ARN - SummerSlam 2010 [Show Notes] (Patreon)

SummerSlam 2010

SummerSlam 2010 took place on August 15th, from the Staples Center, in Los Angeles, CA. It drew 17,463 to the Staples Center, with a paid number about 14,000 paying around $875,000.  The previous year in the same building got 14,116. SummerSlam 2010 got 350,000 ppvs buys; SummerSlam 09 got 369,000

This was the 2nd SummerSlam in a row from the Staples Center, and the WWE would go on to host it there until 2014, before moving it to Brooklyn.

NY at the Barclays Center. What was your thoughts on holding a certain ppv at the same arena for several years in a row? WCW did that for example in the mid 90s, with Halloween Havoc being held in Las Vegas for several years in a row

We're coming off of the Money in the Bank pay per view, which we did a show on recently.

Let's get to some company news heading into SummerSlam

In the middle of August, Linda McMahon captured the Republican nomination for Senator in Connecticut. McMahon won handily, largely based on spending more than $20 million of her own money, among the most of any candidate in the history of U.S. Senate races

Did you follow that at all?

Meltzer reported - Largely due to disappointing domestic PPV numbers, World Wrestling Entertainment had what chairman Vince McMahon called a lousy second quarter, although the company remained profitable.

For the second quarter, the company took in $106,842,000 and ended with a $6,251,000 profit. 

During last year’s second quarter, they took in $138,794,000 and posted a $19,874,000 profit, but that’s misleading because WrestleMania took place last year in April instead of March. Throwing WrestleMania out of the equation, last year’s second quarter would have taken in $106.6 million, or almost identical to this year, but had a higher profit margin of $10.2 million.

“Basically, we had a lousy quarter,” said McMahon. We had a number of negatives, related to the Icelandic volcano. A lot of top talent retired. One we knew about and another we didn’t. There were considerable injuries to Undertaker, C.M. Punk, Shawn Michaels retired, Batista retired unexpectedly, HHH was injured. These are the stars we rely on for our PPV numbers and live events.”

McMahon said even though the quarter showed no increase in revenues, and revenues after the first six months of the year are essentially flat (revenue was down 0.4% for the first six months while profits are down 6.2% from $16,375,000 to $15,358,000), that he believes the company will have annual growth of 15 to 20% annually between now and 2012. They are way behind schedule here, but McMahon said he thought the key business metrics, the house shows and PPV, would be picking up starting next week with SummerSlam.

Specific to that, he noted that the company would have taken in $3 million more if foreign exchange rates would have remained at the same level as last year, as they are victimized by the decline of several foreign currencies against the dollar. He noted that the volcano, leaving talent stranded and forcing last minute changes in television, overall cost the company $1 million (although a later update listed the figure at $700,000).

“We’re looking at SummerSlam reversing the downward spiral,” said McMahon. “We look at SummerSlam as the kickoff the new talent integrating with others.” 

Sadly, on August 12th, Lance McNaught, who wrestled in WWE as Lance Cade passed away at 29 years old. He was married with 2 kids and a stepson. The coroner said he accidentally died from "mixed drug intoxication, complicating a cardiomyopathy"  He was trained along with Bryan Danielson & Brian Kendrick  by Shawn Michaels. He was a 3 time WWE tag team champion, with Trevor Murdoch

What's your memories of Lance and his tragic passing?

Meltzer reported - Taryn Terrell, 24 (Tiffany) was indefinitely suspended on 8/9 when company officials found out she had been arrested by police in West Los Angeles on a domestic disturbance early that morning. Terrell and husband Drew Galloway (McIntyre) went to a party on 8/8 at the Playboy Mansion in Los Angeles and then came back to their hotel where they got into a loud enough argument that hotel security and police were called. She requested a second room in the hotel away from him, but after the police arrived, because of the disturbance, it is policy to take in the person they believe was the instigator for a cooling off period. 

