WWE Money In The Bank 2016

(Sorry for the tardiness of this one. Forgot about it. My bad. Also sorry about the typo in the image. Finally got around to fixing that too.)

It's been touted as the greatest Money In The Bank of all time, but I think the image above tells a more accurate assessment of last Sunday's show.

Per the case, I don't watch the pre-show. The main show is long enough as is.



Tag-Team champions The New Day defeated "The Club", The Vaudevillains, and Big Cass & Enzo to retain the titles. Nice little opener, but I'm getting bored with these New Day antics. They were fun for a while, but they overstayed their welcome. Plus, Will Riker wants his trombone back.

Kevin Owens cuts an interesting interview and even talks smack to Chris Jericho and Alberto Del Rio, pointing out their character flaws. It impresses me that Kevin Owens remains one of WWE's most interesting characters and that's more than enough reason for me to care about the guy; a concept that is foreign to most of WWE. Unfortunately, a Kevin Owens interview will end up being the highlight of the next hour and a half worth of "action."

Baron Corbin defeated Dolph Ziggler... who gives a shit?

Charlotte & Dana Brooke defeated Becky Lynch & Natalya when Charlotte pinned Nattie after a neckbreaker. Nattie then turns on Becky because Nattie's gone crazy after losing for months on end... again, who gives a shit?

Apollo Crews defeated Sheamus... seriously, who gives a shit?

Wow, for a show that's touted as the GREATEST OF ALL TIME, there's a lot of stuff nobody would give a shit about. Look, Baron Corbin beating Dolph Ziggler is akin to beating Glass Joe in Punch Out (doesn't help that the match is, as the crowd would point out, boring), Apollo Crews looks to be the second coming of Bobby Lashley (minus the personality if that's even possible - here's hoping the guy proves me wrong), and I seriously don't think turning Nattie heel is going to make her interesting again, especially since she spent the past few months on her back.

Like I said, a Kevin Owens interview ended up being the highlight of the show thus far. Maybe they should've just had Kevin Owens talk for an hour instead the past three matches worth of "Who Gives A Shit?"

AJ Styles defeated John Cena thanks to "Club" interference that poor AJ didn't know about or something. Well, there's your dream match, folks. And it wasn't THE GREATEST OF ALL TIME. But it was good enough. Look, poor Johnny just came back from a terrible injury and was on the shelf for months. Not to mention that legal spat over some shirt that looks like some beer. He hasn't gotten around to "overcoming the odds" and "putting people over" by making them look like complete tools yet. Give him time (and a rematch) and things will return to normal in time for the brand split. But, in all seriousness, this match was fine, it was interesting, and mildly entertaining. No GOATs here, but I'm sure we'll have plenty of opportunities for that down the line.

Dean Ambrose won the Money In The Bank ladder match featuring a whole bunch of other guys who don't matter. Yes, I know KO was in this, but honestly, he didn't matter here. But, hey, Dean Ambrose actually won something for once! Amazing concept, isn't it? Anyway, this was your usual Money In The Bank ladder match with a bunch of spots, a big spot involving a ladder, and no story behind any of it. It's entertaining enough to keep you awake and even interested, but I think once you've seen one MiTB ladder match, you've pretty much seen them all and maybe it's time to retire the concept before it gets stale. Of course, WWE is the master of staleness these days, so...

United States champion Rusev defeated Titus O'Neil to retain the title. Rusev then laughs at Titus O'Neil's kids who were sitting at ringside... now say it with me, boys and girls. "Who gives a shit?"

[And this feud is still ongoing for some reason.]

Seth Rollins defeated WWE Champion Roman Reigns to win the title, thus saving us from a prolonged Roman Reigns world title reign that nobody seems to care about. I'm pretty sure those booing Roman Reigns right now are just booing him out of habit, not because he's a terrible babyface with no personality or likable quirks. This was a match going through the motions and lacking any real drama or interest. Seth tries to be the chickenshit heel to make Roman look strong, but Roman is just so bland and uninteresting that Seth becomes the hero by default, since he came back from a dehibilitating injury that stripped him of the title he never lost; the same title Roman is holding now or was or whatever.

In any event, the right guy won here, as nobody gives a shit about Roman Reigns and Seth Rollins reclaims the title that he never lost... only to be blindsided by Dean Ambrose who decides to cash in and one Dirty Deed later, Ambrose wins the title, thus allowing Seth Rollins to lose the title the right way (I guess) and giving Ambrose some measure of revenge for jobbing to holograms and exploding televisions a year prior. I admit to having the fear that Ambrose would cash in and Seth would manage to sneak out a win, but I'm glad to be wrong in this case and maybe with Ambrose as champion (which I don't expect to last long) and that triple threat title match match for next month's Battlefront PPV or whatever it's called, maybe this Shield explosion will come to fruition

And who knows? Maybe this will give Roman Reigns something fuel to light his fire and give him that spark he so desperately needs. No doubt with weeks of build-up based on past personal tensions, we can see Roman get some much needed character development that will endear the WWE Universe to him. I'm fairly certain that WWE will do all they can to make sure Roman looks...

Um... yeah.... right.

But the most important thing to come out of this match? We're spared the indignity of watching someone carry an obnoxious looking briefcase for close to a year before they decide to cash in on their title shot. Maybe this is the greatest of all time on that note alone... except not.

It should be noted that the show ran a little over three hours. Possibly close to three and a half hours. There is no reason for a nothing show like this to be this long, especially when there's a whole bunch of nothing matches that could've easily been excised from the card and banished to Superstars or some nothing show like that. If Money In The Bank 2016 had been just the ladder match, the World title match, Cena vs. Styles, the tag-title match, and possibly a nice, strong mid-card match or even a worthwhile Women's match and all of that was paced a little better, it probably would've meant a somewhat better offering. Not necessarily the greatest of all time because there is no way in hell anyone is going to touch MiTB 2011 (both in terms of wrestling and stories told), but it would've been fine.

As it is now, there's a lot of worthless shit that you have to blow through in order to get to the halfway decent stuff. And the longer-than-necessarily runtime doesn't help matters, either. At this point, why bother with the pre-show and make the fucking things six hours long?

On second thought, please don't do that. Just don't.

Overall, if you want to watch the greatest MiTB show of all time, just watch the one from 2011. This one was merely okay with a side order of "Who Gives A Shit" tossed in for bad measure.