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Genre: Wrestling
Produced By: WWE
Format: Pay-Per-View
Date: October 6 2013
Location: First Niagara Center, Buffalo, New York, USA
Attendance: 11,700
The first ever Battleground PPV (which comes after the inaugural Payback supershow in June) felt like a transitional PPV, both beforehand and in execution. The in-ring action promised to be pretty good on the whole, and so it proved to be, with one match in particular standing out as being better than already-positive expectations. But the finish to the main event, the somewhat inconclusive ending to another big match and the promise of a more significant double main event at Hell In A Cell (made on Raw the night after Battleground) added to the feeling that this was far from a must-see show.
Following an enjoyable pre-show match which saw Dolph Ziggler beat Damien Sandow, Battleground opened with a Hardcore match for the World Heavyweight Championship between Alberto Del Rio and challenger Rob Van Dam, accompanied by Ricardo Rodriguez. There were a couple of ways this one could have gone, although if ADR was going over I would have liked to see a Del Rio-Ricardo reunion, since it just feels wrong that the two are apart (and both men have lost part of their charm without the other by their side). On the other hand, since Hardcore rules fits within Van Dam's ECW-based offence, there was also the chance of a new World Champion being crowned here.
That didn't happen, nor did the ADR-RR reunion thing, but we still got a rather good weapons-based brawl to kick off Battleground. A steel chair was introduced early with Van Dam DDT'ing Del Rio right onto it; that the chair came out so soon into the match suggested that the item, usually RVD's go-to prop, would be eclipsed by another object yet to be revealed. That came in the form of a ladder, which we haven't seen used casually during a weapons match for a while. Van Dam rammed ADR into the ladder in the corner, but ADR fought back to avoid more ladder-based pain and introduced a trash can, but RVD countered this by dropkicking the bin into Alberto's face (not quite Van Daminator-style). RVD took control with a split-legged moonsault while ADR was on the ladder, but Del Rio avoided a similar Rolling Thunder crush effect, leaving Rob to land hard. After Ricardo interfered and he and Del Rio exchanged shots with a bucket, Van Dam took an even harder landing when Del Rio dodged an attempted Van Terminator, followed by Alberto trapping Rob's arm with a steel chair for the Cross-Armbreaker, leading RVD to tap out. This was a very good start to the show, and the finish kind of protected RVD while also enhancing Del Rio. But with the injured John Cena announced as ADR's opponent for Hell In A Cell the next night on Raw, and with rumours that this was RVD's last match in WWE for a while, was this all ultimately in vain?
Following that exciting no-rules scrap, we then got something completely different as The Real Americans battled the comedy combo of The Great Khali and Santino Marella. I was going to describe the Indian giant Khali and the allegedly-Italian Santino as the "Non-Americans" to counter the name of the team managed by Zeb Colter, but since Antonio Cesaro is Swiss, that wouldn't work; as a matter of fact, there is still no explanation as to why Colter, who wildly opposed immigration in the spring, willingly accepts Cesaro, and as a man that he wants to manage no less. Jack Swagger was and remains American, though, so that's something I guess.
Given its placement after the fairly memorable opener and the personalities on the babyface side, it's not a surprise to say that this was little more than a run-of-the-mill tag team match. The lone highlight was a pretty good spot, mind you, as Cesaro unleashed his Giant Swing, which made its WWE debut a few weeks ago against Santino, but this time he caught The Great Khali with it, sending the huge man round and round with over a dozen rotations, to the awe of the crowd. The impact of this move was sufficient enough that it allowed Cesaro to immediately pin Khali and pick up the win for his team.
Curtis Axel met R-Truth next with the Intercontinental Title on the line. Given the fairly hefty push that Axel has received over the last few months, this pairing represented a chance for Curtis (and Truth, for that matter) to show us something special, something that we haven't yet seen, and something to get people talking about this match when Battleground was over (in the same way that Cesaro took the monster Khali for a Giant Swing).
Instead, this was just another match; competently executed, far from poor, but with nothing about it distinguishable from any other match on the card, or any other match that Axel and Truth have ever had really. It was hard to believe that the likeable but past-his-prime Truth was going to win the gold, and so he didn't as Axel picked up the victory to almost no fanfare. You get the feeling that both WWE and the fans are running out of patience from Axel to showcase that special quality which justifies his push, but it just doesn't seem forthcoming. Sure, he has the IC Title now, but once he loses that championship, will Curtis Axel's push end as well? If so, he can't particularly blame WWE, because he has received plenty of opportunities to have a truly breakout moment. This was another missed opportunity in that regard.
