaz out!!!

2010 Royal Rumble Results

>The time is upon us, we are officially on the Road to Wrestlemania now that the 2011 Royal Rumble has kicked off from Boston, MA where over 15,000 members of the WWE Universe packed the Garden. After the usual video package and awesome pyro display we kick off the show.

As predicted, Edge vs Dolph Ziggler kicked off the show. Bell went of at 7:08 after Tony Chimel introduced the competitors; Edge started of dominating the match and after almost 5 minutes of kicking Ziggler outside he turned the tables and imposed his will. 10 minutes into the match Edge got the crowd behind him and started a comeback. ---WOW the crowd is HOT, hope they keep it up for the whole evening---
King, Cole and Striker keep playing on the No-Spear rule, which still has done nothing for me.They keep saying asking if he has some other manuever, the seem to forget he used to use the EdgeCution (Impaler DTT). Pretty nice cross-body into a rollover for a close pin by Ziggler. A small "Let's go Ziggler" chant breaks out 15 minutes into the match. Vickie slaps Edge a couple of times... that usually is a DQ but WWE fails to use the same rulebook every match. Out of nowhere Kelly attacks Vickie ??? yeah Im lost to...
After a brutally bad ref bump spot Edge hits the spear followed by The Unprettier for the win after 22 minutes. I had predicted 20 to 25 minutes for these two. Got my wish, but instead of letting the two guys in the ring do their thing, the matched focused more on Vickie which is quite a shame.

Next up we get Randy Orton challenging The Miz for the WWE Title. Orton is out first to a pretty good pop, he is followed by The Miz who is received with pretty good heat. Seriously I don't get WWE's point to push Michael Cole's fetish with the Miz, I hope it goes somewhere otherwise I've been getting pissed off by him a lot for nothing.
So the bell sounds at 7:43. Orton starts out dominating until Riley helps out the Miz ---Cole please shut the F*CK UP, he just gets XPac, change the channel heat--- pretty standard match with the usual stupid Striker quote "Miz working on Orton's midsection setting him up for the SKULL Crushing finale" yeah it makes no sense.
At 17 minutes a RKO is blocked into a Skull Crushing Finales that gets blocked into an Olympic Slam. Nexus makes their way to the ring only to get thrown down by a flying Riley, on the other side CM Punk hits the ring and get Orton up and delivers a GTS. Miz covers and gets the W to retain after 20 minutes. Not a bad match, but again the focus is more on the action of other people instead of the participants of the match. I'm with Dave Lagana #IWantWrestling.

So we can now take Punk out of the possible winners as he will be fighting Orton at Mania.

Up next we have the WWE Divas Title match with Lay-Cool take on Natalya in a 2-on-1 handicap match. Wait we get an Email from the RAW GM changing the match to a Fatal 4 Way adding Eve Torres to the mix. Marked out for the double Sharpshooter by Nattie on Layla and Eve. Pretty solid action by the 4 ladies (enjoy that the match focuses on the in-ring competitors unlike the other 2 matches). Nice Michinoku driver by Nattie and I find it sad that they make fun of Stiker for calling a move by it's name. After a double pin by Eve and Michelle with the ref focusing on Ms. Torres she gets the win and is crowned the New Divas Champion.

Unless they have a throw-in match, the Rumble is next!!!

The "By The Numbers" video package is pretty awesome, as always the WWE does a great job editing video montages... they are the best bar none.

