Thoughts on the Iron Man Match

[Guest Dmann2000]

Point taken on both counts

[Papacita 0]

It wasn't an off night, they just aren't good enough to pull it off. They do have limitations. The WWE style has limitations, it is a style which mainly relies on spots and formula. 60 minutes tends to over-extend the formula and spots and brawling alone cannot carry the match. Angle and Lesnar are both products of the WWE style - it's all they know, it's all they're told - so it naturally suffered.

I wouldn't say that they're incapable of doing it, because with the right preparation (watching old tapes and what not) they could've easily pulled it off. I think the problem tonight was that they were afraid that fans would get bored with a long technical match and tune out, and chose to go with the more spotty style in order to keep people interested. That's another reason why they would've been better off running the match on PPV, because they don't have to worry about sustaining ratings as long as people buy the show.

[RavishingRickRudo 0]

Of course they are capable of it. Both are athletic freaks with workrate out the ying-yang, but it would take years of experience in several different promotions and styles for them to successfully pull it off. I mean, Angle has been wrestling for 5 years, Brock for maybe 3 - 8 years experience with just one style and just one way of working between them and giving them 1 hour in the ring? Now, I'm no big shot professional wrestler and am in no way associated with the business other than being a fan of it, but that's not exactly the 'right' combination of guys I'd have in there.

[RavishingRickRudo 0]

And I don't think Lesnar and Angle even know how to do a "technical" match with each other. All they know is spot, brawl, spot, brawl, longer spot, brawl.

[Bored 0]

Just watched it...I dug it. I think it was never going to live up to everyone's expectations. I think everyone knew going in that there was no way it would be a MOTYC. The match does blow away anything you'll see on Sunday that you have pay $35 for although I guess that isn't saying much. But hey I stayed interested through most of the match, they limited the match to one ref bump and zero interference which surprised me, and I legitmently wasn't sure who was going to win (didn't read the spoilers this week) at the end there so hey I'll take it for what it was worth.

[Papacita 0]

You may be right, but I definitely think the match would've come off better without pressure to sustain ratings throughout the show. I think that was more of a problem than anything having to do with their working style. I'm not saying it'd be Flair/Steamboat had this been on PPV instead, but we probably would've gotten a much better match out of the two if it was.

[Guest Ray]

May I ask...why were any of you "disappointed" in this match?

 

To be "disappointed", you must have thought this would be great.

 

Why would you expect this to be great, when their previous encounters weren't?

 

 

WWE deserves some credit for not doing a dozen run-ins. It was a decent match, not horrible but nothing to blow you away.

[ANKLELOCK 0]

1) Their previous encounters were great.

2) We expected this to be the greatest thing ever because Angle is a wrestling god and Lesnar has a ton of potential.

[geniusMoment 0]

I just don't get it. Everyone over at wrestlingclassics gave it at least **** and now Keller gives it *****. I wanted to like the match, it just was not very good.

[King Cucaracha 0]

1) Their previous encounters were great.

2) We expected this to be the greatest thing ever because Angle is a wrestling god and Lesnar has a ton of potential.

1) They were overrated and subsequently overhyped to hell.

 

2)ANGLE MAAAAAAAAAARK!!!!!

[Red Hot Thumbtack In The Eye 0]

I'm just suprised that this match was so much less than it should have been.

 

2 legit "true" wrestlers

 

60 minutes to do their thing without interruption

 

Part of the country that understands wrestling so they should have the crowd with them.

 

Add to that, neither man blew a spot that I remember.

 

Wrestling is my porn and watching this didn't make me whack it...

 

This is the best SD that I have ever seen though, simply for the fact that it was all wrestling, the crap was kept to an absolute minimum, and it had a special aura around it. Yeah the iron man wasn't the shit, but I say thanks anyway for giving it to me.

 

"In the spirit of competition". The closest we're ever gonna get from Stamford

[slimm44 0]

I thought it went really well, however I am slightly drunk. Anyways my friends who hate wrestling watched it and they enjoyed it. They didn't like how they kept cutting to commercials but who here does? thought it would have been great if it went into OT. It could have been just like RAW overrun. But instead The McMahons stick to the basics. I liked it

[Invictus 0]

Brock hurt the match more than anything, I'd say. He dragged the match down with his complete and utter lack of moveset and funkadelic selling/pyschcology. Angle at least tried to bring in some varied and special moves he does once in a blue moon: Pop-up Superplex, Axe Handle, Moonsault, that funky mat hold I forget the name of, his Heel Hook (modified Ankle lock) etc. Lesnar went with brawl, shoulder charges, F5, suplex.