She was taken in at 8 a.m. and after being arrested, was placed in custody and released at 4:55 p.m. that day on $20,000 bond. Company officials were mad when they found out, as nobody reported it to them, and suspended her. They also weren’t happy about the couple attending a party at the Mansion without authorization because of them marketing themselves as a PG product. Terrell had posed in Playboy before being signed and photos of her from that shoot were republished after she had appeared on television. Her attorney believes the charges will be dropped, and reports were WWE will revisit the situation if and when that is the case, but she didn’t help her cause because of not alerting the company about the arrest when it happened, and the company did not want the Playboy thing out, but it got out because she wrote on her twitter the afternoon before the fight 

“On my way to the mansion for midsummer’s so ready to have lots of fun,” and didn’t say Playboy but it was well known that night was the Playboy midsummer party, and then later, posted a photo of herself at the party. 

Galloway, 25, and Terrell were engaged in July 2009 and were married this past May in Las Vegas. 

Meltzer wrote - Regarding Alberto Del Rio, management likes him because they are looking for another Hispanic star because Rey Mysterio is one knee injury away from possible retirement. He’s done remarkably well on his vignettes so he’s got a shot at being a legit star, which I sure didn’t see when it was just he without his mask doing matches in FCW and not getting over there. He’s done well with management but some wrestlers feel he’s aloof, kind of like his gimmick (although I’ve joked about it, the term that he’s got Mil Mascaras blood in him has gone around) and he’s been talked with about it regarding not rubbing the guys the wrong way. 

That takes us to SummerSlam. 

The Bryan Danielson firing story ended this week when he was the surprise seventh man on Team Raw in the Survivor Series main event on 8/15 at the Staples Center in Los Angeles.

Danielson was fired on 6/11, days after participating in the original Nexus angle, for choking ring announcer Justin Roberts with a tie, which was against WWE standards. From the start, particularly when John Cena came out to publicly defend him, not to mention how the directors didn’t pull away from the choking, there were suspicions the firing was a work. It is possible, although if they really pulled one over on people, one would think someone would be gloating about it.

Based on the best information we have, Danielson was contacted about two weeks before the show, and canceled his bookings both for the Gathering of the Juggalos in Illinois and for a New York Wrestling Connection show in Port Jefferson Station, NY. If this was a planned thing from the start, to bring him back for the SummerSlam main event, it would have made no sense for him to book himself the weekend of the shows, or book dates after mid-August.

WWE also forced him to cancel several (but not all) of his independent bookings, including the 8/28 date for Mikey Whipwreck he had agreed to when canceling 8/14, and a 9/18 date in Massachusetts, since they don’t want him working an indie date the night before the Night of Champions PPV in Chicago. He will still be doing the 9/11 Evolve show and the 9/25 weekend Dragon Gate USA show, although his match that was originally set to be a PPV main event against Shingo Takagi, will now have to be a dark match.

It is known that Pat Patterson and Jim Ross of late had pushed Vince McMahon to rehire Danielson, who was back as Daniel Bryan. Whatever it was, he was told to keep it quiet and to be unveiled as the seventh member of Team Raw, a spot teased for The Miz, and opened up when they did a knee injury angle with Great Khali on Raw the previous week (even though Khali seemed fine standing there with no mention of the injury the next day). 

They put a tarp over the ring before the show when it came for the run through, and snuck him in, so that nobody other than those in the match would see him or know about it. The format sheets for the show listed a seventh man in the match, but no name. Still, his canceling the weekend appearances citing a family gathering seemed suspicious. Even more suspicious was as people were coming into the arena, the company was checking every sign. It became obvious when so many of the confiscated signs were anything that mentioned either Daniel Bryan or Bryan Danielson. 

A funny aspect is that for the first time in recent memory, many of the signs at the event were fake. The company made signs and gave them to people they confiscated signs from, and the company-made signs also had Slim Jim logos on the back.

WWE actually released Bryan being back on twitter about 40 minutes before the match, which is amazing that they would go to such lengths to keep things quiet and have a surprise, only to reveal it before it happened. The web site also put up a story about what “had happened” with John Cena announcing Bryan instead of Miz as the final member of the team. The funny part was the story telling what had happened went up several minutes before it actually happened.

Evan Bourne pinned Zack Ryder in the dark match.

