Views from the Hawke’s Nest: WWE World Heavyweight Championship #1 Contender Tournament – 10.26.15

After Hell in a Cell, WWE booked a tournament to crown a new number one contender for Seth Rollins’ WWE World Heavyweight Championship. I took a look at the whole tournament because it sounded like a fun time.

First Round Match
Roman Reigns vs. Kofi Kingston (w/ Big E)

Kofi Kingston working on top for a singles match sounds terrible on paper. He did not impress me much here, but the match accomplished what it set out to do. It was competitive. Kofi was not awful. Reigns won cleanly while also continuing to prove that he has great timing in the ring and really has become one of the better in-ring talents that company has. The latter has largely gone unrecognized though because the Roman Reigns character has suffered greatly from booking, Roman Reigns the wrestler is arguably the most improved of the whole year. Anyway, Reigns thwarted an interference attempt from Big E. and then beat Kofi with a spear. (**3/4)

First Round Match
Kevin Owens vs. Cesaro

They only got about seven minutes of television time, and they decided to work a million miles an hour to compensate for that. That’s not a strategy I tend to appreciate anymore, but things picked up in the second half of the match when Cesaro strung together a really fun sequence of stuff. He ended up getting distracted by the referee though, which allowed Owens to hit him with the superkick and then the pop-up powerbomb. This was good, but these two can do better. (***)

First Round Match
Alberto del Rio vs. Neville

Coming off a somewhat flat if newsworthy return the night before, it was nice to see ADR produce a genuinely fun match in his second night back with the company. They did not go overboard at all, but they produced a ton of quality action and proved to have nice in-ring chemistry. I also like how ADR continues to win with different moves. On this night, Neville got trapped in the Tree of Joey Lawrence before ADR killed him with a double stomp for the victory. (***1/4)

First Round Match
Dolph Ziggler vs. Big E

I really did not like this match at all. Big E dominated Dolph in methodical fashion, and it got zero reaction whatsoever. Big E had his work cut out for him, and he just did not deliver a big-time performance. Dolph’s underdog work was just not gripping, and the fact that he won did not feel earned at all. He connected on a late superkick, Big E later crashed into a ringpost, and then Dolph hit the Zig Zag. This was tedious to watch. (*)

Tournament Final for the #1 Contender to the WWE World Heavyweight Championship
Kevin Owens vs. Alberto del Rio vs. Roman Reigns vs. Dolph Ziggler

This match basically can be divided in three parts. The first part saw all four men brawling. They were working hard for sure, but they did not commit fully to making this the wild spectacle that it could have been.

The second part of the match briefly saw Owens and ADR team up to work over Ziggler. I always find these portions of four-ways to be dull and a bit forced. I’m not sure how much they actually contribute to the match, and they mostly just seem to stall for time.

The final part of the match final saw things pick up. This was a fairly excited back-and-forth with everyone getting decent nearfalls. They probably should have made the match only this segment or committed more to the earlier parts to make those important.

With Ziggler and ADR taken out, the match ended on what seemed to have the makings of an epic showdown between Reigns and Owens. Instead, Reigns thwarted the powerbomb attempt with a Superman Punch and then easily finished Owens with the spear. I was shocked to see Owens to take this fall instead of Ziggler. (***)

Watch some free matches with these wrestlers!

The Shield vs. Cody Rhodes & Goldust

Kevin Owens vs. Cesaro

Alberto del Rio vs. John Morrison

Dolph Ziggler vs. Daniel Bryan

Neville vs. Sami Zayn

Kofi Kingston vs. Dolph Ziggler

Cesaro vs. Seth Rollins