Note: These reviews were done in real time, so some of the comments may be a tad out-dated in terms of potential story routes that I may have theorised.
WWE Intercontinental Title Match: Sami Zayn (c) vs. Chad Gable - WWE Monday Night Raw - 15/04/2024
This is a pretty hot match. Sami’s first title defence since winning the belt. The crowd is raucous for him as they usually are and they take the time to soak that in before the bell rings. Gable works straight for the most part. He stumbles on a Sami Zayn potential injury in the leg and takes advantage of it. Sami’s selling and comeback attempts are the strong point of the match for me. The crowd comes alive when he starts flowing but Gable cuts him off, countering to build that heat. Gable has a lot of Angle-lite offence about him without that explosiveness, but he’s perfectly fine as a foil and he has some cool moves, like his rolling ankle pick counter to the helluva kick. Gable locks on the ankle lock for one final time but Sami once again escapes and hits the helluva kick in the corner to retain. A big moment! Then came the turn from Gable. The resentment from not winning the belt over and over again comes out and Gable attacks Sami in front of the family. Good match with a good angle to end the show. ***1/2
Non Title Match: Sami Zayn vs. Chad Gable - WWE Monday Night Raw 2024 - 20/05/2024
Unfortunately Chad Gable’s direction following the heel turn was a midcard heel gimmick with a midcard group. Oh well. And they seemed to be rushing through the gimmick that Gable is horrible to his stable mates already. Gable’s new gimmick does allow him to show a bit more personality. Hopefully it pays off for him. It’s been a month since the turn, and I haven’t been following the build but Sami should be a big more furious and aggressive. If we’re judging the match in a vacuum, this was a solid match. Not a patch on their Montreal bout though. It was a story match above all else. Gable finally bullies Otis into helping him to get a pin over the champion. ***
WWE Intercontinental Title Triple Threat Match: Sami Zayn (c) vs. Bronson Reed vs. Chad Gable - WWE King & Queen Of The Ring 2024 - 25/05/2024
They are going all in on the Angle-lite gimmick. The fans are chanting “You Suck” now. That’s not ideal, even if it works. Chad Gable should be his own man. But I’m sure he’s not complaining. I’ve seen limited amounts of this build. Gable and Sami had their match and angle and Reed seems to have interjected himself in. The crowd is once again electric for Sami Zayn and it is sustained. WWE fans sometimes get the flack for being loud on the entrances but not the matches but that’s unfair and certainly not the case here. This was a fun little match. Classic 3-way spots, in-out wrestling and double teaming the big guy. It’s nothing no one has seen before. The stand out moment of the match was Otis accidentally hitting Gable with a clothesline. A fine match but nothing that’ll be retained on the memory. ***
WWE Intercontinental Title Match: Sami Zayn (c) vs. Chad Gable - WWE Clash at the Castle Scotland 2024 - 15/06/2024
Once again this match doesn't fully click with me as it should despite its good qualities. I still find the whole Otis/Dupree angle to be too much of a presence for the technical work to get its TRUE focus and be used to full effect. The outside story was actually put together well but it was a little too much of that for my preferences. The wrestling itself was good. The initial work on the wrist was good as well the final touches on the ankle, which Sami sold terrifically. It was a fine overall package of the match with good storytelling even if it's not something that I'm going to be all in on. ***1/2
Conlusion
This perhaps sums up my broad issue with WWE in a more covert way than perhaps the obvious issues of the Punk vs McIntyre match that took place at Summerslam.
These two were thrusted into a semi-workrate match, which was then tacked on with a mid-level story instead of utilising the one they had. For example, Gable had turned heel out of frustration with being unable to defeat Gunther (the David Starr storyline) and then Sami Zayn, struggling to reach the promised land of the work-rate belt. An interesting story that should've added an extra serious layer to his work, similar to his obvious inspiration in Kurt Angle. In an ideal sense, this should've turned him from mid-carder to upper midcard. Instead, he took a step sideways and turned from midcard babyface to midcard heel with bullying tendencies.
The story became more of a focus for Otis to overcome his mean friend than Gable tapping into his hidden mean streak which is what these matches should've leaned more into. And the result is that you had good singles matches between two of the better wrestlers in WWE at the moments where you were just waiting for the dramatic moment from Otis where he is conflicted whether to help Chad Gable do his evil deeds or not. And while it was an effective story, one the fans certainly enjoyed (this isn't a statement about whether it was a failure or not), it wasn't nearly as interesting as the one they sold to someone like me, who only occasionally watches WWE when I see something that might intrigue me.
The matches were good. That much is true. But the feud could've been much better. Something more akin to the Benoit vs Jericho feud. Built around their wrestling merits, telling an in-ring story that is much deeper than "Will Otis refuse to help Gable". That's all. If this followed the same route as Breakker vs Sami in terms of telling a story through the wrestling without that added extras, this could've been feud of the year, instead of just another good feud.
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