Brock Lesnar def. Triple H

LOS ANGELES — Paul Heyman vowed Brock Lesnar would make Triple H tap out and end his career at SummerSlam, and when the clouds of “The Perfect Storm” broke, Heyman’s bold prediction appeared to have veracity. Lesnar defeated Triple H in an intrepid war that has game-changing ramifications for the entire WWE, not the least of which is the potential departure of Triple H as an in-ring competitor. ( PHOTOS |  TRIPLE H INJURY UPDATE | WATCH: PAUL HEYMAN EXCLUSIVE)

The much vaunted win marks a crowning achievement for the unruly “fighter with ultimate credentials,” but for The Game, the match may well represent the final chapter. Looking like a battered gladiator who had just fought the war of his life, The King of Kings exited STAPLES Center to loud applause. In losing, Triple H fought valiantly, tirelessly. Having left it all out in the ring, there will be no dishonor for The Game — no matter whose hand was raised — and no questions about his resolve.

It took Lesnar 20 minutes of some of the most physically intense action ever witnessed by the WWE Universe to accomplish what he set out to do. Battle-weary, a groggy Lesnar managed to tap out the WWE COO with the Kimura Lock, the same hold that broke Triple H’s arm in April and Shawn Michaels’ arm last Monday.

With his best friend, HBK, laid up due to injuries caused by Lesnar, Triple H dauntlessly ventured into battle alone against Lesnar, who had his incorrigible representative, Paul Heyman, ringside. Tweeting from home, HBK wrote prior to the match, “This match is gonna be about more than winning or losing, but about surviving.”

HBK’s tweet was prescient. Once the bell rang, the two gladiators charged at each other full force. Lesnar used his boulder-sized shoulders to jam The Game into the corner. An early attempt to cinch in the Kimura Lock was fruitless, as Triple H escaped and disposed of Lesnar over the top rope. After taking a moment to recompose himself, Lesnar re-entered the ring, removed his MMA-style gloves and glared menacingly across the ring. Lesnar repeatedly targeted Triple H’s left arm, key-locking the limb and slamming Triple H on it (once on a table), stomping on it and sending Triple H arm and shoulder first into the steel ring steps. The Game withstood the punishment, firing off his own DDT and nailing Lesnar with stiff blows.

The participants signed a hold harmless indemnification last Monday, and if there was ever a match whose wanton brutality justified it, this was the match. The King of Kings lives by the sword and he dies by the sword, and earlier in the evening, he instructed Scott Armstrong, the referee assigned to the match, to “let us fight.” HBK later tweeted that Armstrong should listen to the WWE COO.

Armstrong obliged. When both Superstars were brawling outside the ring, Armstrong held off on initiating a count. Later in the match, during one of Lesnar’s many attempts at the Kimura Lock, Triple H reached the ropes. Though such deft strategy would call for a break of the hold under normal circumstances — i.e., a “wrestling match” — the same would not be true for this fight.

As the contest sprawled around the ringside area, Lesnar climbed an upturned announce table and leaped high in the air, crashing down with a thud on Triple H’s back and head. While outside, The Cerebral Assassin tried to exploit whatever weaknesses of Lesnar he could find. He dragged Lesnar, stomach-first, into an edge of another announce table, temporarily weakening the monster. In November 2009, the seemingly inhuman Lesnar underwent surgery to close a tear in his intestine that had been causing excruciating abdominal pain, abscesses and overtaxing his immune system to the point that he contracted mononucleosis. From the level of damage to Lesnar's system, the surgeon that operated on Lesnar estimated that the intestinal condition had been ongoing for around a year. Many believe that the abdominal surgery led to the end of his UFC career.

Lesnar recovered enough to deliver a blatant low-blow. At that point, Heyman reminded the referee that Triple H “wanted the fight.” The man who sought to bring credibility to WWE then hoisted The Game onto his shoulders and spun him into an F-5 that, against all odds, Triple H kicked out of. ( PHOTOS)

After Triple H powered out of subsequent Kimura Lock, he rebounded just enough to drill Lesnar with the Pedigree.

On this night, however, Lesnar would not be denied. Ten years after beating The Rock at SummerSlam 2002 to become the youngest WWE Champion in history, Lesnar rolled through Triple H’s pin attempt and locked in the Kimura Lock. The gutsy Triple H battled to stay alive, but after Lesnar locked in the Kimura Lock even deeper, he had no choice but to tap.

If this loss is, in fact, the endgame for Triple H, as Lesnar and Heyman contended it would be, he went out in a blaze of glory. Lesnar held on the Kimura Lock just long enough to squeeze a submission out of Triple H. As soon as Armstrong called for the bell, Lesnar exhaustedly released the hold and crumbled to the mat.

WWE’s medical personnel swarmed the ring to assist Triple H to the back, but the proud Game would have none of it. He courageously limped away from the squared circle under his own power and just before stepping through the entrance, he soaked in a bit of the WWE Universe’s adulation.

Afterward, HBK’s tweet said it all: “What can be said...what a match, what brutality. Neither guy is gonna be the same after that one."