The Year in PPV- 2008, Part III

As the year 2008 comes to an end, we are introduced to a brand new match type...


10. Unforgiven

Unforgiven introduced the concept of the short-lived Championship Scramble match. The first Scramble match was for the ECW Championship (Mark Henry, The Miz, Chavo Guerrero, Matt Hardy, and Finlay), the second for the WWE Championship (Triple H, MVP, Jeff Hardy, Shelton Benjamin, and The Brian Kendrick), and the third and final was for the World Heavyweight Championship (CM Punk, JBL, Batista, Rey Mysterio, and Kane). The ECW Scramble produces the best fan reaction for the result, the WWE Scramble is the best of the three and tells the competitive story between Jeff Hardy and Triple H, and the World Heavyweight Scramble is full of controversy since CM Punk was punted in the head by Randy Orton and taken out of the match at the last minute with a mystery participant taking his spot.

The highlight of the show isn't one of the Championship Scrambles though. Shawn Michaels's feud with Chris Jericho had gotten so personal, that they fought in an unsanctioned Street Fight. This is one of the best hardcore brawls to take place during this era because you can feel Shawn's emotion in everything he throws at Jericho. And to see Jericho get beat down for all the things he has done to Shawn and his family is VERY satisfying. However, Jericho's night wouldn't be over as he was named Punk's replacement in the World Heavyweight Championship Scramble match...

Mild Recommendation


11. No Mercy

One of the coolest factors of 2008 that I noticed during No Mercy is just how big the star power is. Big Show fought the Undertaker, Rey Mysterio fought Kane, Batista fought JBL to determine the number one contender for the World Heavyweight Championship, Matt Hardy defended his ECW Championship against Mark Henry, and Beth Phoenix defends the Women's Championship against Candice Michelle. There's also a fun in-ring segment featuring Randy Orton, MVP, CM Punk, Kofi Kingston, Cody Rhodes, Ted DiBiase, and Manu (one of the forgotten short-lived members of Priceless/Legacy). As you can see, a lot of these will not go down as all-time classics, but they do feature many of the top superstars in WWE history all on one show, so that's pretty important for a PPV.

Surprisingly, what should be a "filler" No Mercy PPV actually has two of the best championship matches of the year. The first is in the form of Triple H and Jeff Hardy for the WWE Championship. The two have great chemistry in their competitive nature and their contrast in styles (Hardy's high flying and Triple H's technical). But once again, Chris Jericho and Shawn Michaels own the show with another incredible match. This time, it is for Jericho's World Heavyweight Championship and it's in a match both men are familiar with: a ladder match. That's all you really need to sell the match to the viewer: Michaels. Jericho. Ladder match. Nothing else is needed.

Recommended


12. Cyber Sunday

The goal of Cyber Sunday should be to give the fans what they want right? It should go without saying that not every fan will be happy with the results, but the point is to make the general public happy. There's obvious givens, like choosing the guest referee (Shawn Michaels, Randy Orton, or Stone Cold Steve Austin) in the World Heavyweight Championship match between Chris Jericho and Batista, and some of the hardcore match selections for Kane and Rey Mysterio (Falls Count Anywhere, No Holds Barred, and Two Out of Three Falls) and Big Show and Undertaker (Knockout, "I Quit", and Last Man Standing) don't make too much of a difference on the events of the evening. Some of the match selections that have multiple desired results can be entertaining, like choosing who Matt Hardy will defend the ECW Championship against (Mark Henry, Evan Bourne, and Finlay), or who will face Santino Marella for the Intercontinental Championship (Goldust, Rowdy Roddy Piper, and the Honky Tonk Man).

