2. The Dudley Boyz Get Back To Business
Having a Tables match between The New Day and The Usos for no particular reason made very little sense on first glance, at least until The Dudley Boyz came in talking about how it was “their match” and they deserved a spot in it. For those who have missed it, The Dudley Boyz haven’t exactly had a spectacular run since their shocking return to WWE in mid-2015. They got repeatedly outsmarted by The New Day, got destroyed on a regular basis by The Wyatt Family, and were on the verge of disappearing into the void of Main Event tapings. Realistically, the only reason for them to suddenly appear and insert themselves in the main event of Raw would be for some ulterior motive, and sure enough, that’s what happened. While The Dudley Boyz turning heel doesn’t instantly solve all their problems (and may not even fully take, since people love them for their table antics and don’t really care about The Usos), it does put them back into the conversation, and freshens up a tag team division that was looking increasingly barren in recent weeks.
http://pl.wwe.com/photos/2016/02/09/eight-man-tag-team-tables-match-photos?r30_r1_r1:page=18 Source: pl.wwe.com
1. The Only Thing That Actually Mattered Last Night
He probably should have been bitter.
Nobody would have blamed him. We all learn eventually that life isn’t fair, but the fact that Daniel Bryan, a man who worked his way up from the absolute bottom of the barrel to the main event of WrestleMania and captured the hearts of the entire wrestling world in the process, would be forced to retire at the height of his popularity, after inspiring so many people, after proving that you can live your dream if you work hard enough, is an injustice of the highest order. If there was some sort of bargain that could be made with an uncaring universe, last night, every single wrestling fan in the world would have made it without a second thought.
He should have been bitter. But when faced with the certain end of his wrestling career, years before he’d thought it possible, after months of believing that his return to the ring was an inevitability, Daniel Bryan was…happy. He made jokes about his new haircut (while making sure to plug the charity his hair had gone towards, Wigs For Kids), he thanked everybody he could possibly think of, and most of all, he made sure to let everyone know that he was, above all else, grateful. Because even in the darkest hour of his career, Daniel Bryan tried to make everyone around him feel better.
During his speech, Daniel Bryan told everyone that the wrestling business doesn’t owe anyone anything. And maybe he believes that. The wrestling business is cruel, and callous, and it takes careers like Daniel Bryan’s, chews them up, and spits them out. But while the wrestling business might not owe Daniel Bryan anything, there are plenty of people who do. We, the wrestling fans, we owe Daniel Bryan a great deal. For everything he’s done to entertain us, during both his WWE career and the ten years he toiled on the independent scene. He did what he loved for as long as he could, and we loved him for it. Last night, he got to stand in the ring, close his eyes, and feel how much we loved him. And even that outpouring of emotion doesn’t go a fraction of the way towards paying off the debt that we owe Daniel Bryan, one that we can probably never fully repay. Putting into mere words the effect that he had on professional wrestling feels inadequate, somehow, but if we had to boil it down to a single word, there could be only one:
Grateful.
Thank you, Daniel Bryan. We are eternally grateful for having been a part of your journey.
http://pl.wwe.com/photos/2016/02/09/daniel-bryan-bids-farewell-to-the-wwe-universe-photos?r30_r1_r1:page=21 Source: pl.wwe.com
Stephen Randle
Stephen Randle is an avid wrestling and film fan. He's been writing about WWE, movies, and video games for Goliath since 2015.