WWE Survivor Series 2005

Here's my almost spoiler free look at the PPV.

Best of 7 Series – Match 1: Booker T VS Chris Benoit
This was only the first match in the series, but these two put on a great match! Really good back and forth action marred only at the end when Sharmell got involved and the fans hated that too since it spoiled a great contest.
Match Rating: **1/2

WWE Women’s Title: Melina VS Trish Stratus
Melina and Christy Hemme was said to have put on a solid and stiff match on Smackdown last week, so I was hoping for good things here since we all know Trish can go. And DAMN! They didn’t disappoint! This was easily the best Women’s Title match in a LONG time. This is the way Women’s matches should be: fast paced with a lot of big moves and near falls. Tazz & Joey Styles also did a rather fun job calling the match, and Melina definitely gets the “Scream Queen” award. Damn does the girl have a set of lungs on her!
Match Rating: ***

Last Man Standing: Triple H VS Ric Flair
As expected, this was another bloody brawl, and a Hell of a match! But this is the first big match in a while that HHH didn’t bleed, but he did take a rather dangerous bump when he got backdropped from one table to another! I wouldn’t say it was as good as the cage match from Taboo Tuesday, but definitely one of the most brutal in a while.
Match Rating: ****1/2

WWE Championship: Kurt Angle VS John Cena
Despite trying to get more heel heat on Angle by getting Daivari as his special referee, the fans were going to war with each other chanting for Angle to win the title against the Cena supporters. They even cheered Angle when Daivari cheeted on his behalf! The heat in this match was just INSANE!
The two even put on a pretty good match too, with Angle carrying most of it. The finish was very overbooked with all the referees getting taken out, but you know they are going to continue this since it was a Smackdown referee that made the final 3 count.
Match Ratin: ***1/2 (Thanks to the crowd heat)

Eric Bischoff VS Teddy Long
Unlike the previous match, the crowd pretty much agreed they did not want to see this match with boos for both GMs and “Boring” chants. The whole point of this was to finally get the Boogeyman in the ring, who used a pump-handle slam to put out Bisch for Teddy to get the win.
Match Rating: DUD

Survivor Series Elimination Match:
Team Smackdown: Batista, JBL, Rey Mysterio, Bobby Lashley & Randy Orton VS
Team RAW: Shawn Michaels, Carlito, Chris Masters, Big Show & Kane
Wow. If you think 3 commentators on RAW is tough, try listening to FIVE during this one! I’m not sure, but I think Tazz & Styles were shooting on each other here. Than again, maybe Tazz was shooting on everyone.
Hate to say it, but this really felt like a throwaway match, as the eliminations came way too quickly to my liking. I was also pretty miffed that they didn’t give Lashley the rub that I was expecting by facing off with Kane or Big Show. The whole thing was basically just to set up the return of the Undertaker at the end of it.
Match Rating: ***

Overall: A lot of goodness on this PPV, despite the rather rushed feeling of the main event.

R.I.P. Eddie Guerrero

In what must be the most shocking loss to the wrestling world this year since Shinya Hashimoto, former WWE champion Eddie Guerrero was found dead in his hotel room yesterday morning. His body was found by his nephew Chavo who went to check on him after not answering his wake-up call. The cause of death is still unknown at this time.
This is a huge and tragic loss to the pro-wrestling world, as Eddie was one of the best talents not just in the WWE, but all over the world having worked almost everywhere from ECW, WCW as well as Japan and Mexico and indy promotions throughout his career.
One of the first Eddie Guerrero matches I remember watching was a WCW World Title match against Ric Flair on Nitro. And who could forget his big world title win off Brock Lesner and the emotional ending to WrestleMania XX when he celebrated with Chris Benoit in the ring at the end of the PPV?
I was shocked when I found out the news this morning, and it's a low down dirty shame Eddie had to be yet ANOTHER talented pro-wrestler to be taken from us way too early in his life.

Rest in Peace, Eddie.
You will be missed.

NEW GHC CHAMPION!!!