Brie Bella was chosen as the latest challenger to AJ Lee's Divas Title, as part of AJ's ongoing feud with the cast of Total Divas (and who better personifies that show than the Kardashian wannabe twins, the Bellas?). I have to be honest, I didn't have a great amount of interest in this match, largely because AJ's incredible improvement over the last few months and Brie's comparatively poor efforts, combined with terrible acting during a Randy Orton attack on her soon-to-be husband Daniel Bryan on the pre-Battleground episode of Raw and a non-existent babyface turn for The Bellas based solely on their engagement, all said one thing: AJ is much better than Brie.
Because of this, a Brie title win seemed very unlikely, and if such a result had gone down, many fans would not have been very happy (even though AJ is the heel). Therefore, it wasn't a shock to see AJ get the win with a roll-up after a distraction from her heavy, Tamina Snuka. To be fair, the match was more entertaining than I had anticipated, but it's hardly the sort of thing which I would go and watch back. If AJ is being pitted against those who are on Total Divas, she needs a more qualified opponent than Brie (Natalya, perhaps?).
Next up, we had the well-built match between The Rhodes brothers and The Shield. To recap, Cody Rhodes badmouthed The Triple H/Stephanie McMahon power couple a few weeks earlier, so after he lost to Randy Orton, he was fired. In response, Goldust returned to fight for Cody's job and had an amazingly good match with Orton himself. The brothers Rhodes then invaded Raw, having both been fired, and with their father Dusty Rhodes backing them up, it was announced that they would fight Shield members Seth Rollins and Roman Reigns (without their WWE Tag Team Titles at stake) here at Battleground, with the stipulation being that if the brothers won, they would be rehired, but if they lost, they and their father Dusty would all have their employment permanently terminated.
After a humorous yet effective backstage interview by the family, the match got under way, and soon blossomed into a really enjoyable doubles bout. It had an old-school vibe to its structure, but with the modern, contemporary offence of the likes of Rollins and Cody. Goldust, with new face paint for the first time in forever, proved once again that he can more than keep up with the present crew with some great fast-paced moves; the last month has actually been one of Goldust's best ever months from an in-ring standpoint. Dean Ambrose at ringside also took some licks from Dusty, who hit a few elbows on the United States Champion to a big nostalgia pop. I was expecting some shenanigans by HHH or Stephanie McMahon to deny the Rhodes brothers the win, but instead Cody actually got the victory for his team by hitting Rollins with Cross Rhodes. This was a very good match, capped off by a hugely positive crowd reaction as the brothers regained their jobs, and a post-match celebration between the Rhodes family and many of the wrestlers, plus such ex-wrestlers as Arn Anderson.
We then got Bray Wyatt's second PPV match, as he went one-on-one with Kofi Kingston. Given that the Wyatt character debuted in July and he and his Family sidekicks Luke Harper and Erick Rowan have been protected ever since, and that Kofi is a veteran of the roster who loses more big matches than he wins nowadays, this was another match on the show where the result wasn't very hard to predict.
Indeed, after some decent exchanges, Wyatt picked up the victory with Sister Abigail to continue his slow ascent up the card. This offered more action than the Bray Wyatt-Kane Ring Of Fire match at SummerSlam due to the athleticism of Kingston, and the unexpected spot during the match when Wyatt laid on his back, used his hands to bend upwards whilst his feet stayed planted on the canvas, and then began crawling as if he were a spider or a crab. This was the most memorable moment of the match, and fittingly it received the biggest pop of the bout too. Rowan and Harper helped Wyatt to deliver further damage to Kingston after the match.
