Both the rosters of Raw and Smackdown came together on Sunday, December 16 for the WWE PPV TLC, where the sports entertainment superstars used tables, ladders, and chairs to beat down their opponents. Things got pretty brutal that evening, especially during the main event match.
The show took place in San Jose, California at the SAP Center, and the card was stacked with 12 matches over the course of the evening. Yes, that is a lot of matches for a non-major WWE PPV. There were plenty of titles on the line and plenty of foreign objects allowed in these matches. TLC is a bit of a crazy beast. Check out all the matches in the order they aired.
TLC Match Card:
- Buddy Murphy (c) vs. Cedric Alexander (Cruiserweight Championship) -- Kickoff Show
- Elias vs. Bobby Lashley (Ladder Match) -- Kickoff Show
- R-Truth & Carmella vs. Jinder Mahal & Alicia Fox (Finals of MMC Season 2)
- The Bar (c) vs. The New Day vs. The Usos (SmackDown Tag Team Championships)
- Braun Strowman vs. Baron Corbin (TLC Match)
- Natalya vs. Ruby Riott (Tables Match)
- Finn Bálor vs. Drew McIntyre
- Rey Mysterio vs. Randy Orton (Chairs Match)
- Ronda Rousey (c) vs. Nia Jax (Raw Women's Championship)
- (The New) Daniel Bryan (c) vs. AJ Styles (WWE Championship)
- Seth Rollins (c) vs. Dean Ambrose (Intercontinental Championship)
- Becky Lynch (c) vs. Charlotte Flair vs. Asuka (Triple Threat TLC Match For The Smackdown Women's Championship)
Before this PPV kicked off, I had no expectations. I thought it was going to be pretty awful, as there were 12 matches on the card, and Raw's side of things had little to no build-up to its matches. And I was wrong. The WWE PPV ended up being quite a bit of fun, even with the shorter matches and lack of strong stories. At times, the fights didn't feel like PPV matches, but it was all fine and dandy throughout the evening, as TLC is nothing more than a pit stop on the way to Royal Rumble anyway, which in itself is a pit stop on the way to Wrestlemania.
Like everyone on the internet, I have strong opinions about what happened during the WWE event, so I wrote down all my thoughts, ranked the matches and have presented them to you. Here's what I thought about all the matches during the evening at the WWE PPV, TLC.
Buddy Murphy (c) vs. Cedric Alexander (Cruiserweight Championship) -- Kickoff Show
Buddy Murphy's pants bug me. That's my first impression of this match. I know who these guys are, and I know they're going to put on a great match, but Murphy's trunks are weird. There is just a great amount of smoothness and flow to these competitors' work, something fans don't get to see too much on the main roster. Both men were great at building to a very exciting and intense third act of the match. Put them on the main roster please, along with Mustafi Ali.
8/10
Elias vs. Bobby Lashley (Ladder Match) -- Kickoff Show
The stipulation for this match is so stupid. There is a guitar hanging above the ring, and if you grab it, you can use it on your opponent. Well, what about just using the ladder as a weapon? Last minute, the rules were changed to a setup where the winner is the first person to grab the guitar. God, this is so stupid. I love Elias, but this rivalry is killing him. He's such an interesting and dynamic performer, and he's been put in a story with Lashley, who is incredibly uncharismatic and not fun to watch. Sure, Lashley tossing a ladder at Elias was fun, but that's about it for this bout.
2/10
R-Truth & Carmella vs. Jinder Mahal & Alicia Fox (Finals of MMC Season 2)
I really like the stipulation for this one, where the winners get the #30 spot at the next Royal Rumble. Way to make this tournament worthwhile, WWE. R-Truth and Carmella bring a ton of fun to this match, and the dance break with the Singh Brothers was a totally entertaining spot. Then R-Truth wore Alicia's hat. I am also into this moment of hijinks. For a match I didn't have high expectations for, this was a great way to kick off the show. Yeah, there were more gimmicky, comedy spots than wrestling, but there's nothing wrong with having a quick match like that to open up the show. R-Truth announcing they're going to WWE headquarters in Stamford, Connecticut was the icing on the cake.
6/10
The Bar (c) vs. The New Day vs. The Usos (SmackDown Tag Team Championships)
I was extremely hyped for this match. These are the three best tag teams in the WWE main roster right now, and each team brings something very different to the table. For the most part, it lived up to the hype--aside from a couple of confusing moments of who was legal in the match. There were some fantastic spots where each team showed off what they were best at, and while I wasn't totally into the finish--mainly because The Bar won and I was hoping the titles would go back to The Usos--this is what tag team wrestling should strive to be like on the main roster in WWE.
