Veteran NFL writer and Pat McAfee Show correspondent Mark Kaboly gives his 10 WWE Crown Jewel takeaways from Saturday’s PLE in Saudi Arabia.
Crown Jewel of wrestling: We have been conditioned over time – for the most part – that for a match to be considered entertaining that it needs some sort of extra-curricular activity that decides the outcome. You could pretty much reach into a hat and pull out a name and come up with somebody who both Cody Rhodes and Gunther had beef with recently – Ludwig Kaiser, Goldberg, The New Bloodline, Roman Reigns, Damian Priest, Kevin Owens, Randy Orton, Sami Zayn, The Rock and surely others who were willing to butt into the match. It never happened during the Men’s Crown Jewel Championship, and honestly, if Corey Graves did not precisely explain the backstory associated with Rhodes’ Bret Hart-like reversal of Gunther’s sleeper to get the win, you could easily question the ending of the match. This did not need a gimmick other than just matching up the best vs. best. It did not need to have a messy finish to have an effect. It strengthened Rhodes’ hold as the top dog in the company and left Gunther with plenty of room to still ascend to.
The OTC is a mess: It was another surprising clean finish in the Six-Team Tag Match that saw Solo Sikoa pinning Reigns all alone in the center of the ring. Forget about the result for a moment and focus on what the Original Bloodline looked like – utter disarray. OK, maybe it was expected with the trio not partaking in a match together in 27 months and The Usos not being together for the past 18 months, but it came across clear in this bout that you had one faction that has it all working (The New Bloodline) and one (Original Bloodline) that is still trying to figure each other out and it all had to do with trust. Does Reigns trust Jey Uso? Does Jey Uso trust Reigns? Does anybody trust Sami Zayn even with his after-match help? Reigns' facial expressions before and during the match showed that he was not fully invested in the match and may have regretted “Yeeting” Jey Uso on SmackDown a few days earlier. The match highlighted the dysfunction of the hastily put together Reigns’ Bloodline that really should set up an interesting month heading into Survivor Series: WarGames.
Solo taking over: I know it is the cool thing to do to point out some of Sikoa’s shortcomings after he has become highly visible while being thrust into The Tribal Chief role of The New Bloodline. Besides LA Knight, Carmelo Hayes, and Andrade’s spectacular performance in the United States ChampionshipTriple Threat Match, Sikoa stood out the most to me. Sikoa continues to expand his role as the new Tribal Chief to the point where you might understand why Jacob Fatu “loves” him so much. Turning into a good mouthpiece after being Reigns’ heavy is one thing. Delivering a quality performance inside the ring is another story altogether. Sikoa countering Reigns Superman Punch and Spear as well as avoiding a double Super Kick by the Usos said a lot. A double Samoan Spike on Reigns ended it and now Sikoa owns pins over Rhodes and Reigns in less than four months.
Any competition left? Even though Lash Legend and Jakara Jackson held their own during their PLE debut and Damage CTRL are quite talented, it become ever clearer in their WWE Women’s Tag Team Championship Fatal 4-Way Match that Jade Cargill and Bianca Belair are as unbeatable as they have ever been. It was an entertaining match but it never came across that the other three teams were on the champions' level. To me, it is almost at the point where the only way they even remotely have a chance to lose if there are shenanigans or stipulation match of some sort. We all know how good the two are and they showed that once again at Crown Jewel, but it is appropriate to ask (and fitting with Goldberg announcing he will have one last match) “who’s next?”
No losers here: Two things had to happen in the match between “Big” Bronson Reed and Seth “Freakin” Rollins for this to work: 1) Rollins had to come away victorious to potentially set up a championship run against Gunther and, 2) Reed had to maintain his momentum that he’s accrued over the past few months without harming his bad ass persona he has built up. Both happened. In what had to be a brutal match considering what led to the two finally meeting in the ring delivered from the start (I love it when there is so much heat leading up to the match that the fight starts before the second wrestler gets in the ring). Reed getting to his feet, blood streaming down his face, just moments after taking three wild Stomps from Rollins tells me this might not be done after all depending on what takes place on Raw during the No. 1 Contender Fatal Four Way match that involves Rollins. Rollins’ look on his face said the same.
Bad vs. Bad: Kevin Owens is spectacular being a bad guy. Randy Orton is incredibly good at being a bad guy. Both of those came through during their No Contest encounter. You have to imagine that this was just a tease of something bigger coming down the road very soon and maybe not with just Orton. Owens used every bad guy trick in the book – sneak attack right before the match started, smacking around the referee, trolling with a “Cowboy” Bob Orton t-shirt, brawling in the stands and that crazy elbow off the stage onto Orton. It left you wanting more and that is good. My only question is why is Owens so sore at Orton and Rhodes? Because Rhodes joined Roman Reigns for one match and Orton punched him in the ring? There is more to this storyline than we are seeing. Regardless, Owens is hot right now – white hot.
Liv does it the Liv way: It was interesting that the Men’s Crown Jewel Match was straight forward as straight forward can be, but the Women’s version had enough chaotic events for the entire PLE. That is fine and it was needed on Morgan's end to overcome the size and strength differential with Nia Jax. It was a solid match with a big-game feel to it and Tiffany Stratton nearly cashing in her Money in the Back contract a couple of times added even more excitement. And one final thing was clear - winning the Crown Jewel Title seemed to be a big deal for Morgan.
Best of the Night: The Triple-Threat match for the United States Championship lived up to what was expected out of three of the more dynamic wrestlers in WWE – LA Knight, Carmelo Hayes, and Andrade. With expectations as high as they were based off Andrade and Hayes’ recent history, it cannot be easy to add a third player like Knight and keep up the intensity. Well, they did. If there was one thing that did not work for me was the less than 10-minute match time, but if that is the only problem then they did something right.
No need for a Game 7: As we all know, Hayes and Andrade have put on a wrestling clinic over the past few months that has turned into a thing itself – a best of 7 series. All indications after the results of Crown Jewel suggest that a concluding chapter will happen. But does it have to happen right now? With not much SmackDown competition for Knight in terms of other emerging contenders (until Logan Paul possibly returns), Andrade and Hayes could continue to go after Knight and the United States title and always revisit the Game 7 at a later point. I would like to see Montez Ford get involved in some capacity as well. Whatever happens, it is a good problem to try to figure out.
Odds and ends: For the most part, this was a display of incredible in-ring wrestling from top to bottom. … Reigns looks like a lost soul to me, sort of like he needs some direction from a Wise Man perhaps. … Jey Uso looked like a Singles champion in the ring and not just a part of a tag team with his twin brother. … Having Reigns sit out for the first 12 minutes may have been ad-libbed but it was a little too long for my liking. … I got a feeling that what we saw from Zayn is that it might not be as it seems. … Andrade might be the most athletic Superstar on the roster. … Jacob Fatu continued to do asinine spots for his size where it has almost become expected from him. … Tama Tonga had a solid performance for the New Bloodline. … The fans in Saudi Arabia were as loud and engaged as any crowd that I have ever seen. … I would love to know what Gunther said to Rhodes after he shook his hand in defeat. … Corey Graves with a Dwayne Wade statue reference about Carmelo’s face getting smacked on the announcer’s table was spectacular.