However, there were three voting results I disagreed with. The first is pretty minor, but it's how the Diva's costume contest winner was decided. Without any statistical proof that she was the fans' number one vote, she's handed the victory. The second was choosing which tag team match we'd see (Cryme Tyme vs. The Miz and John Morrison, Mickie James and Jamie Noble vs. Layla and William Regal, and Cody Rhodes and Ted DiBiase vs. CM Punk and Kofi Kingston for the World Tag Team Championships). Not that I hated the actual match that we got, I just thought it's a weird decision to leave the POSTER CHILD for the PPV off the show, not to mention the fact that this was his THIRD consecutive PPV without a match (he probably wanted to drop a huge pipe bomb by this point). The biggest thing I disagreed with was the WWE Championship match. Don't get me wrong, the match was great, but when choosing who Triple H will defend the title against (Jeff Hardy, Vladimir Kozlov, or Hardy AND Kozlov in a Triple Threat), I would think the fans would want the result that produces the most excitement and Triple Threat screams "excitement" to me more than a traditional one-on-one match.

Mild Recommendation


13. Survivor Series

Boy, this show's kind of a disaster. What really didn't work for this year's Survivor Series was that a lot of the main events lacked excitement with the crowd (ironic, since I was just talking about excitement). The Undertaker took on Big Show in a casket match that put a lot of people to sleep, John Cena returned from injury to pretty big fanfare and had a match with Chris Jericho for the World Heavyweight Championship that had a warm to mild reception with Cena's hometown of Boston. The biggest stinker of the night was the planned Triple Threat for the WWE Championship. Jeff Hardy, who had been built up as the competitor to watch in this match, was "found unconscious" in his hotel the day of the event. I remember seeing this covered on actual news websites, the whole thing felt in bad taste. Without Hardy, Triple H and Kozlov completely stunk up the joint until the twist ending, where Vickie Guerrero proclaimed "He's here" and a third competitor came to the ring.

The ONLY saving grace of this show is in the traditional Survivor Series elimination matches. The event opened with Team HBK (Shawn Michaels, Cryme Tyme, Rey Mysterio, and the Great Khali) against Team JBL (JBL, Kane, MVP, The Miz, and John Morrison), then was followed by the Diva's elimination match of Team RAW (Beth Phoenix, Candice Michelle, Jillian Hall, Kelly Kelly, and Mickie James) against Team SmackDown (Michelle McCool, Maryse, Natalya, Victoria, and Maria), and the final elimination match saw Team Batista (Batista, CM Punk, Kofi Kingston, R-Truth, and Matt Hardy) face Team Orton (Randy Orton, Cody Rhodes, William Regal, Mark Henry, and Shelton Benjamin). Of the three, all of them are entertaining (yes, even the Diva's match for sheer cattiness) but for star power I'm partial to the Batista/Orton match.

Skip It


14. Armageddon

End of the year filler never looked so good. Armageddon features a better paced World Heavyweight Championship match between John Cena and Chris Jericho, an epic clash between Randy Orton and Batista, CM Punk and Rey Mysterio in a phenomenal match to determine the number one contender for the Intercontinental Championship, a shocking in-ring segment featuring JBL and Shawn Michaels (think "Lost my Smile" Shawn Michaels, but about the economic recession), and much more. The best part about this is that the show is actually pretty good, but in the grand scheme of things, it doesn't matter. This show was all about closing the year by celebrating the career of one man: Jeff Hardy.

In one of the biggest feel good moments you'll ever see as a wrestling fan, Jeff Hardy won the WWE Champion in a Triple Threat against Edge and Triple H. From the Royal Rumble against Orton, to his rivalry with Triple H, to his new, darker look with the face paint, to being taken out at Survivor Series, plus all of Jeff's personal tragedies outside the ring, the fans really wanted to see him hold the belt and as a Christmas gift to the fans, the unimaginable became a reality. The Triple Threat is very good given the talent of all three competitors, but you aren't watching it for the match. You're in it for the moment of seeing the culmination of Jeff Hardy's career.

Recommended


Final Thoughts: Jeff Hardy and Chris Jericho really were the stars of the year, with their characters a lot different from when the year began. There were quite a number of setbacks toward the end of the year, but overall, 2008 had a great roster and a lot of great moments and matches. Some older fans think this year was the beginning of the end, but there's still so much quality that took place that it's useless to ignore it.


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