Dolph Ziggler retained the IC title going to a no contest with Kofi Kingston in 7:09 when Nexus laid out both guys. Vickie Guerrero came out and got super heat. Crowd started out hot but after a few minutes started to lose interest. Jerry Lawler mentioned that they were on the air on PPV for the first time in Malta. Matt Striker immediately brought up Baron Mikel Scicluna. At least it was something that made sense. Kingston went for a tope but Vickie pulled Ziggler out of the way and Kingston crashed on the floor. The crowd was hot only when Vickie would do something. 

A couple of near falls, including Kingston coming off the top rope with a chop like Ricky Steamboat. Ziggler had the sleeper on when Nexus interfered, which made no sense since he’s both the champion and the heel, and the finish is supposed to build a rematch. Instead, it was the heel who was about to win and keep the belt that got screwed by Nexus. Nexus attacked both guys, but concentrated on Kingston. Darren Young used his spinning full nelson drop on Kingston and Barrett used his forward fireman’s carry. Crowd was really unhappy because they were expecting a babyface save and couldn’t figure out why it didn’t happen. *1/2

Chris Jericho was trying to recruit Miz to the team. Edge was eating a Slim Jim and chewing while he was talking. Jericho said if Miz joins the team it’ll be bigger than Avatar. Miz said he had a lot on his plate and didn’t know if he wanted to make Nexus a priority.

The next match was for the Divas title, Melina defending agasint Alicia Fox

In December 2009, Melina tore her ACL at a house show, which caused her to vacate the Divas title. At Fatal 4-Way in June, Fox won the title in a fatal four-way match against Gail Kim, Maryse and defending champion Eve, and retained the championship against Eve at Money in the Bank. On the August 2nd Raw, Melina made her return and attacked Fox. The following week on Raw, Melina defeated Fox in a non-title match and was rewarded with a title opportunity at the Divas Championship at SummerSlam. 

Melina pinned Alicia Fox in 5:21 to keep the Divas title. Melina came out wearing an Aztec warrior outfit. They made some Pocahontas references even though Mysterio once came out in the same headdress. When they were talking about how pretty the women were, Striker talked about someone from the 90s, “Bull Nakana.” Maybe she dated Wild Bill Curry. Melina landed and hurt her left knee, but was fine. Match wasn’t good. Melina won with a face first snap mare. Nobody thought it was the finish. Team LayCool came out and made fun of Melina, saying she had cellulite. Melina attacked both, kicking Layla in the ribs and then speared McCool. But the two-on-one got the best of her and McCool kicked her in the face and beat her down. Then McCool & Layla attacked Fox. McCool did a running knee to Melina’s face into the announcers table. 1/4*

This was the only woman's match on the show. There was supposed to be a tag match, McCool & Layla vs Kelly Kelly and Tiffany, because of Tiffany's arrest that we talked about earlier, the match was pulled

In May, at the Over the Limit ppv, Punk lost a match to Rey Mysterio, forcing Punk to have his head shaved bald as a result of the stipulation.  Afterwards, Punk started wearing a mask until Big Show removed it on the July 16th Smackdown

Afterwards, Punk's Straight Edge Society's masked "mystery man" faced Big Show in a match, but had his own mask removed during the match, revealing him to be Joey Mercury. On the July 30th Smackdown, the Straight Edge Society attacked Big Show and repeatedly stomped his right hand into the steel ring steps. The following week, it was announced that the Straight Edge Society would be facing Big Show in a 3 on 1 handicap match at SummerSlam 

Big Show beat C.M. Punk & Luke Gallows & Joseph Mercury in 6:44. Punk let his hair grow back. Lawler talked about wrestling Leon Spinks. I think he was the only wrestler to ever get a decent match out of Spinks. Show pressed Mercury overhead and threw him on top of Gallows. Show chopped the ring steps when Punk moved. Then everyone beat down Show. Show made his own comeback, squashing Gallows and Mercury in the corner, then tackled both. After Show missed a charge on Punk, Punk came back. Punk & Mercury did a double team bulldog off the top, but when Mercury went for the pin, Show threw him all the way out of the ring. Punk ended up walking out on his teammates. Show choke slammed Gallows, and then choke slammed Mercury on top of Gallows and got the pin. *3/4

Gallows has said in following years that Mercury tore his pec during this match

Kane talked to an empty casket like Undertaker was there. Sheamus showed up and said he wanted to borrow the casket to put Randy Orton in it because it was way too big for Mysterio. Kane said No. Sheamus told Kane that if the two of them formed a tag team, they’d be unstoppable. Sheamus noted that he’s the real Big Red Monster. They seemed to be building toward something for Mania. They were clearly teasing a match down the line.

