12 Ups And 7 Downs From WWE Clash Of Champions 2019

5. IC Title Is For Workhorses

The Miz Shinsuke Nakamura
WWE.com

Remember when the Intercontinental Championship was held by the best wrestlers on the roster? Well, Shinsuke Nakamura is still a pretty damn good wrestler.

But his match against The Miz was a disappointment. Nakamura relied on the antagonist Sami Zayn outside the ring to save him on multiple occasions, which would be understandable if it was some hard-fought, aggressive battle, but it felt like every TV match we’ve ever seen. It’s clear what they’re going for with Sami – and he’s good at his role – but Shinsuke didn’t look like a former NXT Champion and Royal Rumble winner.

Nakamura looked like a guy on cruise control who couldn’t deal with any speedbumps and needed someone to bail him out. Maybe part of that is Miz not looking like a huge threat with his worn-out offense.

But this match just didn’t do it, especially when compared to the bout that followed it.

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Contributor

Scott is a former journalist and longtime wrestling fan who was smart enough to abandon WCW during the Monday Night Wars the same time as the Radicalz. He fondly remembers watching WrestleMania III, IV, V and VI and Saturday Night's Main Event, came back to wrestling during the Attitude Era, and has been a consumer of sports entertainment since then. He's written for WhatCulture for more than a decade, establishing the Ups and Downs articles for WWE Raw and WWE PPVs/PLEs and composing pieces on a variety of topics.