{"id":36143,"date":"2016-12-11T03:28:22","date_gmt":"2016-12-11T09:28:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/?p=36143"},"modified":"2016-12-11T03:30:38","modified_gmt":"2016-12-11T09:30:38","slug":"best-worst-week-thru-1210-enzo-rusev-snow-shera-corbin-big-show-gives-nakamura-joe-sandowrex","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/2016\/12\/11\/best-worst-week-thru-1210-enzo-rusev-snow-shera-corbin-big-show-gives-nakamura-joe-sandowrex\/","title":{"rendered":"BEST &#038; WORST OF THE WEEK (Thru 12\/9): Enzo-Rusev, Snow-Shera, Corbin, Big Show gives up, Nakamura-Joe, Sandow\/Rex"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"pwtor-1647899111\" class=\"pwtor-before-content pwtor-entity-placement\"><hr \/><b>SPOTLIGHTED PODCAST ALERT (YOUR ARTICLE BEGINS A FEW INCHES DOWN)... <\/b>\r\n\r\n<iframe src=\"https:\/\/widget.spreaker.com\/player?show_id=3076978&theme=light&playlist=false&playlist-continuous=false&autoplay=false&live-autoplay=false&chapters-image=true&episode_image_position=right&hide-logo=false&hide-likes=false&hide-comments=false&hide-sharing=false&hide-download=true\" width=\"100%\" height=\"140px\" frameborder=\"0\"><\/iframe>\r\n<hr \/><\/div><p dir=\"ltr\">Best and Worst of the Week seeks out the greatest, and the most groan-inducing things we saw over the past seven days in WWE and TNA. It can be tough to be a wrestling fan at times, but if we stick through it together, we\u2019ll all come out stronger in the end. We may even learn a few life lessons along the way. Or maybe we\u2019ll all collectively lose our minds over the 5,000th Stephanie McMahon segment. We won\u2019t know unless we watch it all. Now ring the bell!<\/p>\n<h2 dir=\"ltr\"><b><u>Worst of the Week<\/u><\/b><\/h2>\n<h3 dir=\"ltr\">5. Big Show Gives Up<\/h3>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Imagine watching a UFC fight, and one of the fighters gave up because somebody on the outside of the cage was heckling them too much for their taste. Would Dana White ever let them compete again? That\u2019s kind of what The Big Show did this week on Raw. What made it worse was that we were supposed to view his actions as a babyface move. The lumbering giant once again emerged from hibernation, but he now cares so little about wrestling, that someone yelling at him was grounds for quitting. Go back to your mini mall!<\/p>\n<h3 dir=\"ltr\">4. Mauro vs. JBL<\/h3>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Mauro Ranallo appears to have some backstage heat on him. This is possibly in response to him being better at his job than his fellow co-workers. On Raw, Michael Cole seemed to be taking a shot at someone for Retweeting too much. On SmackDown, it looked like we found the culprit.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">JBL went after Mauro multiple times for arguing with \u201ctrolls\u201d on Twitter. Okay, so even if he was in character, who cares? Why is that something that needs to be addressed on a wrestling show? This eventually lead to a real life blocking from JBL after Mauro Retweeted a fan who came to his defense.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">I\u2019m trying to picture Jim Ross and Bob Caudle having this same interaction, and I just can\u2019t do it. Hopefully next week the announcers will keep their petty annoyances off-air. But this is WWE after all, so it wouldn\u2019t be shocking to see it become a full-fledged angle.<\/p>\n<h3 dir=\"ltr\">3. The Tussle in Texas<\/h3>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Didn\u2019t Titus O\u2019Neil grab Vince McMahon\u2019s arm almost a year ago? Didn\u2019t he already serve his time for that infraction? Perhaps The Titus Brand is all in humor, but the joke isn\u2019t readily apparent. Here\u2019s a guy that had a bit of an upside not too long ago, but has been reduced to jobbing in mere seconds to a guy that is one of the least relevant members on the roster. There has to be better ways to fill three hours Raws than this.<\/p>\n<h3 dir=\"ltr\">2. Al Snow &amp;\u00a0Mahabali Shera vs. The Tribunal<\/h3>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">There is nothing good about the Al Snow and Mahabali Shera pairing. Nothing! Snow was doing some of the best work of his career not long ago as an aging prick of a veteran. He was stuck with The Tribunal, though, who are one of the weakest tag teams in wrestling. Then he was turned face and was paired with Shera. Together, the four of them put on one of the least necessary strap matches in wrestling history this week on Impact. To the surprise of no one, it was terrible.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Poor Al. No matter how hard you work, and no matter how much you have improved, sometimes you\u2019re stuck in a really bad situation you can\u2019t get out of. That must be some sort of life lesson that TNA is trying to teach us.