 

I did enjoy the pyschology with the early chairshot and DQ, I thought that was really smart booking, but I found it to just be too helter skelter. The match REALLY degraded the pop value of the signature moves, because that's all they were doing for the most part. The ending was also well done, but I was severly dissappointed with Lesnar regaining the title. Seriously. Send him to midcard for the next 6 months or more and then let him reenter the title scene. I'm sick to death of him being champion or being number one contender.

 

I won't give any star rating because I think they're stupid and just degenerate into flame wars anyways, but I thought the match was decent enough, I enjoyed it. It's a good sign at least that we could be seeing more things of a similar nature in the future.

[iggymcfly 0]

Well, I didn't actually see the match since I don't get Smackdown now, but from what I've read, they completely missed the obvious storyline for the match.

 

Brock's embarassed about tapping to the ankle lock, so he refuses to do it again. Realizing this, Angle doesn't go for pinfalls and merely works on the ankle allowing Brock to build up a good lead (maybe 3-0 at 45 minutes) before he finally has to start tapping out and Angle gets a comeback. I mean really, how hard is that?

[Guest Choken One]

I'm not reading 8 pages...but I enjoyed the match as it's some of the best FREE stuff you can get. Personally, It rocked more then 97% of What TNA gives me and 99.7% of what Raw gives us.

 

The pacing of the commercials was slightly irritaing but hey know what? Wasn't that bad...

 

I guess i'll give it the snowflake treatment of ****1/2 on the TV match scale and overall ***3/4 for the match...Just like Shawn/Bret the MEAT was the ending...

[Guest nikowwf]

The match rocked except for the commercial breaks which were VERY poorly timed. Coming back from a commercial during which 97 german suplexes and a pin attempt occured makes NO sense to me.

 

I think a lot of you went in to this match to hate it. Its confusing to me - the WWE gives us WRESTLING - a whole damn show of WRESTLING and you bitch. If they gave us 100 skits, you'll bitch. If they give half and half, you bitch. Im no genius, but if i didnt enjoy ANYTHING any more id probably find something else to do at this point.

 

niko

[TheOriginalOrangeGoblin 0]

Well I enjoyed it to some extent but wouldn't call it great. The biggest problem for me, don't know if anyone mentioned this, was that after evyer big move or eveyr move period enither guy ever showed long term damage or sold anything for more than a few seconds. For example, Kurt takes a monster F5 on the floor, that should put him out for a while, they come back from break and Kurt is dominating again. The match had no flow whatsoever and that bothered the hell out of me. Oh and the German suplex is absoutely useless move nowadays. They threw like 90 of them here and add Benoit throwing like 3 or 4 and that move has lost all effect and is just another move. I'll take the Wrestlemania match anyday over this, although the SS one wasn't as good.

 

HHH/Rock was miles ahead of this and, to a lesser extent, so was HBK/Bret. The last 20-25 mins of HBK/Bret were bettert han anything in this match.

[Spaceman Spiff 0]

The guys over at CRZ's board all seemed to love it.

 

http://wienerboard.com/thread.php/id=14765

CRZ's board seems to be really "marky", for lack of a better term. No matter how bad a particular Raw was/is, you'll find many people there who enjoy that Raw and/or call it a fun show.

 

Really odd reading this board and seeing "Raw SUCKED!", then going to CRZ's board and seeing "Raw was good/fun!".

[haVoc 0]

I thought the Iron Man match went well. It was fun and entertaining and I never got bored with it. You people nit-pick way too much. The smallest things you have to bitch about.

 

That's why I refuse to watch and try to come up with star ratings when I watch matches. Once you start doing that you look for mistakes instead of watching the match for the good of it. "Oh, he forgot to sell the back for 5 seconds, that's a 1/4 * off the match." Fuck that!

 

By all means, when it's bad like Raw, bitch until your chubby fingers are blue. When it's good, like Smackdown, get laid back and enjoy it.