Akira Taue is the NEW GHC Heavyweight champion, ending Takeshi Rikioh's 7+ month reign as champion! I haven't been this happy with a puroresu match result in a LONG time! I almost had a tear in my eye when I read Taue won the title! Even if he does lose the title in January or March, it's still good that they gave the old dog his due! Taue is certainly one of those guys who DESERVES a run with a major title and I commend Misawa for giving it to him.

NOAH "3rd Great Voyage", 11/5/05 (NTV/G+ Live)
Tokyo Nippon Budokan
16,600 Fans - Super No Vacancy
1. Tamon Honda, Tsuyoshi Kikuchi & Mitsuo Momota beat Jun Izumida, Kishin Kawabata & SUWA (7:39) when Honda used the Dead End on Kawabata.
2. Akitoshi Saito, Masao Inoue & Takashi Sugiura beat Yoshinari Ogawa, Kentaro Shiga & Ricky Marvin (14:07) when Inoue used an Argentine Backbreaker on Shiga.
3. Takuma Sano beat Mushiking Terry (14:07) with a Northern Light bomb.
4. Jun Akiyama & Shiro Koshinaka beat Minoru Suzuki & Naomichi Marufuji (17:39) when Akiyama used the Sternness Dust Alpha on Marufuji.
5. GHC Hardcore Openweight Title: Scorpio © beat Yoshinobu Kanemaru (12:33) with the 450 Splash (1st defense).
6. Kensuke Sasaki & Katsuhiko Nakajima beat Kenta Kobashi & Go Shiosaki (24:58) when Sasaki used a lariat on Shiosaki.
7. Mitsuharu Misawa beat Genichiro Tenryu (14:27) with a running elbow smash.
8. GHC Tag Team Title: Mohammed Yone & Takeshi Morishima © beat KENTA & Katsuyori Shibata (27:50) when Morishima used a backdrop on KENTA (1st defense).
9. GHC Heavyweight Title: Akira Taue beat Takeshi Rikio © (20:43) with the Ore Ga Taue to become the 8th champion.

Results credit: Green Destiny

WWE Taboo Tuesday

JOEY! JOEY! JOEY!
JOEY STYLES ON COMMENTARY!!! WHOO!!!

Gene Snitzsky & Chris Masters VS Matt Hardy & Rey Mysterio
Wow. WWE gives us “complete control” of the PPV, than pulls a “bait ‘n’ switch” by taking Edge out of the match when they knew Matt Hardy was a sure win to be voted into the match cause that’s what the fans really wanted to see.
Never the less, I was REALLY surprised how good this match turned out. Say what you want about Snitzsky and Masters, but they actually worked hard here, and I really have to commend Snitzsky for bumping the way he does for the little guys, including that rather sick looking DDT off the top rope! Great opener which the fans really got enjoyed.
Match Rating: **1/2

Rob Conway & Tyson Tomko VS Eugene & Jimmy “Superfly” Snuka
Snuka beat out Hacksaw Jim Duggan by a close 3% in the vote. Not a lot to the match itself as Eugene worked 98% of the match for his team, only to give the hot tag to Snuka who wasn’t moving as fast as he used to and looked rather awkward in the ring. It even took the old veteran almost forever to get up top to hit the Superfly Splash for the win. I liked the ending where all the Hacksaw and Kamala came out to take out Tomko after the match.
I guess the main difference between Conway and Orton is that Orton can actually beat the legends.
Match Rating: *

Carlito VS Mankind
Mankind won with a landslide 52% of the vote! Mick looked a heck of a lot bigger (ie. Fat) than when last we saw him in the ring. The match itself was an ok match, not on par with the Orton/Foley match from last year, but good none the less. Mankind hit all his signature spots: Cactus Clothesline, apron to floor elbow, double-arm DDT, and of course, the Mr. Socko (with afro!) Mandible Claw! Carlito once again showed his lack of ability here, which I hope he can improve on soon cause he’s just boring to watch.
Match Rating: *

They announce HBK winning the 3rd slot in the main event with 43% of the vote, beating Kane who had 38% of the vote, which brings us to our next match.

