WWE Elimination Chamber (March 8, 2020) -- Results & Afterthoughts

Elimination Chamber (2020) (also known as No Escape (2020) in Germany) was a professional wrestling pay-per-view and WWE Network event produced by WWE for their Raw and SmackDown brands. It took place on March 8, 2020 at the Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was the tenth event under the Elimination Chamber chronology.

Eight matches were contested at the event, including one on the Kickoff pre-show. In the main event, NXT's Shayna Baszler won Raw's women's Elimination Chamber match to become the number one contender against Becky Lynch for the Raw Women's Championship at WrestleMania 36. On the undercard, Aleister Black defeated AJ Styles in a no disqualification match, Sami Zayn, Shinsuke Nakamura, and Cesaro defeated Braun Strowman in a 3-on-1 handicap match, with Zayn pinning Strowman to win the WWE Intercontinental Championship, and The Miz and John Morrison retained the SmackDown Tag Team Championship in SmackDown's tag team Elimination Chamber match.

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Note: I'm not going to discuss every match on this card as I think we can all agree that this show was unamiously a massive dud. Not a bad show, but just a really boring one, missing a lot of key top talent and lackluster matches, save for a few bright spots on the under card. A lot of people, myself included, went into and walked away from this show feeling like it was a bigger waste of time than advertised. This show did absolutely NOTHING to get me excited for WrestleMania in any shape nor form. 

Tag Team Match

The Viking Raiders (Erik and Ivar) def. Curt Hawkins and Zack Ryder

Kick-off Match. Didn't watch. Didn't care.

Singles Match

Daniel Bryan def. Drew Gulak by technical submission

For the love of all that's holy, can we stop with all of these scary neck bumps? Daniel Bryan for sure doesn't need to be taking them in any way, shape, nor form.

Enough with the fucking neck bumps. I'm sure Naito and Ibushi's dicks were hard seeing that spot though...

Outside of that scary moment (along with another with their Dynamite Kid-style suplex out of the ring spot), I thought this was a decent technically sound match. I understand that Bryan wanted to work with Gabba Gulak to give him the rub/shine so to speak, but I don't see how a loss in their initial encounter is going to do anything to advance this program to make anyone want to see them do a possible rematch for WrestleMania.

Singles match for the WWE United States Championship

Andrade (c) (with Zelina Vega) def. Humberto Carrillo

I get it - Humberto Carrillo is one hell of a talent in terms of the lucha libre style, but ENOUGH with the title shots that this dude has gotten over the months against Andrade or for the United States title in general. I can't look at the guy without thinking that he's the love child of Evan Bourne/Matt Sydal and Joe Lopez ("Other Joe" on AngryJoeShow). Seriously, Google those two guys and tell me you don't see it too!

This wasn't a bad match, but holy shit, they are running this feud into the ground just like how they did Andrade vs. Mysterio last year, which burned people out well before the feud could properly climax at WrestleMania last year too!

Elimination Chamber Match for the WWE SmackDown Tag Team Championship

The Miz and John Morrison (c) def. The New Day (Big E and Kofi Kingston), The Usos (Jey Uso and Jimmy Uso), Heavy Machinery (Otis and Tucker), Lucha House Party (Gran Metalik and Lince Dorado), and Dolph Ziggler and Robert Roode

Eliminated	Team	Entered	Eliminated by	Method	Time[1]
1	Lucha House Party	3	Heavy Machinery	Pinfall	17:15
2	Heavy Machinery	5	Dolph Ziggler and Robert Roode	Pinfall	23:45
3	Dolph Ziggler and Robert Roode	6	The Usos	Pinfall	25:15
4	The New Day	2	The Miz and John Morrison	Pinfall	29:05
5	The Usos	1	The Miz and John Morrison	Pinfall	32:55
Winner	The Miz and John Morrison	4

For me personally, this was the match of the night - until Heavy Machinery were eliminated. Lucha House Party killed it here with a ton of great spots (at least the ones that they didn't botch upon execution), only to get eliminated right after their biggest spot of the match by the New Day. You knew that wasn't good when that elimination took all of the air and excitement out of the building in one fell swoop.

This was a thing of beauty right here. Too bad the Lucha House Party got eliminated immediately after this spot.

Heavy Machinery got the crowd going again, until they got eliminated as well, following Tucker's failed attempt to hold his own after Otis went flying out of the one of the chamber pods down to the floor.