[Guest Ghettoman]

Enjoyabble, realistically subpar.

 

If the talk about how great of a wrestler Angle is continues I'll have no choice but to laugh, how he's near the level of an Eddie or Benoit when he's having his mistakes covered by Lesnar I'll never know.

 

Main problem with the match was they didn't expand there movesets. Lesnar's already shown more in squash matches than he did in that match, where was his multiple rib-breaker? Double powerbomb? Why wasn't the SSP utilized more either way? The DDT and the missile dropkick spot were the only two spots in my mind that stand out.

 

Ok, but you should expect more from two guys who if anything can just get stupid and still entertain.

[haVoc 0]

Fine, their move set was slower then usual. Wait! They both had injuies going into this 1 hour match! Of course they were going to slow it down a bit.

 

Jesus. You people don't give these wrestlers enough credit.

[CanadianChick 0]

They're both injured? Hm, didn't know that.

 

As someone said before, it was an excellent TV match, but I'm still not convinced it was a **** or anything. I still don't think that putting an Iron Man Match on TV is a good idea. The commercials interrupt the flow. That hurt it a lot. And maybe my expectations were really high, which maybe they shouldn't of been. Sure, it was entertaining, but not the 4 star match I was dreaming of. But I will say this: if they have a Smackdown every week like they did this week, I would be a happy camper. There was hardly any crap, and the crap that there was (Shanuiqua/Torrie and Nidia, McMahon segment) was kept extremely short. Althought the main wasn't a 4 star match or anything, this was one of the best overall Smackdowns in a long time.

[RavishingRickRudo 0]

Anyone else think that Angle should have gotten a pin-fall off the missile dropkick? That would have been instant credibility thus giving Angle another finish (or at least near-fall) under his belt to use in other matches.

 

And Papacita, Main Event at Wrestlemania or Main Event on Smackdown... which is more pressure?

[Papacita 0]

More pressure to deliver a good match at Wrestlemania obviously, but with Wrestlemania they don't have to worry about viewers tuning out either.

[godthedog 0]

Anyone else think that Angle should have gotten a pin-fall off the missile dropkick?

 

getting a fall off a moonsault would've been better.

 

i kept expecting angle to bust out a sharpshooter in those last 5 minutes. that would've been better as well.

[RavishingRickRudo 0]

Nah, he never hits the moonsault anyways It would have been better to have him get the pin off a flying move (dropkick), go for another one (moonsault) since the first one proved effective, and then have Brock get wise to it and move.

[Guest Mulatto Heat]

I think a lot of you went in to this match to hate it. Its confusing to me - the WWE gives us WRESTLING - a whole damn show of WRESTLING and you bitch. If they gave us 100 skits, you'll bitch. If they give half and half, you bitch. Im no genius, but if i didnt enjoy ANYTHING any more id probably find something else to do at this point.

 

By all means, when it's bad like Raw, bitch until your chubby fingers are blue. When it's good, like Smackdown, get laid back and enjoy it.

 

OK, I apologize to everyone. *****! NO, ******!!! Greatest match ever! Don't matter if it was promised as a technical marvel but ended up a long, long brawl! It don't matter that Brock spent a chunk of the match either stalling or hopping! Don't matter if one-quarter of the hour was for commercials! Everything was PERFECT! I just wish I taped it so I could whack off to it later!

 

Geez, do you guys feel better now? Can you go on with your day? Will you be able to sleep tonight?

Edited September 19, 2003 by Mulatto Heat

[Enigma 0]

HHH and Rock were both products of WWE style, and their Iron man match worked much better.

The WWE style in 2000 was much different than the WWE style in 2003.

[Open the Muggy Gate 0]

You gotta realize here that Brock had a minor leg injury. That might be why both men took their time in this match. I gave it a ****. Anyone who can wrestle for 60 minutes at least deserves that.

[Enigma 0]

1) Their previous encounters were great.

2) We expected this to be the greatest thing ever because Angle is a wrestling god and Lesnar has a ton of potential.

1) They were overrated and subsequently overhyped to hell.

 

2)ANGLE MAAAAAAAAAARK!!!!!

if he's an Angle mark, then why is he issuing dissatisfaction with this match?