World Tag Team Titles: Lance Cade & Trevor Murdoch VS Kane & The Big Show
I was surprised Show and Kane worked as well together as they did. Once again, you can say what you want about the Big Show’s ability, but the fans really react well to him and whatever he does. I guess the one complaint I would have was that this match was an almost squash for the two giants. I would have preferred if Murdoch was made to be just a bit tougher since he did mention before he likes to fight. It was still a fun match though, and I guess now I can look forward to the big men defending the tag titles against Val Venis & Viscera since they beat Cade & Murdoch before.
Match Rating: **

It’s announced that the WWE Divas will be wearing lingerie for the 2nd ever Fulfill Your Fantasy Battle Royal, winning with over 40% of the vote.

Street Fight: Jonathan Coachman with Goldust & Vader VS Batista
The Street Fight won with a huge 91% of the vote! Short and simple as expected.
This was more of a 3-on-1 handicap match, and I was interested in seeing Batista VS Vader, but Vader is just so out of shape and having trouble keeping his balance that it isn’t even funny. I would have liked if Batista brought some backup to help deal with Vader & Goldust (Didn’t Eddie Guererro become his friend or something?). It didn’t do much for Vader’s legacy to get dominated like he did, but than again just walking around looking like he does isn’t helping any either.
Bottom line now I guess is Smackdown went 2-0 on a RAW PPV, which will set up Survivor Series.
Match Rating: ½*

Fulfill Your Fantasy Battle Royal for the WWE Women’s Title
Ashley VS Candice Michelle VS Mickie James VS Victoria VS Maria VS Trish Stratus
After seeing the lingerie their wearing, I’m betting a lot of people wished they had voted for something else as there really wasn’t anything special about lingerie in my view. Heck, they all look like they are wearing standard wrestling attire.
The match itself was ok. I’d say Victoria was the MVP of the match. I was really expecting Mickie James to win the match by accidentally eliminating Trish, but that didn’t happen. Guess we’ll have to wait a little longer for that heel turn of hers.
Match Rating:*

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Intercontinental Title Steel Cage Match: Triple H VS Ric Flair
The Steel Cage won easily with 83% of the vote.
Now this was a truly great match! You had a lot of emotion and a lot of blood spilt in this one, plus it told a great story. You could probably guess Flair was going to win since the IC title was only the line, but I still MARKED OUT for Flair winning, and like Joey Styles, even I had GOOSEBUMPS for it! At the last Taboo Tuesday, Flair had the Match of the Night with Randy Orton, this year he looks to receive that honor again with this one! And of course for all the evil deeds he’s done in the past, give H credit for putting Flair over. Who knows? Maybe H even enjoyed Flair grabbing his balls.
Match Rating: ****1/2

Triple Threat WWE World Title Match: Kurt Angle VS Shawn Michaels VS John Cena
You know, the reason everyone says Cena will lose the title before Batista is because Cena gets booed a lot, whereas Batista has the fans firmly backing him. Here was another good example of that as the crowd were heavily behind Angle to win the title here, and even I was screaming at Cena to tap when Angle had him in the ankle lock.
Of course when you consider who was involved in the match, it was a pretty good WWE-style 3-way dance. But you could easily noticed how they managed to hide Cena’s weaknesses by taking him out for a majority of the match and letting the veterans carry it, only to have him more or less steal the win in the end. A solid match though.
Match Rating: ***1/2

Overall: Three good matches and a possible MOTY makes this a pretty good PPV by my standards. The must see match is obviously the Flair/HHH cage match, followed closely by the main event. Obviously the build to Survivor Series starts now, and it should be interesting to see how the inter-brand war goes off.

On a side note, Joey Styles did an INCREDIBLE job on commentary! WWE really need to be kissing his ass to get him on RAW as he totally blew away any other commentary I’ve heard all year on WWE TV! He’s just a natural at it and WWE really NEEDS to have this guy on instead of Coach or even JR!