The plan (technically) comes together: WWE Bragging Rights 2010

John Cena had a lot riding on the main event of Bragging Rights, and he wasn’t even competing in the match.  Wade Barrett, challenging for Randy Orton’s WWE Championship, told Cena in no uncertain terms that if he did not win the match, Cena would be fired from the WWE.  So Cena watched, completely stone faced, as Barrett fought for his career.  A referee bump brought out the rest of the Nexus to beat on Orton, but as soon as the referee began coming to, Cena jumped into the ring and began throwing them out, even going so far as to giving David Otunga an Attitude Adjustment.  Barrett berated Cena for this, but Cena argued that if he was disqualified it would still count as a loss.  Finally, when Orton seemed to have gotten the better of his opponent, Cena again entered the ring, but surprisingly delivered an AA to Barrett rather than Orton.  The official decision gave Barrett the win by disqualification, though allowed Orton to retain his title.  Cena’s actions fulfilled Barrett’s demand while still preventing him from gaining the title.  Orton himself was not amused by Cena’s actions, giving him an RKO as he tried to give the champion his title belt.  As he celebrated, Barrett tried to attack and received an RKO for his own actions.

Match-by-match recap of the rest of the show after the jump.

Daniel Bryan vs. Dolph Ziggler (w/Vickie Guerrero)
In the years I’ve been a wrestling fan, I’m not sure if I can recall a match in which I’ve seen a man get kicked in the face as many times as Dolph Ziggler did here.  The match was quite good, with tons of reversals and near falls.  Both Bryan and Ziggler certainly demonstrated that they deserve their respective titles.  One move in particular that had the room I was watching in let out a collective groan saw both men go for a cross body, and bounced off one another in mid-air.  The finish seemed to come when Ziggler landed the Zig-Zag and got the three count, but just as the referee slapped the mat for the third time, he spotted Bryan’s foot on the rope and refused to ring the bell.  A frustrated Ziggler went for his sleeper hold, but Bryan reversed into his Lebell Lock, earning the victory by submission.

WWE Tag Team Championship Match: “Dashing” Cody Rhodes & Drew McIntyre vs. The Nexus (John Cena & David Otunga)
Rhodes and McIntyre entered the ring to complain about not having a match on Bragging Rights, but realize that there are no worthy tag teams on Raw to challenge them.  This led to the anonymous Raw GM to ring in and make a match for the belts against Cena and Otunga, with Barrett informing Cena that if he didn’t bring home the gold, he’d be fired.  Otunga started the match, but quickly tagged out to Cena, who single handedly defeated the champions, making Cody tap out to the STF.  Otunga celebrated with the belts, handing one to Cena, but Cena suddenly hit Otunga with the Attitude Adjustment and left with both belts.

Ted DiBiase (w/Maryse) vs. Goldust (w/Aksana)
The pace of this match was pretty quick throughout, and quite good.  Goldust seemed to be getting the upper hand when Maryse suddenly attacked Aksana at ringside.  After two attempts, Maryse rolled Aksana into the ring, causing her to begin crying.  Goldust spotted his bride-to-be and went to help her, but DiBiase capitalized on the distraction to drop Goldust with a DDT and picked up the win.  Maryse quickly grabbed the Million Dollar Belt from the timekeeper and went to return it to DiBiase, but Aksana intercepted her and began a brutal (not damaging) looking catfight.  Goldust used this distraction to hit DiBiase with the Final Cut and once again departed with DiBiase’s belt.

WWE Diva’s Championship: Layla(c) (w/Michelle McCool) vs. Natalya
Despite facing the numbers game once again, Natalya again did not bring either member of the Hart Dynasty to back her up.  Natalya dominated both Layla in the ring and McCool outside of it, causing Layla to grab her title and try to leave for the countout loss, though Natalya would have none of it.  She pushed aside McCool and brought Layla back to the ring, but was left vulnerable to an attack from McCool behind the ref’s back allowing Layla to get the pin and retain her title for LayCool.

Buried Alive Match for the World Heavyweight Championship: Kane(c) w/Paul Bearer vs. Undertaker
Certainly not a technical match, Undertaker and Kane did a lot of brawling, with Undertaker getting the upper hand.  Kane began attempting to escape through the crowd, but his brother would have none of it.  Taker began chucking chairs into the ring, but the move cost him as Kane got there first and began wailing on him with a chair.  Two chokeslams later, Kane began carrying his brother towards the gravesite near the stage.  Undertaker regained both his senses and the advantage, sending Kane scurrying up the grave to get away.  Taker followed him and managed to lock on Hell’s Gate, knocking Kane out and allowing Undertaker to roll him into the grave.  He set his sights on Paul Bearer, allowing the Nexus to enter and begin attacking.  As the Nexus beat on Taker, Kane climbed out of the grave and rolled his brother into it.  Heath Slater and Justin Gabriel began shovelling dirt onto the Dead Man, but Kane stopped them and called forth the bulldozer above the grave to bury Undertaker and give him the win.

After Kane and the Nexus departed, lightning struck the tombstone, setting it ablaze as the Undertaker’s music played.

