10 Best Moments Of WWE WrestleMania 33 Weekend
9. Shinsuke Nakamura's Swansong
The match between Bobby Roode and Shinsuke Nakamura was a restrained masterclass of the wrestling art form.
Roode was operating in impervious heel mode throughout, refusing to engage Nakamura in the opening act. He then withstood Nakamura's relentlessly stiff barrage and re-injured his knee in a winning callback to their original match. Nakamura sold it as if it was hanging off the bone. Every time he had to use it, it weakened him. His selling was as consistent as it was believable. It felt like he was actually suffering in there.
His bumping was even better. When he was struck by Roode's match-changing chop block and subsequent backstabber, he fell to the mat in a cracked mirror image version of his "Yeoh!" entrance appeal. It was as if Roode had broken the whole and not just the part. Everything that happened had some bearing on the next; it was impossible not to invest in.
The finish was emphatic. Roode drilled Nakamura with a super version of his Glorious DDT, and that was it. There were no cheap near-falls, no gaps in logic. Nakamura put him over big, as per the tradition of NXT's floating roster, but on this evidence it's sad that the main roster doesn't do this more often with their heels. Nakamura looked great even in defeat.
They don't make 'em like that anymore - only, they do.