WWE Roadblock 2016 Review: Top Highlights and Low Points
For the second time this year, WWE found itself hitting a Roadblock, although Sunday's Raw pay-per-view was branded with the subtitle "End of the Line."
With this being the final special event of 2016, it was the red brand's last chance to make a statement before heading into 2017 and the build to the Royal Rumble and subsequent Road to WrestleMania 33.
On its surface, quite a bit of this card left much to be desired.
The build to many of these matches seemed halfhearted, as if this was concocted from the leftovers that needed to be tossed out at the end of the year.
Having seen Sasha Banks face Charlotte Flair time after time, was their supposed final encounter just a repeat of what's already happened, or did they end things with a bang?
How was WWE able to create interest in The New Day's title reign after it had already surpassed Demolition's record?
Was the main event tarnished by having a heel go up against one of the least popular babyfaces, or did that different dynamic lead to something special?
Now that the results are in and the pay-per-view has ended, were there more positives or negatives? What segments fell under the pros and the cons?
Let's look back on what happened at Roadblock: End of the Line and single out the biggest highlights and low points of the evening, presented in order of appearance.
Low Point: Pre-Show
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Every pre-show tends to be rather uneventful and something people can skip with no problem, but this one in particular was absolutely pointless.
When Chris Jericho and Kevin Owens were in the social media lounge, it was an entertaining segment with a lot of laughs. Sami Zayn, on the other hand, was a total bore, simply repeating the same basic lines a handful of times.
There weren't any other interesting backstage promos or interviews with The New Day or anyone who could pepper in some entertainment, either.
Instead, there was just one match with Rusev and Big Cass, which consisted of a lackluster Enzo Amore promo, relatively no action and a count-out decision.
This was an awful excuse for an hour of WWE programming, which started everything off on a sour note, no matter how you cut it.
Highlight: WWE Raw Tag Team Championship Match
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As an unabashed major fan of The New Day from the beginning, it's tough to call it a highlight to see its title reign come to an end, but it was a necessary change.
After having the same champions for such a long time, having new titleholders will freshen things up a bit.
The record has already been surpassed, so there weren't any other hurdles to be crossed, making it difficult to keep things interesting going forward.
At least with Cesaro and Sheamus as champions, there will be a newer dynamic, as those two don't get along with each other despite their tension easing a bit of late.
Thankfully, the match itself had some fun twists and turns to keep the crowd on its toes for the finish. At times, it felt like The New Day could turn heel or find a way to retain, which made the actual end of the match a bit of a shocker.
Going forward, we'll have to see if Cesaro and Sheamus can try to match the success The New Day had with the tag team division, but if you're a fan of change for the sake of change, you'll be happy to get something different.
Likewise, if you're a fan of The New Day, it doesn't seem to be splitting up anytime soon, so that's reassuring as well.
Highlight: Sami Zayn vs. Braun Strowman
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Having the 10-minute time limit was a huge benefit to this match, as it allowed for it to be booked in a different way than the thousands of other fights we've seen this year.
There was no reasonable way Sami Zayn could beat Braun Strowman, but for him to be able to withstand the time frame through some technicalities means both men looked good in the end.
Strowman still looks as dominant as he's been the past few months, and Zayn gets a credibility boost for putting up with all the torture and denying Mick Foley's request to throw in the towel.
In a way, it would be better for this feud to end here rather than continuing and possibly running the risk of having nowhere to go. However, if you look at it from another perspective, this segment was fun enough that more interaction between the two could be just as good or even better.
For a match that effectively had a non-ending, this turned out well.
Highlight: Neville Returns
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While the Cruiserweight Championship match was OK and didn't stir up an audience frenzy by any means, what followed was something quite surprising.
For months, Neville has been cleared to compete, yet he was still absent from television, making few appearances and not accomplishing much when he did show up.
Out of the blue here, though, he made a statement return by turning heel and attacking Rich Swann and TJ Perkins.
Just like that, he's not only back in the swing of things, but he's also booking himself into a division that could use his notoriety. Additionally, he's heading into it with a renewed character, switching things up from his standard babyface role that he's been playing for such a long time.
Low Point: Raw Women's Championship Match
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The purpose of an Iron Man match is to allow multiple decisions, yet WWE seems to always prefer to allow none; that's frustrating.
One can argue that the goal is to create tension, but that same anxiety would apply to a standard one-fall match. Why not utilize this gimmick to its fullest while you have it at your disposal?
More pinfalls would result in more excitement, but the first decision didn't come until 20 minutes into the action, meaning the first two-thirds of the match was just setup.
If that setup had culminated in something epic, it would have been worth it, but the final third of this bout was only a slight improvement over the rest of it.
There have been far too many Iron Man matches that kept the score at 0-0 for nearly its entirety, and this was just another one added to that list.
As far as the action inside it, we've seen it all before, as Sasha Banks and Charlotte Flair have faced off time and time again for the past 12 months.
Banks and Bayley already had a much better matchup back in NXT.
With this boiling down to a 30-minute repeat of previous bouts, it just felt like a drag that didn't need to go into overtime.
The worst part of this storyline is it means that, three times in a row, Banks has defeated Flair for the championship on Raw, only to lose it to her at the next pay-per-view.
That sort of unnecessary repetition is why this doesn't matter as much as it potentially could have.
Thank goodness this was billed as the last time these two would face off for a long while, as it's time for both women to move on to something new.
Sadly, this means we all have to sit through another terrible Flair promo where she'll say exactly what she's said every time she has had a microphone for the past year and experience another title reign that will hit the same exact notes she's done time and time again.
Rinse and repeat what you've seen the past few months—but with Bayley's name instead of Banks'.
Low Point: WWE Universal Championship Match
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Noticeably absent from this list is the Seth Rollins vs. Chris Jericho match, which was decent but nothing special and, thus, a middle-of-the-road situation rather than a highlight or low point.
Similarly, the Universal Championship match between Roman Reigns and Kevin Owens was of somewhat comparable quality, but what makes it teeter more toward being a low point is how it should have been better as the night's main event.
With Jericho causing a disqualification to finish the match, it felt more like the end of an episode of Raw rather than something worthy of a pay-per-view finale.
Overall, this PPV came off more as setup for the future rather than an event that stands alone as being worthy of four hours of our time after weeks of build.
What do you think were the best and worst parts of the night? Do you agree or disagree with this list?
Tell us your thoughts in the comments below!
Anthony Mango is the owner of the wrestling website Smark Out Moment and the host of the podcast show Smack Talk on YouTube, iTunes and Stitcher. You can follow him on Facebook and elsewhere for more.
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