The Miz cut a heel promo saying he has accepted Cena’s offer and will wrestle in the main event. When he asked if he should join Team WWE, everyone booed. Miz claimed Cena begged him to join the team. Miz claimed John Morrison admitted that he was the Marty and Miz was the Shawn, but even better than Shawn. Miz said his decision was bigger than LeBron’s decision and said LeBron’s decision will lead to the Lakers losing the NBA title. When Miz said he’d join the team, the reaction wasn’t there, even with more boos than cheers.

The next match was for the WWE Title, Sheamus defending against Randy Orton

On the July 19th Raw, Orton defeated Edge & Chris Jericho in a triple threat match to become the number one contender for the WWE Championship at SummerSlam. On the August 9th Raw, the anonymous Raw GM added two stipulations to the match, stating that anyone who interfered in this match would be suspended indefinitely and if Orton lost, he would not get another match for the championship while Sheamus is champion. 

Randy Orton beat WWE champion Sheamus via DQ in 18:56. The announcers pushed this as it being the biggest championship the history of sports entertainment, not even giving lip service to the Smackdown belt being equivalent. They again pushed Sheamus had never beaten Orton, even though he pinned him at the Raw in San Jose in march. They brawled into the stands. Match wasn’t much early and crowd not into it. The crowd got into it at the 13:40 mark when Sheamus missed a charge and went into the post. Orton used a superplex.

His father was one of the first guys to do that move. Sheamus came back and missed the brogue kick and flew over the top rope. Orton used the draping DDT and went for the RKO. Sheamus was supposed to push him off but it looked bad as Sheamus took the bump and Michael Cole called it like he hit the move even though Orton was selling and Sheamus went for the pin. They showed replays of it and you could see why Cole did that given that it was a miss that looked like a hit.

Sheamus went for the high cross (Razor’s edge), but Orton blocked. Orton went for another RKO, and blocked and Sheamus hit the Brogue kick. Orton kicked out. Sheamus went out of the ring to get a chair. Ref Jack Doan grabbed the chair and they struggled over the chair and Sheamus ended up pulling it and Doan took a bump out of the ring. Doan called for the cheap DQ and the crowd hated that. To make them a little happier, Sheamus went for a chair shot, Orton ducked, kicked

Sheamus low and gave him an RKO on the announcers table, which didn’t break. Even though Sheamus was laying there, no Miz coming out to cash in (he does eventually address this on TV. There were even a few people (like five) trying to get a “We Want Miz” chant going. ***

In the arena, they turned off the lights and showed the trailer for “Legendary” and snuck Undertaker to get under the ring.

The next match was for the World Title, Kane defending against Rey Mysterio

On the May 28th Smackdown, The Undertaker defeated Mysterio to qualify for the fatal four-way match for the World title at the fatal four way pay-per view in June. During the match, The Undertaker suffered a legit injury, forcing him to be written out of the match by having him found in a "vegetative state" by Kane over Memorial day weekend. As a result, Kane accused several wrestlers of incapacitating his brother and attacked them. 

Mysterio won a battle royal to replace The Undertaker by last eliminating Kane, and went on to defeat the defending champion Jack Swagger, Big Show and CM Punk at Fatal 4-Way to win his 2nd World Heavyweight Championship. At Money in the Bank, Kane won a Money in the Bank ladder match, and cashed it on on Mysterio later that night, after Mysterio had defeated Swagger to retain the title

Kane defeated Mysterio to win his first World Heavyweight Championship. On the July 23rd Smackdown, Mysterio defeated Swagger in a 2 out of 3 falls match to earn a rematch against Kane for the World Heavyweight Championship at SummerSlam. On the July 30th Smackdown, Kane revealed that The Undertaker had disclosed that his attacker was Mysterio, and vowed to get revenge 

Kane pinned Rey Mysterio to keep the world title in 13:32. Michael Cole said he thought Mysterio could have taken Undertaker out, but he would have needed help. Lawler and Striker both disagreed. By the way, there were none of those moments where Striker said something really stupid and you can see Lawler lose patience with him. Striker noted Mysterio’s whole career ha been about honesty and dignity. So Striker backs Mysterio and Cole backs Kane. Crazy. Kane threw Mysterio into the post and worked his back over.