7.5/10
Braun Strowman vs. Baron Corbin (TLC Match)
Braun has a bum elbow because he had surgery on it this week, so he had some help in this match, since it's a TLC match, and there are no DQs. So Apollo Crews joined the match because… um…. Why not? It's not like Raw storylines have to make sense. Then Chad Gable and Bobby Roode showed up. Then Finn Balor showed up. Then referee Heath Slater removed his shirt and punched Corbin. Then Kurt Angle showed up. Everyone hates Corbin. Poor, poor Corbin. Sorry for the play-by-play, but this was treated more as a segment than an actual match. Even though Raw has been abysmal recently, this was a nice way to close off the Corbin as GM storyline.
6.5/10
Natalya vs. Ruby Riott (Tables Match)
Ahh, the storyline which I constantly say is in poor taste. And while this match itself was pretty great, when it got to Riott rubbing Natalya's face on the table with the Jim Neidhart cutout on it, that was a bit much for my liking. It got a bit annoying with Natalya repeatedly saying things like "Don't mess with my family," and man, this match slowed to a crawl when Riott and Natalya were setting up tables. However, it was an alright match, once you ignored the fact you could hear all the spots getting called. And I loved seeing Natalya take out the Riott Squad, one by one. Additionally, this had a great finish with Riott getting powerbombed through a table, although the setup was a bit slow. While these two have been feuding for a bit, it's nice to see their PPV match felt like a PPV match and not just something else we'd see on Raw. It was very middle of the road, but I didn't expect much more than that.
5/10
Finn Bálor vs. Drew McIntyre
Hey! A regular match at TLC! Nice! What's so confusing to me about this match was that it isn't a continuation of McIntyre/Ziggler. Yes, Ziggler was involved in the match and helped Balor get the win, but Balor shouldn't have been McIntyre's opponent for this PPV. Frankly, this felt like just another Monday Night Raw match. It was fine for both of these competitors. I really enjoy them both, but the big fight feel simply wasn't there.
6/10
Rey Mysterio vs. Randy Orton (Chairs Match)
You know what this match didn't have enough of, right outside of the ring? Empty chairs. Just kidding. It had a ton. This is the eighth match of the evening, and it feels like it's been on all day. Well, at least this match had two veterans who know how to put on a good show. The Mysterio sliding spot onto Orton--who was outside of the ring--was fantastic. I also had a good chuckle when Mysterio jumped off the top rope and Orton just threw a chair at him. I am a monster. The ending came a bit out of nowhere, but sometimes, we need non-traditional finishes to throw the audience off a bit. Strangely enough, this match was a lot better than I expected and the most fun one of the evening, up to that point.
8/10
Ronda Rousey (c) vs. Nia Jax (Raw Women's Championship)
Rousey continues to impress me, and that's coming from someone who dismissed her time and time again like an ignorant idiot. She's taking bumps well and doing some innovative stuff, like when she was about to be suplexed but somehow turned it into a choke on Jax. We got to see her do a crossbody from the top rope onto Jax outside the ring. That was pretty awesome. The weak spot here is Jax, as her character turns face or heel more than Big Show at this point, so who Jax is has become muddled. However, the David vs. Goliath story is one the works pretty well for this scenario. I loved seeing Rousey climb on Jax to lock in submission holds. If you would have told me back in March that I'd be a huge fan of Rousey's in-ring work, I would have called you a liar then had to eat my own words.
We then got a backstage segment of Becky Lynch attacking Nia Jax, and it was the best.
8.5/10
(The New) Daniel Bryan (c) vs. AJ Styles (WWE Championship)
Going into this match, I knew it was going to be great. You have to expect that two of the best performers in the company are going to put on an amazing match. Bryan has really changed up his moveset since his heel turn, and I love his ruthlessness now. There were so many counters and reversals during the match, and there was some great technical wrestling during the event. Man, I could have watched these two battle each other for another 30 minutes. What a great fight.
9/10
Seth Rollins (c) vs. Dean Ambrose (Intercontinental Championship)
Commentary for this match was bad and weird, and made me want to mute my TV. The audience had lost a bit of steam on this one, as Styles/Bryan was a barn burner. It affected me as well. There was the whole thing with the audience turning on Ambrose and Rollins, chanting "This is boring," which is a bummer. I enjoyed the finish, but this was a rough one to get through. There's nothing really to say about this. It was a letdown, and it should have been the best match from Raw's roster.
4/10
Becky Lynch (c) vs. Charlotte Flair vs. Asuka (Triple Threat TLC Match For The Smackdown Women's Championship)
This was awesome. Lynch and Flair's match at Evolution was the best WWE bout of the year, without question, and this triple threat TLC match lived up to the hype, and it finally elevated Asuka back into the main event spotlight, where she should have been the past year. This was incredibly brutal and one of the most intense matches of the year. While I was really pulling for Becky Lynch to retain her title, the finish worked exceptionally well, even though some folks were not into Rousey interfering. For me, it helped fuel the feud between the two, which will probably all come to a head at Wrestlemania. This match could not have been put together any better. Well, maybe if WWE turned down the ring mics, so we couldn't hear all the spots being called. This truly was worth the main event spot on the show.
9.5/10
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