Bragging Rights Elimination Match: Team Raw (The Miz (w/Alex Riley), Sheamus, CM Punk, R-Truth, Santino Marella, Ezekiel Jackson, John Morrison) vs. Team Smackdown (Big Show (w/Hornswoggle), Rey Mysterio, Edge, Alberto del Rio, Kofi Kingston, Tyler Reks, Jack Swagger)
The first elimination, predictably, was Santino Marella as he failed to land the Cobra on Tyler Reks and suffered his torture rack/DDT.  Raw stopped the advantage minutes later when Sheamus eliminated Kofi Kingston.  Alberto del Rio quickly demonstrated that his personal vendetta outweighed his brand loyalty, as he betrayed teammate Rey Mysterio, forcing him into the guardrail outside, and having Mysterio leave the area for medical attention.  Jack Swagger attempted to eliminate John Morrison with the ankle lock, but Morrison escaped the hold and landed Starship Pain to eliminate Swagger.  A minute later, Sheamus kept Raw’s momentum going by eliminating Tyler Reks.  This brought in the Big Show to brawl with Sheamus, but as both men began moving further and further from the ring, the ref’s count got the best of them, and both men were counted out. 

Now five-on-two, Edge began a comeback for Team Smackdown, eliminating both R-Truth and John Morrison within 30 seconds of one another with spears.  Not to be shown up, Alberto del Rio came back in, but fell prey to a roll up from CM Punk and was eliminated.  As Del Rio was making his way to the back, he was attacked by Rey Mysterio, who returned to the match to help out Edge.  Mysterio and CM Punk traded near falls until Mysterio finally landed the 619 and eliminated Punk to tie the match at 2 vs. 2.  Two minutes later, Mysterio hit the same move on Big Zeke, giving Smackdown their first advantage since the first elimination.  Rey tried for the 619 on the Miz, but Alex Riley jumped up and took the move for him, but that couldn’t save Raw’s team captain from suffering a spear from Edge, giving Team Smackdown the final elimination and winning the Bragging Rights Cup for the second year in a row.

Final Show Results

• Daniel Bryan def. Dolph Ziggler (w/Vickie Guerrero)
• The Nexus (John Cena & David Otunga) def. “Dashing” Cody Rhodes & Drew McIntyre for the WWE Tag Team Championship
• Ted DiBiase (w/Maryse) def. Goldust (w/Aksana)
• Layla (w/Michelle McCool) def. Natalya to retain the WWE Diva’s Championship
• Kane (w/Paul Bearer) def. Undertaker in a Buried Alive match
• Team Smackdown def. Team Raw in the Bragging Rights Match
•      Tyler Reks eliminated Santino Marella
•      Sheamus eliminated Kofi Kingston
•      John Morrison eliminated Jack Swagger
•      Sheamus eliminated Tyler Reks
•      Sheamus was eliminated by countout
•      Big Show was eliminated by countout
•      Edge eliminated R-Truth
•      Edge eliminated John Morrison
•      CM Punk eliminated Alberto del Rio
•      Rey Mysterio eliminated CM Punk
•      Rey Mysterio eliminated Ezekiel Jackson
•      Edge eliminated The Miz
• Wade Barrett (w/John Cena) def. Randy Orton by disqualification; Orton retained the WWE Championship

Looking Back
Another year, another Smackdown win at Bragging Rights.  Actually, if you go by the tally of matches, Raw and Smackdown tied at two a piece (Daniel Bryan/Nexus for Raw, Layla/Team Smackdown for Smackdown), but being that Smackdown brought the Cup back home, it definitely signals a victory for the Friday night show.  This seems to be a running theme whenever they have a brand dominance match.  Theoretically, since Smackdown is at the less-appealing timeslot on the less-appealing network, having Smackdown win (or in this case dominate) over Raw would cause interest in the brand and bring more viewers over.  Smackdown certainly had the better team roster, and those not established as stars (like Tyler Reks and Alberto del Rio) got their moments to shine.  Both Edge and Rey Mysterio re-established themselves as top-level babyfaces, which is good being that Kane looks to need a new opponent for a while.

Speaking of Buried Alive, I was pretty shocked to see Undertaker lose to Kane for the third month in a row.  Though I suppose it’s not unusual for Taker to lose one of his “signature matches”.  In this five Buried Alive matches thus far, Undertaker has lost all but one of them.  In each loss, he stayed out for a month or two, then returned with a gimmick change.  The real question is where Kane goes from here.  I suppose a feud with Edge is the most likely choice.

On the other brand, I greatly enjoyed the title match between Wade Barrett and Randy Orton, though I feel like the ending was rather predictable as soon as Barrett ordered Cena to ensure his winning the match rather than winning the title.  It’s a game of semantics that I’m sure will not happen again.  Cena got to cost Barrett the title and finally hit him with the Attitude Adjustment, though he himself suffered an RKO for his efforts.  Wade Barrett has very quickly evolved into a legitimate threat for the WWE Championship.

Other thoughts…

• I really felt bad for Dolph Ziggler after Daniel Bryan hit him in the face for about the 17th time.  That being said, both men had one hell of a match.  I’m not sure if I would use the term “stole the show” but they were pretty close.
• I was surprised that Kaitlyn did not appear at all in the match to further her feud with Vickie Guerrero…but I’m glad she didn’t.
• I hate to see a team with as much promise as Cody Rhodes and Drew McIntyre get buried by losing to John Cena, but I do like that Nexus has some gold.  Call me torn on the matter.
• Good call giving Ted DiBiase the win but keeping the belt on Goldust.
• Aksana spent half of the match keeping her dress from exposing her rear.  Personally, I thought she should just let it happen.
• I think I’m getting sick of LayCool, but I also think that’s pretty much the point. 
• What I don’t get is how Layla can defend the belt that was clearly won by Michelle McCool.  Had Natalya beaten her, would she be the legitimate champion?
• What were Nexus doing in the Undertaker/Kane match?
• After the Buried Alive Match, the commentators seemed baffled by Kane “summoning” a bulldozer to bury the Undertaker, despite it sitting there for the entire match, as well as being present on the Smackdown before the show.
• For that matter, the bulldozer was used in the last Buried Alive match as well.  Perhaps even the one before that.