Mysterio did the Santo torpedo off the top. Crowd wasn’t into this match much, even in Los Angeles. Kane really wasn’t a heel to he crowd. Kane was selling the knee. Mysterio did a reverse DDT and Striker called it a slop drop (it’s mid-90s name). The crowd was so dead Lawler said it was an “uncomfortable hush.” That was a good one. 

Kane tried a slam but Mysterio reversed into a DDT for a near fall. Springboard legdrop by Mysterio but Kane kicked out. 

Kane blocked the 619 and kicked Mysterio into the casket. Mysterio got out. Eventually, Mysterio hit the 619 and went for the springboard splash, bu Kane went to get his knees up, but Mysterio blocked and cradled him. But Kane came back with a high kick and a choke slam for the clean win. 

Kane went too put Mysterio in the casket but Mysterio got out and Kane choke slammed him two more times and finished him with a tombstone piledriver. He went to put him in the casket, opened the lid and Undertaker was there. Kane freaked out. Undertaker got in the ring and went after the downed Mysterio and screamed at him about why he did it. Mysterio swore he didn’t. Undertaker said he believed him. Then he snatched his throat and Kane smiled. Undertaker slit his throat like he was going to finish Mysterio but turned to Kane. 

These dramatic swerves that make no sense are so old. Undertaker went after Kane, but Kane was too powerful and choke slammed him and left him laying after a tombstone. Sheamus vs. Orton was at least building to be a good world title match until the bad finish. This one never was even close. **½

The next match was Team WWE vs The Nexxus

The Nexus made their debut on the June 7th Raw, attacking Cena, CM Punk and members of the ringside crew. The following week on Raw, the then-GM Bret Hart refused to give them contracts and as a result, The Nexus attacked him, forcing Vince McMahon to appoint a new, anonymous GM who then signed all members of The Nexus to the show. 

The Nexus continued to attack various wrestlers and crew and ended up costing Cena, costing the WWE Championship twice at Fatal 4-Way and Money in the Bank. On the July 19th Raw, Cena confronted The Nexus, who offered him a place in their stable, which he refused and instead revealed that he had assembled a team, called 'Team WWE' (consisting of Cena himself, Edge, Chris Jericho, John Morrison, R-Truth, The Great Khali, and Bret Hart), to face The Nexus at SummerSlam. 

On the July 26th Raw the anonymous GM changed the match to an elimination match. Following dissension on Cena's team in the next few weeks, Edge and Jericho left the SummerSlam match on the August 2nd Raw. They rejoined the following week, however, when The Nexus tried to attack the members of Team WWE and Edge and Jericho. On the same episode, Khali was attacked by The Nexus, removing him from the match at SummerSlam. 

Team WWE of John Cena & Daniel Bryan & Chris Jericho & Edge & R-Truth & John Morrison & Bret Hart beat Team Nexus of Wade Barrett & David Otunga & Heath Slater & Skip Sheffield & Darren Young & Michael Tarver & Justin Gabriel in an elimination match 35:19. Nexus had a ton of heat coming out. Given that it looks like this show did far better than last year, based on one match, the idea of allowing heels to get and keep heat may not be the worst idea this year. Miz came out to be the seventh guy but Cena told him that they couldn’t wait for him to make up his mind and they had gotten a partner, and it was Bryan. Bryan opened the match with hard kicks to Young and went for a guillotine to an uma plata to a crossface for the tap in :45. 

Tarver was back wearing gloves and doing the boxing gimmick by throwing a ton of punches. Lawler made reference to Bryan Danielson. Morrison pinned Tarver in 3:36 with Starship pain. Morrison was slapping around Sheffield, but Sheffield came back with a powerslam. Fans started a “We Want Bret” chant. Morrison was kicked in the head from behind by Gabriel, allowing Sheffield to do a running clothesline on Morrison for the pin in 7:34. Sheffield then pinned R-Truth with a running clothesline in 7:59. 

