WWE Night of Champions 2014 Results: Worst Booking Decisions from PPV

The 2014 edition of WWE's annual September pay-per-view, Night of Champions, has come and gone, and in its wake it has left fans scratching their heads at some of the questionable booking decisions that unfolded during the WWE Network presentation. So bad were some of the moves that fans questioned whether the show was even worth the $9.99 they had paid for their network subscription.

What were these decisions, and why were they so bad? What effect may they have on the product going forward?

Here are your answers.

Credit: WWE.com

The Main Event Finish

One would think by now WWE would have this whole pay-per-view thing down pat, especially since we are nearing the 30-year anniversary of its first presentation way back in 1985. Does it not understand that people expect more from a show that they are asked to pay for than what they would typically see on Monday or Friday nights?

Night of Champions may have brought them the return of Brock Lesnar to the ring but in terms of an adequate finish to the WWE World Heavyweight champion's title defense against John Cena, the show disappointed tremendously.

WWE Creative clearly had booked itself in the corner. It could not afford to have Cena lose another match, not with the sudden sidelining of Roman Reigns for the foreseeable future. It also was not prepared to have Lesnar drop the title only one month into his reign atop the WWE mountain. So WWE Creative had to devise a finish that did neither of those things.

Instead, it called on Seth Rollins.

Rollins, like an idiot, rushed to the ring to cash in his Money in the Bank briefcase. He caught Lesnar with the Curb Stomp but could not find the referee to make his decision final. By the time he did, Cena had recovered and fought the architect off. 

So not only had fans been treated to a miserable disqualification finish to the originally scheduled Cena-Lesnar rematch, they were also robbed of seeing Rollins leave Nashville with the WWE World Heavyweight Championship.

Credit: WWE.com

AJ Wins The Divas Championship

AJ Lee is an awesome talent, easily the most elite female performer in today's WWE. She has been for quite some time. This is by no means and indictment of her. What it is an indictment of is a WWE Creative staff that does not seem to know what it is doing when it comes to AJ's budding feud with Paige.

One minute the Divas are frenemies, then Paige appears to be somewhat obsessed with her rival. Paige wins the title in a hard-fought match at SummerSlam, then drops it back to AJ at Night of Champions. Suddenly, it appears that the young Brit's second title reign, much like her first, was a fluke.

At some point, WWE Creative is going to have to decide what it wants to do with the story. Is Paige a heel? All signs point to "yes." Is AJ crazy, or is she playing games with Paige? What's going on in the former champion's pretty little head?

WWE Creative has failed so spectacularly with this feud that it is not difficult to imagine that it could not even answer the most basic of questions, such as "who," "what," "when," "where" and "why," let alone anything even remotely more complex.

Credit: WWE.com

The Miz Wins The Intercontinental Championship

After weeks of mediocre build centered around stunt doubles R-Truth and Damien Sandow, the Intercontinental Championship match between Dolph Ziggler and The Miz at Night of Champions descended into further madness with the involvement of the truly awful national country recording "artists" Florida Georgia Line on commentary.

The match was an overbooked mess between two guys fans have seen involved in countless quality contests. Instead of letting Ziggler and Miz bring it under the bright lights of WWE pay-per-view, they were but extras in a story involving Sandow, Truth and the Nickelback of country music.

The Miz regained the Intercontinental title from WWE's resident Showoff, leaving many to wonder why the title was ever switched at SummerSlam in the first place. Who knows? The answer: Probably not WWE Creative.

Credit: WWE.com

Seth Rollins Is An Idiot

So the guy who fancies himself the "Architect of The Shield," and the smartest guy in the room, issues an open challenge to anyone, anyone at all, knowing full well that his crazy former partner-turned-even crazier enemy is running around somewhere.

Then, after being thoroughly beaten up by the returning Dean Ambrose, he decided to cash in his Money in the Bank briefcase. On Brock Lesnar. Not only is that an awful idea, regardless of whether or not you delivered the Curb Stomp, you never really incapacitated John Cena nearly enough to keep him from screwing up your guaranteed title match.

A bad night for WWE Creative and a worse one for Rollins, who looked like the biggest moron in the history of pro wrestling—a moron who needed to be saved by Joey Mercury and Jamie Noble.

Not exactly the Justice League, those two.