In the latest extension of the CM Punk-Paul Heyman feud, we got CM Punk vs. Ryback next. Ryback entered the rivalry at Night Of Champions to help Heyman get an unlikely victory over Punk. His heel turn still doesn't feel right, although with Heyman as his manager he may settle into the heel role more (and some of their segments have been weirdly entertaining, as well as Heyman referring to him as "my big beautiful Ryback"). One of those, a brawl in Punk's hometown of Chicago, led to Punk awkwardly missing a table that Ryback tried to slam him through. That aside, Punk vs. Ryback has been inferior to their 2012 feud, largely because we've seen it before, when both men were more suited to their roles (Punk as the heel, Ryback as the face). All of which means that unless we're killing time until Punk faces Brock Lesnar again, this match felt inconsequential, and has threatened to make the previously-exciting Punk-Heyman feud hit the dreaded point of overkill.
Of greater intrigue was the potential result. Ryback shouldn't really lose the first match of a rivalry given his bullying heel persona, but since Punk hasn't won on PPV since defeating Chris Jericho at Payback (and this was his only PPV victory of the year up until this point), it was hard to envision that Punk would lose, raising the likelihood of either a draw or a controversial DQ/countout finish (hence part of the reason why Battleground as a whole felt like a transitional show). As it turned out, there was a controversial finish, but the dodgy moment (a Punk low blow) went unseen by the referee, allowing Punk to get the pinfall win. Match quality was alright, but nothing spectacular or memorable. It does appear that this feud, or at least the Punk-Heyman issue, will continue until Hell In A Cell; if the rivalry doesn't end on that particular card, then it really will become stale and uninteresting.
The video package played for Daniel Bryan vs. Randy Orton, but we then got some sort of botch as the video abruptly ended, and for around two minutes, we just saw ring announcer Justin Roberts awaiting his cue with the crowd also waiting for something to happen and no noise from the commentators. Eventually, this awkward silence ended, and we got the headline match as planned. Bryan vs. Orton would decide the fate of the WWE Championship, which was vacated after the controversial finish to their previous bout at Night Of Champions. Well, that's what we were told, but with Hell In A Cell on the horizon and no other obvious challengers to either man after Battleground when the show began, something told me that there would be shenanigans.
And that's exactly what happened, which was a shame because this was a really entertaining match; it still didn't quite reach the level of, say, Bryan vs. CM Punk in 2012 or Orton vs. Christian in 2011, but it was definitely a better match than their Night Of Champions showdown. Unfortunately, their strong efforts were all for naught when Big Show, who has been tormented for weeks by HHH and Stephanie and has been forced to carry out heelish acts against his will, came out and decked Bryan with a punch, as well as the referee. He then cracked Orton too to a big pop, and left with a smile on his face, almost accepting that he would be fired, and was now past caring. This major moment, however, was the way in which WWE ended the show; with both men laid out flat, with the match having no conclusion, and with nobody crowned as the WWE Champion. Fans were not impressed and nor was I, especially since we have seen other men kick out of a pinfall cover made immediately after a Big Show punch in the past. Had this been on Raw, it would have been a cool ending; on PPV, it was a damp squib.
Much happened on Raw the following night. Another Daniel Bryan vs. Randy Orton match for the vacant title was announced for Hell In A Cell, this time in Hell In A Cell, and after a fan vote between Bob Backlund, Booker T and Shawn Michaels to become special guest referee, Michaels was chosen. Bruno Sammartino made an appearance in his hometown of Pittsburgh during a commercial break. As alluded to earlier, it was announced that John Cena, who apparently is still injured, will be making a return to face Alberto Del Rio for the World Heavyweight Title at HIAC. The Punk-Heyman feud rolled on. And after being fired by Stephanie McMahon in the opening segment, Big Show returned to the arena after the main event and withstood a Shield beatdown to drop Triple H with an almighty punch to a massive ovation.
I mention all this because, when you analyse it, this edition of Raw was a lot more eventful than Battleground. Of course, Battleground had better matches, and three of them were good or very good, as well as culminating the ADR-RVD rivalry and being the base for Cody Rhodes and Goldust to earn their jobs back. But I felt going in that it would be a B-show, and despite some good action and productive developments, that's exactly what it turned out to be, epitomised by the endings to the final two matches (especially the main event). Hopefully, Hell In A Cell will be a step up, because while WWE has trotted out the "Best for business" phrase ad nauseum since SummerSlam via Triple H and Stephanie, the last two PPV events have been underwhelming to the point that it will not be best for business if these supershows continue to feel insignificant or in some way leave the viewers feeling unsatisfied.
Overall Rating: 6/10 - Reasonable
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