Bret Hart tagged in to work with Slater, throwing punches, a reverse atomic drop and went for the sharpshooter. Hart can’t do a match because he can’t bump or take any shots, but his movement and offense looked good. It was actually incredible considering he’s 53, has an artificial knee and suffered a serious stroke. Barrett threw in a chair and Hart used the chair on Sheffield for the DQ in 12:10. The crowd was genuinely mad when Hart was eliminated, and he was the only guy in the match you could say that about. 

Jericho then hit the codebreaker on Sheffield and Edge pinned Sheffield after a spear in 13:14. The idea was to protect Sheffield in that you needed a chair shot and two different guys finishers to beat him. Jericho made a babyface hot tag. Striker called him “The Winnipeg Jet,” which sounds like a nickname out of 1964. Jericho used a lionsault on Otunga and made him tap to the Walls of Jericho in 19:16. Jericho was after Slater. Crowd was doing “Y2J” chants and he was playing to them. Slater moved and Jericho ran into Cena, and then Slater pinned Jericho from behind in 20:05. 

Edge then yelled at Cena for costing Jericho the fall. Bryan was trying to play peacemaker. As this was going on, Slater came from behind Edge and pinned him with an O’Connor roll in 20:39. Edge then speared Cena and Jericho and Edge both yelled at Cena and called him stupid as they left. At this point it was Cena & Bryan vs. Barrett & Slater & Gabriel. The next seven minute were the Nexus guys beating down Cena. The crowd was really into this part of the match, with the kids and women chanting “Let’s Go Cena” and the adult males doing the “Cena Sux.” Cole kept ripping on Cena for picking Bryan over Miz and putting Raw in jeopardy. 

They kept beating on Cena until he tagged to Bryan. Bryan did a German suplex to Slater, a dropkick on Slater followed by a tope. Loud “Daniel Bryan” chant so he made himself here. He did a missile dropkick and nip up to Slater, then did a missile dropkick with one leg nailing Barrett and the other nailing Gabriel. Bryan put Slater in the crossface for the tap in 29:02. Miz then came out and hit Bryan with the briefcase and Barrett pinned him in 29:32. This left Cena vs. Barrett & Gabriel. A lot of heat here as they tagged in and out on Cena. 

Gabriel picked up the mats from the floor and Barrett gave Cena a DDT on the floor. They threw Cena in the ring, but Gabriel missed the 450 and Cena pinned him in 34:51. Cena then put the STF on Barrett in the middle of the ring and he tapped in 35:19. ***½

Chris Jericho has said it was Vince McMahon's idea for Cena to be the sole survivor of the seven-on-seven match, even as Jericho and others felt that Wade Barrett needed to go over in order to keep The Nexus strong. Justin Gabriel has said that Cena himself had the finish changed to him winning. Gabriel said that he had no bad feelings toward Cena, it was simply a bad call 

Jericho and Edge also disagreed Cena's idea that Barrett needed to DDT him on bare concrete just before Cena's Superman comeback where he would pin Gabriel, and then make Barrett submit to the STF. Jericho felt Cena needed to barely survive in a more realistic manner, but Cena was insistent. Jericho would also claim that in the aftermath of the show that night, Cena admitted he was wrong about how the finish was done.

This match was also the longest match in SummerSlam history. The match went 35 minutes and 15 seconds, a SummerSlam record. The previous record was in 1994, when Bret and Owen Hart's steel cage match for the World title went 32 minutes, 22 seconds 

• Thumbs up 51 (19.5%)
• Thumbs down 102 (38.9%)
• In the middle 109 (41.6%)

BEST MATCH POLL

Team WWE vs. Nexus 179

Sheamus vs. Randy Orton 32

WORST MATCH POLL

Melina vs. Alicia Fox 161

Big Show vs. Punk & Gallows & Mercury 29

Dolph Ziggler vs. Kofi Kingston 11

Sheamus vs. Randy Orton 8