I'm still disappointed that Otis hasn't been out for blood since Ziggler stole Mandy away from him.

I don't know what the hell WWE Creative was thinking in regards of booking this match. The only thing they had to do was either let Heavy Machinery win here after getting their hands on Ziggler and Roode or allow Roode & Ziggler to win to have them lose the titles to Heavy Machinery at WrestleMania. This isn't rocket science. Otis AND Tucker are over like rover. It's not like with the Street Profits where the team obviously had one clear star (Montez Ford) from sheer charisma and athleticism and his partner is just standing in his shadow (Angelo Dawkins).

Tonight was your weekly reminder to NOT sleep on Tucker Knight.

Both members of Heavy Machinery proved their worth here in this match with Tucker reminding people that he's a force to be reckoned with as well.

I get that reuniting The Miz and John Morrison in 2019 and putting the tag titles on them earlier this year was a big deal in terms of nostalgia, but it wouldn't have killed them to drop the titles to the two teams I mentioned earlier, especially when the Otis-Mandy-Ziggler triangle is the biggest storyline going over on SmackDown! that people care about. Haven't we seen The Usos against the New Day enough in our goddamn lifetimes though? When they started this match I was already rolling my eyes harder than that Tony Stark/Robert Downey Jr. meme that people love using.

No Disqualification Match

Aleister Black defeated AJ Styles (with Luke Gallows and Karl Anderson)

For a No DQ match, I thought this was mostly pretty darn boring until towards the end of the match. The most frustrating thing here is it was obvious that they were dragging this out to fill out time on the show and the fact that I know that both Black and Styles are capable of much better performances than this.

The Club's reactions here were priceless.

The only reason I was engaged as I was just waiting for the arrival of The Undertaker like everyone else was at this point. They had to do something to continue hyping up this feud between Styles and Taker, so it was a given that something was going to happen in this match to even up the odds. That being said, I hope it's The Undertaker and Aleister Black against The O.C. (AJ Styles, Luke Gallows, and Karl Anderson) at WrestleMania instead of Styles and Taker one-on-one. Styles would bump his ass off for the Deadman for sure in a singles match, but let's not leave any window for another lackluster performance by The Undertaker, especially when his best years are behind him. A tag team match would be much more easier for him with Black doing most of the heavy lifting so to speak.

I love how Styles get caught out of the Phenomenal Forearm as if it's a video game. 

Tag Team match for the WWE Raw Tag Team Championship

The Street Profits (Angelo Dawkins and Montez Ford) (c) defeated Seth Rollins and Murphy

Simply put - this was a Monday Night RAW television match. Nothing more, nothing less.

Owens came out with a bag of popcorn to distract Rollins' for the finish.

...Only to get served a Stunner for his troubles.

This match was easily forgettable, save for Rollins' sell to Kevin Owens' Stone Cold Stunner.

3-on-1 Handicap match for the WWE Intercontinental Championship

Sami Zayn, Shinsuke Nakamura, and Cesaro defeated Braun Strowman (c)

Since Zayn pinned Strowman, he won the championship.

During the promo backstage before this match started, Sami told Nakamura and Cesaro to stand back while he handled Strowman on his own. Boy was that a load of bull... As soon as it started he retreated back to allow his cronies (sad what both Nakamura and Cesaro have been reduced to at this point...) to do his dirty work.

I'm happy that Sami Zayn (who is getting a bit of a Dad Bod...) finally won singles gold on the main roster, but did they need to take the title off of Strowman right now? Dude already seemed like he was allergic to titles every opportunity he got to win one in the past. I would like to assume that they will have Strowman run through Nakamura and Cesaro over the course of the next few weeks of SmackDown! programming, only to force Sami to face him one-on-one at WrestleMania. If they end up being in that nothing of a match called the Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal then someone needs to be slapped. That's all what I'm saying. This should be as easy as booking The Big Show versus Cody Rhodes that one year at WrestleMania. Nothing fancy. Just go out there and get the job done to drop the title back to Strowman.