The number 1 entrant is: CM Punk!
The number 2 entrant is: ---the whole Corre come out and surround the ring... a huge brawl breaks out! And we get an email from the GM.--- Daniel Bryan!!!
Dueling CM Punk and Daniel Bryan chants, as we get our first countdown.
3rd entrant: Justin Gabriel who goes after Punk, but is eliminated by Bryan.
4th entrant is: Zack Ryder. Only a minute to be eliminated by Bryan.
The 5th man in is: William Regal. Regal suplexing the crap out of Punk and Danielson. Uppercut fight between King and Daniel.
6th in is: Ted DiBiase. We now have for men in the ring for the first time tonight.
#7 is John Morrison. He pulls out an awesome C4 on Bryan. Regal is eliminated by Dibiase. Morrison pulled of some crazy shit, he was thrown out but grabbed on to the barricade and then jumped back to the ring steps (AMAZING!!!, and anything I say will not do it justice)
#8 is Yoshi Tatsu. 5 guys in the ring.
The 9th is Husky Harris. He sure comes to help out Punk
The 10th entrant is Chavo Guerrero! We are 25% into the entrants. Chavito now wearing boxer trunks. He pulls out the 3 amigos only to be stopped by Punk. Nice tribute to Eddie.
#11 is Mark Henry. Henry eliminates Chavito. Tatsu is thrown out by Henry.
12th man in is: JTG.
#13 is Michael McGuillicuty. He eliminates JTG. DiBiase is elminated by Mike and Husky
The 14th entrant is Chris Masters. 
The number 15 entrant is: David Otunga. So we have all Nexus helping Punk. Nexus eliminated Bryan, Masters and Morrison. We got the 4 Nexus members against Mark Henry, who is now eliminated.
#16 is Tyler Recks. Who gets quickly eliminated by Nexus. They are looking good.
The number 17 entrant is: Vladimir Kozlov. He lasts 45 seconds and is kicked out.
Up next at 18  we have R-Truth. I hope he gets thrown out in 5 seconds. K-Kwik is out!
#19 is none other than The Great Khali. Husky Harris is out!
#20 is Mason Ryan! We are halfway through the entrants. Ryan kicks out Khali!!! Again we have Punk and 3 members of Nexus alone in the ring.
The 21st entry is: CAN YOU DIG IT SUCKA?!!?!? Booker T. Striker goes nuts and, as he says, is marking out!!! Great showing by T but Ryan throws him out!
At #22 we have John Cena! Business is about to pick up! He throws every Nexus member over. We now have Cena vs Punk!!! Crowd is HOT...
For 23 Hornswoggle is out. Tell me I did not just see that! Stiff kick by Punk to Horny. Cena and Punk battle it out until Cena AA's Punk out of the ring.
#24 is Tyson Kidd. He'll last 2 seconds. Horny AA's Kidd!!! WTF!?!? And he gets kicked out by Cena
The next man in is #25 Heath Slater. Tadpole splash after a double 5 knuckle shuffle. Slater is out!
#26 is Kofi Kingston... Staredown and they see the WM sign before battling it out. As they are going at it
#27 Jack Swagger is out.
The #28th entrant is Sheamus! Bicycicle Kick to Horny to eliminate him.
Rey Mysterio is in at #29. He eliminates the All American American.
At 75% of the entrants we get #30 Wade Barrett. 
#31 is Mr. Perfection Dolph Ziggler. This has been slooooow...zzzz....
#32 is Big Daddy Cool Diesel!
#33 is Drew McEntyre
#34 is Alex Riley. Barrett eliminates Nash! 
The next entrant at #35 is The Big Show. Big Show eliminates Ziggler.
#36 is Ezekiel Jackson. Drew is gone. Big Zeke eliminates the Big Show. 6 superstars in the ring: Cena, Mysterio, Barrett, Zeke, Kofi and Sheamus
37 is Santino. He is kicked out, but goes under the bottom rope so he has not been eliminated.
Entry #38 is Alberto del Rio. Riley has been eliminated during Del Rio's entrance. Did Miz call him Roberto del Rio.
Entrant #39 is Randy Orton. RKO for Del Rio and everyone. Kofi out, Sheamus out. Cena and Orton come face to face
The final entrant with #40 is Kane. Zeke is eliminated! Rey eliminates Kane! Barrett eliminates Mysterio.
We are down to 4: Cena, Del Rio, Orton, Barrett. Attitude Adjustment from Cena to Del Rio. Riley distracts Cena so Miz eliminates him!!! Orton eliminates Barrett and DEL RIO ELIMINATES ORTON!!!

Alberto Del Rio wins!!!