<\/p><div id=\"pwtor-3759242787\" class=\"pwtor-content pwtor-entity-placement\"><div align=\"center\" data-freestar-ad=\"__336x280 __336x280\" id=\"pwtorchcom_test_300x250\">\r\n  <script data-cfasync=\"false\" type=\"text\/javascript\">\r\n    freestar.config.enabled_slots.push({ placementName: \"pwtorchcom_test_300x250\", slotId: \"pwtorchcom_test_300x250\" });\r\n  <\/script>\r\n<\/div><\/div>\n<h3 dir=\"ltr\">1. Enzo\u2019s Bedroom Brawl<\/h3>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Even after 30 years of presenting professional wrestling, Vince McMahon still can&#8217;t decide on a consistent way to present his TV shows. Do wrestlers know there is a camera in front of them or not? Why is it so hard to just pick a side and stick with it? I would vote that they do know at all times, but my vote doesn\u2019t count. I will instead ask politely that he makes up his mind within the next decade.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">This week\u2019s latest illogical step saw Enzo Amore continuing to be a horrible person, as he was about to fool around with a married woman. Two cameramen caught this all on film. He got beat up in the process, but it\u2019s hard to feel bad for him, as he willingly showed up to have sex with another man\u2019s wife after sexually harassing her in past weeks. Isn\u2019t that the sort of thing that used to make Rick Rude a heel?<\/p>\n<h2 dir=\"ltr\"><u>Best of the Week<\/u><\/h2>\n<h3 dir=\"ltr\">5. Nakamura vs. Joe<\/h3>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Only a minor hit here. WWE didn\u2019t bring their \u201cA\u201d set, or lighting equipment, or even camera team to Japan it seemed, but it was still cool to see Nakamura and Joe battle it out in a whole new country. It made the NXT brand feel a touch more prestigious, even though the match itself was by far their weakest yet.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Here\u2019s to hoping this is the last of the title switches between the two, as Charlotte and Sasha Banks are already running that act into the ground on Raw. As a side note, I\u2019m also baffled why we need to see a Total Divas commercial during a title match on a network we pay for, but such is life as a WWE fan.<\/p>\n<h3 dir=\"ltr\">4. Finally, Some More Talent!<\/h3>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">The Raw, Smackdown, and NXT women\u2019s divisions are absolutely depleted. It\u2019s hard to have a legitimate division when each show only has half a dozen female competitors. In a long overdue move, WWE signed three promising women wrestlers: Nixon Newell, Kimber Lee and Heidi Lovelace.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">The best women\u2019s match I ever saw in person involved Lee and Lovelace, so hopefully they can start tearing it up on the NXT roster soon (Lee should get more of an opportunity than her quick job to Ember Moon this week now that she\u2019s full-time). This is a nice start, but the men still outnumber the women by roughly a 5-to-1 ratio if you add up everyone under contract. You just can\u2019t have a real revolution if you don\u2019t have the numbers to back it up.<\/p>\n<h3 dir=\"ltr\">3. Sandow Shines&#8230; I mean Rex<\/h3>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Aron Rex has finally turned into an interesting character in TNA. All it took was for him to revert back to what worked in the first place. It\u2019s too bad he cut that initial worked-shoot promo on his old gimmick when he first debuted on Impact, as it looks a bit foolish in hindsight now that he\u2019s going back to the same role. Still, it was the right call.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">His inability to accept that Moose was the better man made for some good comedy, and it also made him come across as an arrogant heel who needed to have some sense beat into him. Bonus points for Rex threatening to sue the entire crowd. Not sure why, but that was my favorite line of the week.<\/p><div id=\"pwtor-1661188087\" class=\"pwtor-content-1 pwtor-entity-placement\"><!-- Tag ID: pwtorchcom_test_300x600 -->\r\n<div align=\"center\" data-freestar-ad=\"__336x280 __300x600\" id=\"pwtorchcom_test_300x600\">\r\n  <script data-cfasync=\"false\" type=\"text\/javascript\">\r\n    freestar.config.enabled_slots.push({ placementName: \"pwtorchcom_test_300x600\", slotId: \"pwtorchcom_test_300x600\" });\r\n  <\/script>\r\n<\/div><\/div>\n<h3 dir=\"ltr\">2. Baron Corbin\u2019s Week<\/h3>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">It pains me to say this, but I\u2019ve come to the realization that Baron Corbin is the coolest guy on the SmackDown roster. Not from an in-ring perspective, but just going off a character standpoint. Dean Ambrose dresses up as wacky characters, A.J. Styles can\u2019t beat James Ellsworth, Dolph Ziggler isn\u2019t half as funny as he thinks he is and Mojo Rawley won\u2019t ever settle down. Meanwhile Corbin talks a big game, backs it up and then goes off and does his own thing. He\u2019s cooler than us, and we secretly want his lifestyle.