5 Biggest Missed Opportunities From WWE Stomping Grounds 2019
Been there, done that, retained the title.
On Sunday night, WWE hosted the inaugural edition of its brand new (and bizarrely-named) pay-per-view Stomping Grounds and the results were quite interesting.
No, that statement is not actually referring to the outcomes of each match (those were rather predictable), it's making reference to the overall standard of action which, in all honesty, was quite a mixed bag.
Seth Rollins put his Universal Championship on the line against his long-time rival Baron Corbin in a match that was officiated by an unapologetically rogue referee, while Ricochet climbed the ladder of success to defeat Samoa Joe and win his first U.S. Championship, and Daniel Bryan was treated like a hometown hero as he and Rowan successfully defended the SmackDown Tag Team Titles against Heavy Machinery.
Yes, the night started off with a number of pleasantly surprising highs, but unfortunately, the standard declined throughout the event as Stomping Grounds soon fell victim to more than a few issues - issues that have been plaguing WWE programming for some time now. As a result, it ended up being just another uneventful pay-per-view, which is unfortunate given that it had the potential to be so much more.
5. The Chance To Make A Fresh PPV Feel Fresh
In spite of its not-so-great name, Stomping Grounds was uncharted territory for WWE, so it goes without saying that the creative team could have used this fresh new opportunity to produce something, well, fresh and new.
While the first half ended up feeling like they had indeed figured that out, the fact of the matter is that this event was doomed to fail before it even started. After all, how many of the matches due to take place were rematches?
Becky Lynch's title defence against Lacey Evans was a rematch from Money In The Bank, Roman Reigns' showdown with Drew McIntyre had already been done at WrestleMania - and then you have the Universal and WWE Championship matches which were both Super ShowDown rematches simply orchestrated in a cheap attempt to ensure that the respective rivalries between Rollins and Corbin and Kingston and Ziggler would finally be considered part of the official WWE canon.
What makes it even more redundant is none of these four rematches were significantly better than their predecessors and, to top it all off, they ended with the exact same results! With that in mind, you have to ask: What did it really accomplish?
It's unfortunate because, following the mess that was Super ShowDown, they had a real shot here to produce something of a much higher standard. Instead, we got a moderately decent offering that wasn't particularly great or awful. It just existed which, at this point, is what all WWE pay-per-views seem to do.