Nothing like Del Rio saying A HUEVO PUTOS!!!

2010 Royal Rumble

The 2010 WWE Royal Rumble is upon us. Only 33 more hours left for what is, in my opinion the most exciting PPV of the year. The Rumble has provided some great memories, and the fact that so many guys are involved in the match makes it harder to pick a winner.

I've never been to a Rumble show but have seen the better part of the live, I gotta pick the 2001 event as my favorite not so much for the matches although it was a solid show, but more for the fact that I had Wrestlemania X-7 tickets so the Rumble had so many implications on the storyline development for that awesome April night in Houston.

Boston is in for a wild ride tomorrow night. We've got only 4 matches scheduled, and I do believe they'll get a 5th on the card, but that seems enough for a 3 hour show as now there will be 40 men in the Rumble Match (more on that later)

1st off we have the WWE Divas Championship match with Natalya defending against Lay-Cool in a 2 on 1 handicap match. Nattie has been impressive for the last 5-6 months; I know she's an awesome wrestler but she has been really connecting with the fans and that match with Melina last Monday was pretty darn good. On the other hand we have Lay-Cool who has been a good act for the past year (BTW any time Layla shows up on my screen is a good thing) and have put on good matches, besides their out-of-the-ring antics are pretty fun to watch and easy to hate. I really hope the keep the title on Nattie but the way the switch them around this days I expect Lay-Cool to pick up the win, and then have a blowup between them.

Up next we have Dolph Ziggler challenging Edge for the World Title. Ziggler has been as good a wrestler can be in the WWE in the last 4 months, and having Vickie helping out getting heat is great; i fun this guy solid and fun to watch in the ring, easy to hate... give him some time and he may very well be what his theme song says. His opponent is none other than the Rated-R Superstar, Edge, who is coming of a brutally bad feud with Kane which ended in a World Title Win; we all know Edge is solid in the ring and will make Ziggler look great. I hope they give this guys a good 20-23 minutes to tell a nice story in the ring with Edge picking up the win in the end -for the record I could care less of the no-spear rule for the match- Ziggler does have World Champion written all around him but I don't think they want to start the Road to Wrestlemania with him as champ, not in 2011 at least.

The final singles match will be The Miz defending his WWE Title against Orton. A quick FYI, this feud has done absolutely nothing for me and did not catch my interest. I love the Miz as champion, they have showed a darker, more violent side that gives him credibility. Not a fan of Orton as champ and think he is more interesting when chasing the title. As with the last match, I'm not sure WWE wants to go with Miz as champion leading into WM; although he does get a ton of press outside the WWE, so this is really a toss-up in which I would enjoy seeing The Miz go over and retain the WWE Title.

And now it's time for the Royal Rumble match, still get chills when I hear that. You know you are in for a little more than an hour of a fun, unpredictable, entertaining and pretty memorable match. Last couple of years we have had the return of Cena and Edge to win it all, could this be a signal for a HHH comeback? Will Alberto del Rio make good on his promise and win it? Will Mark Henry win it all after his push on RAW (before someone flames me, this is a joke!) How will the Corre vs Nexus storyline work out? Could we have an Undertaker sighting leading into 'Mania? Who will we have as a returning Superstar taking part in the Rumble? -Booker T seems likely, HHH, Wade Barrett said something of Papa Shango although that seems like a joke by the Brit-. At which other time during the year do we have a PPV with so many questions to be answered? Only at the Rumble. By the way, my pick for the rumble is Cena, although I'd love for Del Rio to make good on his promise; if HHH were to return he'd be penciled in to win.

The 40 man Rumble is just a gimmick to call it the biggest in history, does nothing to help the match but its a good thing to have 10 more guys make a payday; the thing I fear is that they will be cutting people shortly after. Lets see how this plays out.

I absolutely love WWE marketing. This is the most important PPV in the history of mankind and will change the face of history... until next month.

Hope we get a great show tomorrow in Boston and kickoff the Road to Wrestlemania with a bang! I'll be back with my thoughts on the show tomorrow night.

MrKhakbaz out!