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">This week he took down Kalisto multiple times, and didn\u2019t have to fall victim to 50\/50 booking like the majority of the roster. He also shined once again on Talking Smack by coming across as a genuine jerk. Not bad at all.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">As a small miss, I\u2019m not so I\u2019m not sure I understand the logic at play here for Kalisto\u2019s rematch. \u201cI couldn\u2019t beat you in a match where I could hit you with chairs&#8230;but I can beat you in a REGULAR match on SmackDown!\u201d I\u2019m paraphrasing here.<\/p>\n<h3 dir=\"ltr\"><b>1. Styles vs. Ambrose<\/b><\/h3>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">The ending stunk, and it made no sense, but A.J. Styles and Dean Ambrose still delivered one hell of a main event at TLC. Styles may have completely locked in the wrestler of the year in 2016 with that performance, as his streak of delivering great feuds with a variety of opponents continued.<\/p>\n<p><span id=\"m_-3255790808575217561gmail-docs-internal-guid-f587017c-ea75-5199-ee5f-aabef54ec1d2\">It makes you wonder how incredible the match would have been with a different finish, and an entire build that didn\u2019t revolve around James Ellsworth. But still, from a pure match-quality standpoint, it may be the strongest Tables Ladders and Chairs match featuring singles competitors we\u2019ve seen so far.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><strong>NOW CHECK OUT LAST WEEK&#8217;S ARTICLE:\u00a0<\/strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/2016\/12\/09\/best-worst-week-thru-122-heymans-tears-beckys-fire-205-live-james-storm-bar-fight-mother-styles-clashes\/\">BEST AND WORST OF THE WEEK (Thru 12\/2): Heyman\u2019s tears, Becky\u2019s fire, 205 Live, James Storm, Bar Fight, Mother of All Styles Clashes<\/a><\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<div class=\"entry-content clearfix\">\n<div class=\"yj6qo ajU\">\n<div id=\":vr\" class=\"ajR\" tabindex=\"0\" data-tooltip=\"Show trimmed content\">\n<p><em>(This is the second edition\u00a0of Andrew Sousek\u2019s new \u201cBest &amp; Worst of the Week\u201d feature. It will run on a weekly basis right here at PWTorch every weekend.)<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"pwtor-end-article-groups pwtor-entity-placement\" id=\"pwtor-4052794628\"><div id=\"pwtor-2448894515\"><div align=\"center\" data-freestar-ad=\"__336x280\" id=\"pwtorchcom_medrec_3\">\r\n  <script data-cfasync=\"false\" type=\"text\/javascript\">\r\n    freestar.config.enabled_slots.push({ placementName: \"pwtorchcom_medrec_3\", slotId: \"pwtorchcom_medrec_3\" });\r\n  <\/script>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\nTHANK YOU FOR VISITING<\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div class=\"mh-excerpt\"><p>Best and Worst of the Week seeks out the greatest, and the most groan-inducing things we saw over the past seven days in WWE and TNA. It can be tough to be a wrestling fan <a class=\"mh-excerpt-more\" href=\"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/2016\/12\/11\/best-worst-week-thru-1210-enzo-rusev-snow-shera-corbin-big-show-gives-nakamura-joe-sandowrex\/\" title=\"BEST &#038; WORST OF THE WEEK (Thru 12\/9): Enzo-Rusev, Snow-Shera, Corbin, Big Show gives up, Nakamura-Joe, Sandow\/Rex\">[&#8230;]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5639,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"episode_type":"","audio_file":"","podmotor_file_id":"","podmotor_episode_id":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","itunes_episode_number":"","itunes_title":"","itunes_season_number":"","itunes_episode_type":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[46,4380,52,27],"tags":[2387,3655,517,164,2332,719,1327],"class_list":["post-36143","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-spotlightarticles","category-best-worst-of-the-week","category-opnionandanalysis","category-specialists","tag-al-snow","tag-aron-rex","tag-baron-corbin","tag-big-show","tag-enzo-amore","tag-jbl","tag-mauro-ranallo"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/ShowBigTB_3x2_600.png","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36143","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36143"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36143\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":36149,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36143\/revisions\/36149"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5639"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36143"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36143"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36143"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}