WWE No Mercy 2017 Review

WWE No Mercy 2017

Announcers: Michael Cole, Corey Graves, Booker T & Vic Joseph

Location: Los Angeles, CA

Venue: The Staples Center

A solid match to kick off the show with the 7-time Intercontinental champion The Miz defending against Jason Jordan. Miz had The Miztourage Bo Dalls & Curtis Axel with him at ringside who proved very useful to the champion. Crowd was hot for The Miz because he is billed as from LA these days. Dallas & Axel provided a distraction to help Miz get an early advantage working over Jordan's mid-section with the 'It' Kicks. Jordan manages to catch Miz charging at him in the corner and starts throwing him around with various suplexes. Jordan's hits his awesome looking multiple Northern Lights Suplexes but only gets 2. Jordan looks to be going for the finish but Dallas is on the turnbuckle. Jordan knocks him down and while the ref is distratced, Axel blasts Jordan and is met by a Skull Crushing Finale from The Miz for the win. I think this was the right call because Jordan is still early into his push and needs to chase Miz to get the title. Build that momentum and try and get the crowd more behind him because it isn't quite working yet.

Next up we got the AWFULLY titled Man Vs Man match pitting Bray Wyatt against Finn Balor and his not very subtle new attire! I thought this match was decent and actually better than the one they had at SummerSlam. Bray attacked Balor before the bell rang slamming him on the announce table helping to build sympathy for the babyface Balor. They told a really good story in this match with Balor selling the rib injuries he had suffered in the pre-match assault. This was one of the better showings for Bray as well as he exploited Balor's injuries to come across more dominant. The crowd was fairly into it and was solidly behind Balor. In the end Balor won but needed two Couple De Graces to win something I haven't seen before. This puts Balor 2-1 in this feud which probably means this is over but they might still drag it out for a gimmick match at TLC next month.

This year the WWE has been pulling out some excellent tag team matches and we got another one at No Mercy. Following on from their instant classic at SummerSlam the Raw Tag Team Champions Seth Rollins & Dean Ambrose defended their belts against the former champions Sheamus & Cesaro. Cesaro deserves a hell of a lot of credit as he took a vicious bump into the turnbuckle and got his mouth busted open and lost some teeth but still gutted it out for the majority of the match. There was an awesome spot where Cesaro Powerbombed Rollins onto Dean which drew the best reaction of the match. In the end Cesaro & Sheamus made one mistake with Sheamus accidentally hitting Cesaro with a Brogue kick taking him out of the match allowing Rollins & Dean to hit double team moves. I would have no issue with them giving these two teams another match at TLC if they are going to keep delivering matches these good.

So far No Mercy has been very entertaining and it continued with this next match for the Raw Women's Championship. The Goddess of WWE Alexa Bliss defended against Bayley, Emma, Nia Jax & Sasha Banks. This was a really great fast paced match with alot of near falls. Nia Jax got a really good reaction from the crowd and took a savage powerbomb bump on the outside involving all four of her opponents. I wouldn't say anyone looked particular weak in this match as everyone got a chance to shine and hit some big moves. The finish saw Bliss take advantage of the frantic pace hitting her DDT on Bayley for the win. I think this was the right choice as Bliss has only just won the title back and like I said no one really looked weak in this match. Asuka is coming next month at TLC and they might wanna put her straight into the title picture and Bliss would be a good foil for her.

The first of 2 Wrestlemania calibre matches for the night with the first ever one-on-one encounter between John Cena & Roman Reigns. Not surprisingly for a match between two of the most polarising superstars in WWE history the crowd was absolutely rabid. Reigns dominated for most of the match which started slow building towards the high spots making them feel bigger than they might if the match was rushed. The table spot with Reigns spearing Cena looked sick with Reigns looking like he DDT'd himself. Cena hit 4 AAs with one coming off the second rope and two back to back and still Reigns kicked out at two much to the shock of Cena and the crowd. As well as the table spot Reigns hit two Superman Punches on Cena and finished him off with a Spear. Show of respect after the match between the two that was expected. Cena is leaving for a bit now so will have to wait and see when he comes back. Reigns opens Raw this week on Miz TV so will imagine that will set up what is next for him.

So far so good for No Mercy but now....now....it all goes horribly wrong. Enzo Amore challenged Cruiserweight champion Neville in a match that Neville dominated as he should. Enzo barely got any offence in and for whatever reason he won! And not only that he won by kicking Neville in the balls with the refs back turned! And perhaps worse of all the crowd cheered this! WHY?!?! A year on from the incredible Cruiserweight Classic where we got to see the absolute best athletes under 205 pounds and now we have a champion who's gimmick is he can't wrestle and has to cheat to win. MADNESS!!

MAIN EVENT TIME!! The second Wrestlemania calibre match as the Universal Champion Brock Lesnar defends his big red title against the impressive Monster Among Men Braun Strowman. I thought this was a decent match with some good moments but I feel it could have been better. Perhaps this could have been better if it was a No Holds Barred match and was given a bit more time. The spot where Lesnar hit the first of 6 German Suplexes on Braun only for Braun to get up and Chokeslam Brock was awesome! Strowman was in control for the majority of the match and managed to hit his Running Powerslam finisher a number of times but was unable to finish Lesnar off. Brock had Braun in the Kimura lock for a long while which Braun sold fairly well and eventually led to him succumbing to defeat at the hands of an F5. Neither Braun here or Samoa Joe at Great Balls of Fire kicked out of an F5 which might upset some people but I feel like finishers are not protected enough in WWE. At least they are consistent with that! It seems like Brock going into Wrestlemania as champion is still the plan but hopefully they have something big for Braun going forward because he has been amazing the last few months and I personally wanted to see him win the title here but I have faith his time will come.

Overall I would say No Mercy was a good show that could have been better. The Tag & Women's title matches were very good and of course the Cena/Reigns match was as good as we all expected it to be. The main event was decent but I still feel that Braun should have won. The Cruiserweight title was awful and the more I think about I think it is the worse match I have seen on WWE PPV this year. Lets just pray Enzo's reign is short...like Neville wins it back on Raw!

What did you guys think of No Mercy? Let me know in the comments and thanks for reading!