Elimination Chamber Match for a WWE Raw Women's Championship match at WrestleMania 36

Shayna Baszler defeated Natalya, Liv Morgan, Asuka, Ruby Riott, and Sarah Logan

Eliminated	Wrestler	Entered	Eliminated by	Method	Time
1	Sarah Logan	3	Shayna Baszler	Submission	7:50
2	Ruby Riott	2	Shayna Baszler	Submission	8:15
3	Natalya	1	Shayna Baszler	Submission	9:30
4	Liv Morgan	5	Shayna Baszler	Knockout	15:00
5	Asuka	6	Shayna Baszler	Knockout	21:00
Winner	Shayna Baszler	4

I understand why this match went last (mainly because it was International Women's Day and the SJWs would have roasted them all over social media if it wasn't...) but it didn't deserve that spot, much like Becky Lynch doesn't deserve to main event WrestleMania for the second year in the row. This should have ended with either the Tag Team Chamber match or Black/Styles just for the massive pop this dead crowd erupted for the arrival of The Undertaker at the end of that match. Instead, we got a massive dud of a main event here. Don't get me wrong. I understand that this was damage control to repair Shayna Baszler's street cred and overall impression since arriving on the main roster as most people aren't savvy to her credentials from dominating on NXT over the past two years. I just didn't agree with these massive windows of time where there's absolutely nothing going on other than Asuka shouting in Japanese while Shayna is merely posing as they are awkwardly standing around as they wait for the pods to open up.

Asuka's taunting within her pod was one of the more entertaining moments of this match.

This match would have ended better if Liv Morgan got in before Shayna for they could have done the confrontation of all three members of the Riott Squad facing off, only for Shayna to come in shortly afterwards and clean house with them upon arrival.

Jeebus Christ!

I wouldn't be surprised if Nattie was concussed during this match, especially after those cringe-inducing bumps she took back to back from Sarah Logan. Like holy shit, I thought she bit the turnbuckle at ringside from that first bump from Logan after being dropkicked into the pod. Don't forget about that dive too where Logan's knee smashed Nattie in the face. I'm sure she had to be pissed about that as I was mad seeing it. If I were to speculate, that's another possible reason why this match didn't go as long as it should have. Nattie was probably meant to go the distance against Shayna until she got hurt here, but who knows. As of this posting (3/13/20), there's no reports floating around of possible injuries from this match from the female talent but there's no denying that Nattie got her bell rung here.

As much as they were teasing and hyping up the confrontation between Asuka and Shayna towards the end of this match, I was disappointed that Asuka didn't last longer against her, especially given her own reputation as a record holding NXT Women's Champion in the past. I guess they wanted to play it safe with Asuka's recent wrist injury and didn't want her to have too much action here with WrestleMania around the corner.

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Afterthoughts:

At the end of the day, WWE got what they wanted. They established Shayna Baszler as the "killer" set out to challenge "The Man" Becky Lynch for WrestleMania - as if there was any shred of doubt going into this PPV. With those reports floating around of Vince not really buying into Shayna and that leaked photo of Rousey at WWE HQ, I was half-expecting them to pull an audible and sub-in Ronda Rousey instead of Shayna for WrestleMania against Becky Lynch one-on-one since it didn't happen previously. Y'know, do the finish where someone (Shayna) is eliminated early for the shock factor, only for Ronda to replace someone else and steal the win like that one year Edge stole Kofi Kingston's Elimination Chamber spot, only to win the entire thing after losing the title earlier that night. (Laughs) Yeah, I know. I give WWE Creative too much credit in that regard and should have known better.

Despite of all of that, I wasn't anywhere as pissed off like a lot of other people online after this show. I don't know what it is but I'm at the point where I just watch these PPVs, NXT, and read spoilers/highlights from RAW and SmackDown!. If I don't like this processed bullshit that WWE continues to churn out every week, I know how to turn the channel to something else I rather see. That being said, I can totally relate with the complaints about this show. This is the last stop before WrestleMania and with the clear lack of star power and big names, you can tell that this show was phoned in after Sweet Saudi Money V: Keep Hope Alive. They don't care as WWE is obviously in their annual "It's WrestleMania and we know you're going to watch anyway" mindset at this stage of their schemes. WWE needs to start getting concerned, especially when people had "#CancelWWENetwork" trending after Super ShowDown when Goldberg beat The Fiend for the WWE Championship, only to follow that show up with another flop. It's not doing anything for fans' morale going into "The Show of Shows". I just hope they get their shit together - not only with these coronavirus concerns - but with this show altogether. Maybe they should cancel WrestleMania? That would give WWE Creative a lot more time to fix this shit and figure out exactly what the hell they should be doing with their product.