WWE Clash Of Champions 2017: Star Ratings For All 7 Matches
Mattel and Tapout Present: WWE Black Hole.
A quick reminder of the criteria prior to the critique...
Using the quarter increment system of its Wrestling Observer inspiration, the full ***** rating is reserved only for those elusive matches as perfect as they are significant. Bret Hart Vs. Steve Austin from WrestleMania 13 and the first Hell In A Cell match are the benchmarks here. Significance is often weighted by history - so it must feel, instantly, like one of the absolute greatest matches in WWE history, much like John Cena Vs. CM Punk at Money In The Bank '11 did.
From ****3/4 to ****, we range from absolute best of the rest territory (The Undertaker Vs. Shawn Michaels, WrestleMania 25) to Match of the Year outliers (New Day Vs. Usos, SummerSlam '17). ***3/4 to *** covers the very good to the good, which may also incorporate the slight disappointments and over-achievers, dependant upon the level of talent involved. **3/4 to ** covers increasingly more average and or sloppy ground. *3/4 to * finds us firmly in the realm of the woeful and the uninspiring, and plain bad - whereas 3/4* to 0 is reserved only for the embarrassments, the full-scale atrocities, and the morbid fascinations.
Factors include, but are not limited to in-ring work, crowd heat, psychology, storytelling, significance and innovation...
7. KICKOFF - Mojo Rawley Vs. Zack Ryder
Tempting as it was to immediately write off Mojo Rawley's chances of singles success - with some justification, given his nothing CV - this was something of a quiet revelation.
The former partners did well to engineer an atmosphere of animosity, refusing to betray the wider storyline with by-the-numbers Kickoff lock-ups; Ryder flew into Rawley with an immediate, nicely-executed dropkick before Rawley patrolled the expected narrative pattern. Rawley showed something he hadn't yet shown, proving right the secondhand take of the heel turn's platform for genuine improvement. Rawley once possessed the worst traits of a jock with his irritating, Cro-Magnon enthusiasm; here, he became a very intense, trash-talking bully, smashing Ryder to the outside with a careless shove before fusing his flesh into the barricade with a wincing pounce.
Wasting no motion, Rawley studied from the Kevin Owens playbook by filling rest hold dead air with the characterful taunts of an unhinged man of sociopathic ambition - before punctuating a really quite good showcase performance with a positively brutal-looking running forearm smash. Ryder sold this brilliantly, too.
Still, that Mojo Rawley almost stole the show is a colossal indictment of Clash of Champions.
Star Rating: **1/2