8 Reasons WWE's Money In The Bank Concept Is Played Out
The briefcase gimmick has had its day.
Upon its debut in 2005, the Money in the Bank ladder match was an undisputed hit. The spots provided by the likes of Shelton Benjamin, Chris Benoit, and the rest put a new spin on a simple ladder match, and created an intriguing concept that could keep audience interest all year round. When Edge cashed in the briefcase nine months later, his WWE Championship win over a defenseless John Cena was a moment instantly etched into unmistakable WWE history.
Eleven years later, the gimmick continues onward, with the bloom explicitly off its rose.
Like any intriguing concept, Money in the Bank has kinda lost its luster. Since becoming a standalone event in 2010, at first featuring two annual ladder matches for World Championship match contracts, the thrill of the gimmick has slowly petered out, owed to overexposure, and beating a dead horse with little variance to the strikes.
There's no doubt the match was great for launching new main eventers, be they Edge, CM Punk, Daniel Bryan, or Seth Rollins, but there are other ways of going about building new stars. Besides, most of the faults aren't with the match itself. It's the logistics of Money in the Bank that have run the cash-in storyline firmly into the ground.
8. The Contract Almost Guarantees Screwy Title Switches
Only two briefcase-holders ever cashed in "honorably": Rob Van Dam in 2006, and John Cena in 2012. They gave advance notice to the respective champion of the date they intended to hand in the briefcase in exchange for their entitled shot. In every other instance, cashing in has been centered around taking advantage of the champion in a physically-compromised state.
Simply put, that concept is old. It should be a bit more shocking when a World Champion loses his belt for contestable reasons. The endurance of the Money in the Bank gimmick has made each ensuing cash-in attempt less effective as a memorable moment (with a few exceptions).
Nowadays, it's only exciting when it's a legit crowd favorite like Rollins or Dolph Ziggler that dethrones the exhausted titleholder. Otherwise, the virtually-annual cash-ins devalue the belt.